"Last season was a very, very busy season and very challenging." Mr Emmett said the flagged area at Tay St had been well received by locals and visitors last season. This summer, the Tay St patrol will run from Christmas week, including Christmas Day, until January 17. The patrol will also run an hour longer each day.
Surf Life Saving paid for the patrol last season by reallocating funds within existing budgets. Yesterday, an extra $4000 was requested from Tauranga City Council, which the council agreed to fund, to cover the extra week of patrolling at the site.
A small aluminium patrol tower will be wheeled to Tay St each day and flags will be set up for swimming. Surf Life Saving is also hoping to trial a mobile patrol site and flags at Papamoa East in the 2016/17 season for a similar time period as at Tay St.
Mr Emmett said a statistics project had been under way for two years at Papamoa.
During the Christmas and New Year week, a stretch of beach along Papamoa East between Taylors Reserve and Motiti Reserve, about 600m to 700m long, was getting up to 450 people on the beach and about 150 people in the water at any given time. "A mobile patrol will definitely help save lives at Papamoa East. A flagged area will get people to swim in safer areas and having someone watching over them that's skilled in rescuing people."
Last year, there were 90 drownings nationally. None were at patrolled beaches. Funding of extra patrols will be decided through service delivery contract negotiations.
At a Tauranga City Council Monitoring Committee meeting yesterday, Surf Life Saving presented a summary of the last season at Tauranga's beaches and their plans for the near future. Eastern region lifesaving and education manager Leigh Sefton said at the meeting that the numbers of people in the water last summer warranted an extra patrol at Papamoa East.
"The numbers at Papamoa Beach during the previous season were huge."
Kate Garland, a Papamoa East resident, told the Bay of Plenty Times her partner had carried out three rescues last summer on his kayak. Her neighbour had also done one rescue on his kayak. "I have been brought up around the ocean, so I feel safe swimming. It's the locals who know how to read the seas."
There were 10-fold more people here during summer who did not have that experience and got into trouble, she said. Ted Hansen, of Papamoa East, asked where the sites would be located. He thought a proper surf club along the beach would be a better idea with the growing numbers in the area.
- The Surf Life Saving patrol season starts this weekend.
Extra reporting by Ruth Keber
