Letters, March 2: TECT, recycling and museum plan

The issue of glass recycling needs more work, a reader says.

TECT proposal will revolutionise city
Waipuna Hospice has been a grateful recipient of funds from TECT over many years. We provide essential services to the community and rely heavily on community support.

We are excited at the prospect of potentially more funds being available for charities such as Waipuna. The needs and expectations of the community for our services continue to grow, but without access to increased charitable trust grants from the likes of TECT, these future needs and expectations will not be able to be met.

Waipuna believes that the proposal put forward by TECT trustees will be revolutionary for Tauranga and will greatly benefit all who live in this community.

Those who currently receive the TECT cheque should not be disadvantaged (as they are compensated in the short term and will potentially pay less for power in the long term), yet the community as a whole will benefit greatly from having those additional funds reinvested in a range of wonderful ways that each and every one will benefit from.

I have seen the good that TECT has done in our community – and can only imagine the massive potential an increase in community funds could do for us all.

Richard Thurlow
Chief executive officer
Waipuna Hospice Incorporated

Robbing Peter to pay Paul
Brilliant letter David Medhurst (February 26) of Otumoetai. It's a timeless quote. Our council is currently pandering to the museum naysayers (paying the Paul's) via a non-binding referendum at a growing cost (now estimated at $88,000 - not the original $45,000) leaving the strong, albeit misguided impression that allocated museum funds will be diverted (robbing Peter) to infrastructure.

That's like putting all allocated utility funds into paying the power bill while leaving no funds for years to come, to pay rates, other essential utilities, the rainy day fund, or investing in the future (saving for retirement)! Robbing Peter to pay Paul, in my view, is shocking financial management.

The TECT cheque process has been appalling as has council's pandering to the few over the museum. It's time for strong, balanced, honest, open and decisive leadership across key sectors in and around Tauranga. For now, the TECT cheque should stay, and the next steps should be taken towards the Cliff Rd Museum.

Charmian Brown
Tauranga

TECT cheque for consumers
I read that "Social Link", representing about 260 social sector organisations are supportive of the TECT proposal to transfer assets to a "Charitable Trust". The TECT trustees will view their support as positive to their views irrespective of the hundreds of people within those 260 organisations who do not have Trustpower as their energy provider.

The purpose of TECT was to ensure the "consumers" of Trustpower energy received the majority of financial benefit from the asset. Community and charitable groups have benefited by millions of dollars over the past 25 years and will continue to do so over the next 50 years by retaining TECT as it was set up.

The obligation of the trustees is to "act in the best interests of the consumer". We, the consumers are not paying the trustees to work in opposition to "our best interests".

Maureen J Anderson
Pyes Pa

Recycling
The issue of glass recycling needs more work. If something is going to work properly, then it needs to be easy. Now we all need a new bin or storage place for our glass while we wait to accumulate enough to make it worthwhile for a special trip to the transfer station (if you have a way of getting it there).

Glass drop-off points at two Tauranga transfer stations and six community sites spread all the way from Bowentown to Te Puke is a woefully inadequate number and will mean some communities having to travel long distances to offload their glass.

The present situation will no doubt lead some people to just toss their glass in with the general waste, that will then end up in the landfill or, even worse, dumping it in the countryside.

I see there is a suggestion that people might be prepared to pay a small fee to have their glass collected ... all well and good if there had been a rebate on collection fees for the reduction in service.

I believe this new regime is a backward step ... remember if it is going to work it has to be easy.

J. Collier
Oropi