The Bongard Centre on Cameron Road, Tauranga. Photo / Alex Cairns
City leaders have criticised plans to sell a building earmarked as a “critical” part of a multimillion-dollar tertiary education hub in Tauranga’s CBD.
The Bay of Plenty Times can reveal plans have been approved to sell the Bongard Centre on Cameron Rd and government housing agency Kainga Ora is considering buying the site for housing.
Tauranga MP Sam Uffindel believed the sale would have “very real, negative consequences” for the city but the New Zealand Institute of Skills and Technology, Te Pūkenga, said the building has been empty “for some time” and, as a result, it is obligated to follow the Crown Asset Disposal process.
The Bongard Centre was built in 1991 for business, management, office, computing and hairdressing educational programmes. It is next to the University of Waikato campus on Durham St and there were plans for the centre to form part of the city’s future Knowledge Precinct, a project aimed at centralising tertiary education in the CBD.
A Bay of Plenty Tertiary Education Partnership - involving the university, the then-Bay of Plenty Polytechnic, Te Whare Wānaga o Awanuiārangi and Wairariki Institute of Technology - sought support for its vision from councils and stakeholders.
In 2015, the partnership was given a $30m-plus land funding package from Tauranga City Council, Bay of Plenty Regional Council, and the Tauranga Energy Consumer Trust (TECT) towards this, resulting in the university Durham St campus. The campus opened in 2019.
TECT chief executive Wayne Werder said the university campus was the first stage of a wider Knowledge Precinct plan.
Funders and supporters expected the the Bongard Centre to be part of stage two, he said.
“From our perspective, [stage one] had gone exactly as we wanted it to. The building is a great addition to the CBD and sets the groundwork for the Knowledge Precinct.”
The aim was for the Knowledge Precinct to become a “campus in the city”, as detailed in a City Centre Action and Investment Plan in August 2022.
It was expected up to 5000 students would use the area with concentrated educational facilities, research offices and student residences in the Spring St, Durham St, Elizabeth St area east of Cameron Rd.
The plan was also included in Western Bay of Plenty economic development agency Priority One’s Tauranga CBD Blueprint 2022-2030, which detailed eight precincts for the central city, including a Justice Precinct, Sports and Events Precinct, Retail and Commercial Precinct.
“The Bongard Centre is a very important part of this in that it completes the Knowledge Precinct,” Werder said.
“We would be concerned, that we put in significant funding and continued ... work with the university, if that [Bongard Centre] were no longer part of the precinct.
“It’s a huge lost opportunity.”
Werder said Bay of Plenty Polytechnic - which has since become Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology and was part of Te Pūkenga - was part of the original trust that oversaw the development of the university campus as part of the heart of the Knowledge Precinct.
In his view: “For the polytechnic, Te Pūkenga, to make this decision, it seems a bit like working against that trust they were part of.”
He believed it also appeared to run counter tocity plans..
Werder said, in his view, if the Bongard Centre needed to be disposed of, then it should be transferred to the university.
“That would protect it and keep it,” he said.
“The sooner this can be sorted out, the better for everyone.”
Tauranga Tertiary Campus Charitable Trust chairman Mark Arundel wrote to Education Minister and Tauranga-based Labour list MP Jan Tinetti in June to express concern about the proposal.
In the letter, Arundel said retaining the Bongard Centre was “critical” to the city achieving its plans for the area and the trust had always assumed the site would remain protected “and subsequently utilised for the purpose of future education or potentially student accommodation”.
Arundel said the site design of the university campus was based on the ability to connect and integrate with the future redevelopment of the Bongard site as part of the Knowledge Precinct.
He also referred to the City Centre Action and Investment Plan’s inclusion of the Bongard Centre as part of the Knowledge Precinct.
“It is therefore somewhat confusing that the Bongard Centre has been determined to be surplus to tertiary requirements ...
“Any use of this site for anything other than education purposes would severely put at risk the overall aspirations to develop the tertiary Knowledge Precinct and undermine the previous investment made by both the local funders and University of Waikato.”
Arundel asked Tinetti to review the situation and seek to approve the transfer of the Bongard Centre to the university “so that the site can be protected for the purpose of future education or student accommodation”.
Uffindell told the Bay of Plenty Times there was a strong community desire to retain the Bongard Centre to enhance tertiary education and research in the region.
Uffindell believed the sale would have “very real negative consequences” for the city.
In his view: “It will significantly limit the ability for the university to expand and greatly damage the future of Tauranga’s Knowledge Precinct.”
In written parliamentary questions provided to the Bay of Plenty Times, Uffindell asked Tinetti about the plans to sell the Bongard Centre and whether she intended to retain it for the expansion of tertiary education in Tauranga.
In her written reply, Tinetti confirmed that in April 2021, then-Education Minister Chris Hipkins and Finance Minister Grant Robertson approved the centre’s disposal due to it being “surplus to its education requirements”.
She did not intend to retain the centre as Te Pukenga was in the process of its disposal.
Tinetti told the Bay of Plenty Times she understood this was “a very important issue for the local Tauranga community” and she met with the university’s deputy vice-chancellor to discuss the issue.
“Following that meeting, I’ve requested further advice from Tertiary Education Commission on the situation.”
University deputy vice-chancellor Alister Jones said the university had told the current and previous education ministers it was interested in acquiring the Bongard Centre as part of the university’s future plans for a wider tertiary campus.
“In establishing the Tauranga campus tertiary partnership with Toi Ohomai (now Te Pūkenga) in 2018, the Bongard Centre was a part of these plans.”
The university leases the ground car parking of the building but after exploring future uses for it, learned the building would need “significant works”.
Jones said the university had “bold plans to create a significant university presence in Tauranga” and this was the basis for the conversation with the minister.
Asked to elaborate, Jones said the university was “committed to advancing the interests of the Bay of Plenty” with “a range of initiatives” to grow the campus.
“We have expressed an interest in the Bongard Centre as it would be a key part of our plans given its location within the Knowledge Precinct.”
Kāinga Ora general manager of urban planning and design Katja Lietz said it was in the “very early stages” of assessing a potential purchase of the Bongard Centre but no decisions had yet been made.
It was not known what type of housing was potentially being considered.
“The Kāinga Ora Land Programme seeks to enable a range of housing types at different price points in areas where the private market may struggle to deliver the volume of housing needed,” Lietz said.
“Tauranga, like many other New Zealand towns and cities, has a critical housing shortage. We are therefore always looking for opportunities to help ease this pressure by increasing the supply of public, market and affordable housing across the region, including through our Land Programme.”
A Te Pūkenga spokeswoman said that in 2019, Toi Ohomai operations that were based at the Bongard Centre in central Tauranga were moved to its Windermere campus, bringing its Tauranga-based students together in one place.
“The Bongard Centre had not been in operation since and was declared as surplus to our requirements. The building was under Crown ownership and under the Crown Asset Transfer policy, when we have an asset which is surplus to our requirements we must follow the Crown Asset Disposal process.
“We are currently working through the necessary steps for the sale of this building,” the spokeswoman said.
“This is a legal obligation rather than a choice Toi Ohomai/Te Pūkenga has made. As the building is currently empty and has been for some time, when the building is sold this will bring a new owner and purpose which will benefit Tauranga more than an unused building.”
Proceeds from the sale of the building would be reinvested “with our strategic priorities front of mind”.
Toi Ohomai/Te Pūkenga remained “committed to the Bay of Plenty Tertiary Education Partnership” and to delivering quality education in Tauranga.
Two Tauranga house fires on June 14 were put out by Fire and Emergency NZ firefighters.