Govt and council to blame, over a long time

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

Predictably there has been a swift back-slash to the so-called slash report which came out yesterday afternoon.

Mayor Rehette Stoltz has come out fighting, expressing “our disappointment”, “serious concerns” and that “we fundamentally disagree with several recommendations”.

That both the district council and the forestry industry have come in for harsh criticism in the report does not surprise me.

As a journalist in Gisborne since 1979, and lately as someone who has been researching the area’s past, I say government and council are both to blame for encouraging commercial land use at the expense of the environment — and for a very long time.

That making money off the land has taken precedence without full oversight and regulation, has been the story since the 1880s.

Repeated floods, erosion and siltation of the rivers had become major concerns even before World War 1 broke out.

The country’s newspapers have carried repeated warnings from locals and overseas experts about the huge changes wrought by the clearance of land for timber, and large areas of hill country being turned to pasture for sheep.

Reports to government, and anyone who will listen, from our own experts (like Dr Mike Marden who lives here) have fallen on mostly deaf ears.

Government policies and incentives over the years since World War 2 have been unhelpful in slowing the abuse of the land — schemes that could have made an impact were either discontinued, modified and changed as to purpose.

Those concerned, including the present council, should hang their heads in shame for not being good caretakers/kaitiaki of the community’s environmental assets and the wellbeing of water, land and people.

It now remains to be seen if any actual commitment can be secured from government and its agencies to start putting right more than a century of harm to the land.

The first sign should be a clear admission that collectively we have been wrong and caused massive damage.

Roger Handford