"We had a big meeting with council, the business community, police, and worked out what we could do for our city now that we didn't have community policing.
"So we had this incredible trial and it was so successful after six months, everybody wanted to keep it on.
"In fact, all our Flaxmere councillors said, 'We want it in Flaxmere too'."
While being video-interviewed for the story in Hastings CBD, the mayor scolded an unruly passer-by who took exception to the video camera. "I'm the mayor, I'm on the camera," she told the bystander. "Don't you talk like that in my city."
City Assist staff walk up to 10km a day checking in with store owners and assisting with problematic behavior, helped by a direct line to the police watchhouse.
Founding city assister Herman Godinet said at first it was "pretty rough".
"There were people hanging around the ATM machines, there were people going in and out of shops just helping themselves, literally."
Behaviour has since improved, with City Assist winning praise from both retailers and police.
Hastings District Council's purple-clad City Assist has been credited with adding to the CBD's ambience and vibrancy.
"We provide a safe environment for the CBD, in terms of people coming in to do their shopping, their business - just generally enjoying the ambience that the city provides.
"We help enhance it by just reassuring people that if anything goes wrong, anything happening that they can see, there is a number they can call us and then we will actively and proactively deal with whatever the situation might be.
"Our mantra is simple - we can't just actually walk away - so whatever is happening in front of us, we've got to find a solution to it."
City Assist has a car, enabling fast response to calls for help from Havelock North and in Flaxmere, where City Assist is based at the busy Flaxmere Community Centre.
Hazlehurst said visitors were made to feel welcome by City Assist.
"We measure success by the beautiful smiles of the people in town, who come up to me and say how safe Hastings feels, how they're really proud of our City Assist team, how welcoming the city feels and just enjoying being in Hastings."
Hazlehurst said many other councils in New Zealand visited Hastings "to look at our City Assist model and Hastings, to see if they can replicate it in their cities".
While City Assist has helped deal with the symptoms of youth disengagement, it also spurred a successful programme to help youth find employment, Hazlehurst said.
"Our youth were in town, they were disengaged, they didn't have opportunities.
"We're seeing the younger brothers and younger sisters that don't seem to have any other course in life, to follow what their older siblings have done.
"And that's the sadness, really. I find that really hard to deal with."
