High Court quashes Napier resource consent

Janet MacPherson and Neil Matheson at a property opposite their home in Paradise Rd where WIT Whatever It Takes planned to build a 7-unit social housing development.

A Napier social housing development delayed for more than 12 months on-hold again after a High Court decision quashing resource consent granted by City Council staff in March last year.

In a decision by Justice Ailsa Duffy, the Napier City Council is ordered to reconsider a consent granted to Whatever It Takes Trust for a 7-unit redevelopment of former scrap-yard land between Chaucer and Paradise roads, a short distance off Carlyle St.

Council processes have been criticised by the Judge, Paradise Rd residents Neil Matheson and Janet MacPherson, who took the court action at a cost of "tens of thousands of dollars," and by the chairman of the Trust.

"I consider that the errors the Council made in granting the resource consent are serious and more than just technical defects of no possible consequences," said Justice Duffy.

Ms MacPherson, concerned by Trust courtroom accusations that she and her partner were prejudiced against the mental health conditions of intended residents, said: "That's not what it was about at all. It was the Council we were taking to Court, and it's unfortunate for WITT, because the Council has let them down too."

Trust chairman David Robb, told Hawke's Bay Today the Trust would enter discussions with the Council on "where to from here," but added: "We are clearly disappointed. We lodged a consent application with the Council on the basis they would process it according to requirements."

New Council chief executive Wayne Jack, in his job less than a month and not involved in any of the consent processes, said the Court found the manner in which the Council applied the new National Environmental Standard for Assessing and Managing Contaminants in Soil and consideration of the matter as a Controlled Activity rather than a Discretionary Activity was incorrect.

Errors arose from a "highly complex situation," he said, adding it was caused by the combined effects of the Standard implementation just before the Trust's application was lodged, and a District Plan change coming into effect just afterwards, he said.

"The situation is regrettable but Council will now move to reconsider the application as directed by the Court," he said.

Mr Matheson and Ms MacPherson knew nothing of the project until earthworks began about 13 months ago, and they learned the vehicle access to several of the units would be a few metres from their cottage in a Napier Hill Character Zone on the steepening, narrow, no-exit Paradise Rd.

They investigated, and after trying to get plans changed went to court with an application for a judicial review of the Council process, on the basis the granting of the consent was illegal.

The application was heard by Justice Duffy in the last week of July, but the couple's jubilation in winning their day in Court, revealed when the decision was delivered last Thursday, was measured.

"It was not something anyone would want to do," said Ms MacPherson.

Legal costs have run into "tens of thousands of dollars," against a ratepayer-funded Council (first respondent) and the publicly-funded Trust (second respondent), which has other social housing sites in Napier, but Justice Duffy has given the Council leave to apply for costs.