Being elected chair of the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council carries a clear responsibility to provide steady, accountable leadership at a time when our region faces some of its biggest challenges.
It’s a role that demands both pragmatism and compassion, and one that must always put the long-term wellbeing of our people, our land and our rivers at the centre of every decision.
The past few years have tested Hawke’s Bay in ways that none of us could have imagined. Our communities, landscapes and waterways have endured enormous pressure and yet, through it all, we’ve shown what resilience truly means. Now, the focus must shift from recovery to renewal.
Sophie Siers has been chosen as chairwoman by her fellow councillors on Hawke's Bay Regional Council. Photo / HBRC
Our direction as a council is clear. The recent disasters have brought into sharp focus the workstreams that matter most for our region’s future:
• Land management in our upper catchments – accelerating programmes that stabilise soils, reduce sediment runoff, improve water quality and increase carbon sequestration. This is about protecting the long-term fertility of our food-growing plains and supporting sustainable farming systems.
• Water and biodiversity management – developing smarter, more comprehensive programmes that respect and care for our most valuable taonga. Clean, available water underpins every part of life in Hawke’s Bay.
• Reimagining our rivers – continuing the essential planning and engineering work to strengthen our rivers and flood protection networks against increasingly extreme weather events.
These are enormous challenges. But they’re also extraordinary opportunities to build a region that’s more resilient, productive and biodiverse than ever before.
The scale of what’s ahead is significant. Our Reimagining Rivers work alone carries that expected price tag of half a billion dollars or more, and it will demand both courage and creativity to fund and deliver in a region where ratepayers are already feeling the strain.
But as I’ve said to my fellow councillors, the cost of not being prepared for a changing climate is far greater. We will manage these financial pressures carefully and transparently, and we will make sure our community understands the value of every dollar spent.
Ultimately, this is about more than infrastructure or workstreams; it’s about trust. We need our community alongside us. We need to celebrate our successes, own our mistakes, and tell the story of the exceptional work this organisation does.
If we do this right, Hawke’s Bay can be a model for New Zealand: a region where clean rivers, healthy soils and thriving communities go hand in hand. That’s what success looks like to me, and that’s the pathway I’m determined to help build, together with this council and with you, our community.
