Survey indicates satisfaction drop for Napier City Council

The site for a new reservoir atop Hospital Hill, on Mataruahou, Napier. Despite the plans water issues still dog the Napier City Council. Photo / NZME

Challenges for a new Napier City Council after the Local Elections appear to be mirrored in a residential survey showing a dramatic drop in general satisfaction with council services during the last year.

A report for a council meeting tomorrow says there were 452 respondents in the annual survey, and general satisfaction dropped from 68 per cent last year to 55 per cent in the 2021/2022 study, the latest of surveys done annually for the past 30 years.

It is the lowest since 2015 and comes at a time when Mayor Kirsten Wise and her 12-member current council face questions about replacing a chief executive, who has resigned after less than two years in the job.

Extraordinary meetings of its Audit and Risk Committee and the council on the chief executive situation are scheduled for next week, the last full-council meeting of the three-year term. With two councillors not standing again, there will be at least two new faces at the table after the elections are decided on October 8.

Meanwhile, the Hastings District Council in 2021 deferred a survey because of the Covid-19 crisis, and a spokesperson says a roll-out of a new survey is expected later this year. Some other regional city councils have also deferred their surveys.

Almost half of the Napier council services (13 of 30 categories) were scored at under 60 per cent satisfaction among the respondents (who numbered 1-2 per cent of the city's teenage-adult population), the lowest rating being 28 per cent for drinking water, albeit up from 26 per cent in the 2020-2021 survey.

A staff report to the council notes satisfaction rates for drinking water, stormwater, libraries, swimming pools, sewerage and carparking all rated more than 10 per cent below a national benchmark.

The city's community and recreational facilities remained the most satisfactory aspects of life in Napier for local residents, with satisfaction still over 80 per cent, although satisfaction with rubbish collection had declined from 81 per cent to 75 per cent.

Comment on the declining satisfaction Mayor Kirsten Wise, coming to the end of a first term in the chair and facing election opposition from Cr Nigel Simpson and non-councillor John Clive Smith, said: "On the whole, it hasn't come as a surprise. It's actually a national trend and satisfaction is down across the board."

The decision to do the survey – a decision led by the chief executive rather than the council – would have been made with the knowledge of that dissatisfaction and the council might not fare that well.

"It is really important that we do get that feeling of the community," she said.

Such ratings are incorporated in long-term planning and performance frameworks.