Moves are afoot at the Kaipara District Council to appoint in-house experts rather than rely on external consultants.
The council is seeking a planning and community general manager, a revenue manager, a planning engineer and a resource-consents team leader.
"In the past, the council outsourced those skills and this has
left the organisation vulnerable and relatively poorly resourced," chief executive Steve Ruru said. "We need people who are skilled and well-trained, with the knowledge, skills and experience to do their jobs at a very high level. I also wanted clearer lines of responsibility and accountability."
Three staffing divisions have been created focusing on: planning and community; finance; and operations, with a general manager heading each group. Two managers are already in place and a third will be recruited.
Mr Ruru said the council also wanted to strengthen its engineering capacity and would recruit an operations engineer and an asset-management information officer to work within its water-services area.