Letter to the Editor Thursday July 17, 2014

The real issues

The recent council full-page advert showing the $5.1 million spend on district facilities shows how far off the mark Mayor Carter and his council are with the reality of what the Far North community requires, and confirms my concern at this council's spend under Carter's leadership.

The real issues affecting the Far North District have been magnified by the recent wet weather, which happens every winter. Our roading network has been neglected for the past 20 years, under Carter's reign as National MP for Northland, and over the past year in his failure to monitor the roading contractors' maintenance programme.

Major damage has been caused by contractors' failure to maintain stormwater drains and culverts. The chairman of the infrastructure portion of council business, John Vujcich, has been found wanting, as multiple roads, water and sewer systems have failed to cope with the recent storm events.

Time for this governance group to step up and get staff to do their job as instructed, as the ratepayers' roading assets are deteriorating at $10 - $15 million annually. Perhaps Mayor Carter could get the SFO to look at these significant losses, and compound to every business in the region suffering financial loss due to the road failures.

These losses and costs have been escalated by the closure of Mangakahia Road to heavy vehicles.

Roading engineers and Civil Defence staff clearly have no concept of the impact this decision will have on the Far North and Northland economy. What is even more concerning is the roading engineers were notified of the land movement and road slumping on Mangakahia Road, and therefore potential for a major slip problem, over two years ago.

The entire road engineering staff need to be asked to answer some serious questions by governance.

STEVE MCNALLY

Kerikeri