Bach owners fight for a piece of Rangitoto

By ANNE BESTON

Rangitoto Island bach owners are taking legal action to fight the latest order to get out of their properties by Sunday.

Families who own 19 of the 34 baches left on the island have asked a Queen's Counsel for legal advice on whether they can be forced to meet the October 31 deadline to leave.

The Department of Conservation has notified owners by letter that on that date the baches will revert to the Crown.

It is the latest tussle in a dispute going back to the 1930s.

Some bach owners have been without a lease for more than 10 years, others got three-year lease extensions in the 1990s, and still others were given the usual 12 months' reprieve after the death of the lessee.

But DoC's latest move is formal notification that all leases are now expired.

A solicitor acting for the bach owners would not comment. However, it is believed that the Rangitoto families have been encouraged by a recent victory in the Environment Court by bach owners at Taylors Mistake, near Christchurch, allowing owners to demolish existing baches but build new ones.

But strict conditions are being imposed on the Taylors Mistake residents, including a ban on fulltime occupation and limits on the size of homes that can be built.

Department spokeswoman Fiona Oliphant said DoC was offering owners help to remove their belongings from Rangitoto.

"Unless we get some sort of court injunction, we will carry on," she said.

Once owners had left, the baches would be secured against vandals.

The legal action comes as the Rangitoto Island Historic Conservation Trust continues restoration work on some of Rangitoto's baches, with a $60,000-a-year AMP sponsorship grant over the next three years.

Trust archivist Susan Yoffe said it was hoped all 34 baches would eventually be handed to the trust.

They might ultimately be opened to the public in some form, possibly as artist-in-residence-type accommodation, or as DoC housing for visitors to the island.

"We may not be able to salvage all of them," Ms Yoffe said, "but we want to keep them looking as they always did, just sitting among the pohutukawas."


Bach dispute

* About 120 baches were built on Rangitoto in the 1920s.

* Since 1957, site leases have been extinguished upon death of the lessee.

* Restoration work is being done on three baches with more planned, depending on funding.

* Owners of 19 of 34 remaining baches are now threatening legal action.