Brian Rudman: Port's secret harbour grab

An aerial photograph Auckland City waterfront. Photo / Richard Robinson

Ratepayers may be in for an unpleasant surprise if council fails to stop plans for further reclamation

The endless jockeying for power between the politicians and bureaucrats at the Auckland Council has begun with a bang this year. Last week the boffins tried to pull a swifty by slipping in a resolution asking councillors to boot their colleagues Mike Lee and Christine Fletcher off the governing board of Auckland Transport (AT).

AT is the only Auckland Council-Controlled Organisation permitted by government to have political representation on its board, and that only after a concerted campaign by Aucklanders pointing out that AT would account for more than 50 per cent of council expenditure. To their shame, the politicians meekly kicked for touch last week. Instead of tossing the resolution out, they agreed to deputy mayor Penny Hulse's recommendation to postpone a decision until next month.

Tomorrow, the bureaucrats are having another go, this time trying to relitigate the vexed issue of port reclamation. The full council, meeting as the Auckland Development Committee, are being asked to endorse a "Central Wharves Strategy" which, if adopted, reverses their vote last year to oppose any further harbour reclamation in downtown Auckland.

The recommendation by the City Centre Integration Group, made up of the chief executives from across the council "family" - including the port company - is being marketed as a triumph for Aucklanders, providing "more public space, greater access to the water", an expanded ferry basin and a dedicated cruise ship terminal.

The catch is, it includes a new cruise ship terminal on Captain Cook Wharf. To compensate for this loss of wharf space, the port company wants to reclaim 3ha of seabed at the northern end of Bledisloe Wharf.

It gets worse. In secrecy, councillors will be asked to permit the port company to reclaim another 2ha of harbour every 10 years into the future. In other words, over the next century, the port company will get the 20ha of reclamation it originally demanded. However much you flossy it up with talk of extra open space and cruise ships loaded with big-spending oldies waiting to be relieved of their cash, the downside is 20ha of mudcrete extending out into the harbour.

Last year the politicians voted to make further reclamation a "non-complying" activity in the draft Unitary Plan.

Despite the port company being a 100 per cent council-owned subsidiary, it has been fighting to have this ban lifted. Now it seems to have enlisted the CEOs of the council "family" to side with it against the politicians.

Even putting aside the issues of reclamation and who governs, what the CEOs don't mention is the cost to ratepayers, for you can be sure the port company will refuse to pay - that's if the Queens Wharf experience is anything to go by.

In June 2011, Mayor Len Brown announced, without public discussion, that a $6 million cruise ship terminal would be built on Queens Wharf. In the previous year's election campaign, Mr Brown had championed a plan by architect Gordon Moller to create a cruise ship terminal on an extended - by 100m - Captain Cook Wharf. Mr Brown's change of mind apparently came about on his receiving estimates that buying Captain Cook Wharf from Ports of Auckland, extending it and building a terminal would cost ratepayers $200 million.

Just two years earlier, the Government and the Auckland Regional Council had jointly paid $40 million to the port company to purchase Queens Wharf as a "people space". As part of the deal ARC agreed to provide a cruise ship terminal at no cost to the port company. In 2013, the transformation of the Shed 10 into a terminal was completed at a cost to ratepayers of $18.6 million, three times Mr Brown's earlier figure. The port company's contribution was a gangplank!

Ratepayers also pay $4.1 million in annual wharf operating costs. The port company pays for underwater wharf maintenance.

The new plan involves abandoning this purpose-built terminal at the bottom of town and repeating the exercise on the next wharf along. The CEOs seem to think that's a good use of ratepayers money. Tomorrow, the politicians have the chance to let us know what they think - both on the wharf plans, and on who is running the city.