Coromandel mill plan splits beach community

AINSLEY THOMSON investigates the pros and cons of Blue Mountain Lumber's proposal to build a mill near pristine Whangapoua.



The words "No mill" have been sprayed on the road that leads up to where the controversial Coromandel Peninsula sawmill will be built.

But someone has written over the top and changed it to read "Go the mill".

This is a community spilt over a sawmill that some say promises jobs and others say will destroy the landscape and environment.

This week, international logging firm Blue Mountain Lumber gained resource consent to build the mill, which will employ 40 people.

The news was met with disappointment and a pledge to fight on from those opposed to it.

Next week, it is expected that one of the main opponents, the Whangapoua Environmental Protection Society, will lodge an appeal with the Environment Court. The Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society says it is considering an appeal, and the Department of Conservation, which made a submission against the mill, says it is examining the resource consent ruling.

Blue Mountain says it will also fight to continue the project, which has been three years in the planning. The company says its legal fees are expected to be between $500,000 and $1 million.

FOR

Plant 'would bring jobs and money'

To Jim Davies it makes sense to build the mill as close as possible to the forest.

The site of the proposed Blue Mountain Lumber mill at Te Rerenga was perfect, he said, because it was right next to the forest.

He believed it would mean fewer logging trucks on the road because there would be less transporting of logs and the milled trees would take up less space in the trucks.

The 70-year-old forest owner and retired logging contractor made one of the 28 submissions in favour of the mill at the resource consent hearing. More than 300 were received against it.

Mr Davies, who has lived on the Coromandel Peninsula all his life, said there were many people in the community who were in favour of the mill; they had just not been as vocal as those opposed to it.

He said forestry was a major industry in New Zealand and it needed to be able to expand to prosper. The mill would bring jobs and money into the area.

"There are some people who would be grateful for the jobs."

As far as the adverse environmental effects go, Mr Davies said they would not be as bad as claimed.

"The burning of wood is a natural process that has been done for years. The smoke out of the mill will be filtered and refined and cleaned as much as possible."

He could also not see how the water run-off would be toxic

"I just can't for the love of me see how pollution is going to make it down to the harbour."

As for the argument that the mill would ruin the landscape: "How can it be a blight sitting amongst the trees? They would probably see the chimney, but that's it."

Mr Davies was also pleased that Blue Mountain Lumber had said it would buy logs from small forest owners such as himself.

He said the Malaysian-owned company set high standards.

"I had horrors when I first heard the forest had been sold to a Malaysian firm. But it has turned out very well."

AGAINST

It's not the project, it's the location

Megan Graeme says it is not the mill itself that she is opposed to, it is where it is being built that is the problem.

Ms Graeme, who is spokeswoman for the local Forest and Bird Protection Society, said it was a common misconception that she was a fervent opponent of mills and milling in general.

In fact, the 33-year-old Whangapoua resident said, if the mill was built in the right place it would be appropriate.

But the site at Te Rerenga, 8km from the beach settlement of Whangapoua, is simply not the place to put a mill that would operate 24 hours a day processing 200,000cu m of logs a year.

The landscape - with Castle Rock looming in the background, the sweeping Whangapoua Harbour and Whangapoua Beach, which is considered one of the most stunning on the Coromandel Peninsula - was of outstanding value, she said.

And it was a landscape that she thought was protected in the Thames Coromandel district plan. In the plan the mill site is in a rural zone.

Ms Graeme - who runs an ecological business called Natural Solutions with her husband, Hamish Kendal - and most others opposed to the mill took this to mean that the only industries permitted in the zone were ones that serviced rural activities, for example small portable sawmills.

She said the large-scale mill Blue Mountain Lumber planned should be in the industrial zone at Whitianga.

"The mill would fit in Whitianga and most people think it is a good idea; you can get better value out of your commodities.

"It's the placement of it that's the problem."

However, at the resource consent hearing it was ruled that the mill did fit within the rural zone.

Ms Graeme said Blue Mountain Lumber had not thoroughly looked at alternative sites.

"I think there is no certainty of where you can live and not be near industry, because they do not stick to their zoning."

Members of Forest and Bird often went tramping in the hills behind the mill site, she said, and the last thing they wanted was the sound and smell of a commercial mill disturbing the environment.

"The community is depressed. At the hearing there was a feeling that the committee was actually listening to us, so everyone was feeling positive."

Other common concerns of those opposed to the mill are the effects run-off will have on the delicate ecosystem in the Whangapoua Harbour, Opitonui River and Awaroa Stream and the effects on tourism and road safety, with increased logging trucks on the narrow coastal roads.

Ms Graeme said the argument that the mill would bring economic prosperity to the area was not persuasive.