By TONY GEE
Outside the Whangarei district, calls are growing through the rest of the region for upgraded infrastructure (especially roading), improved IT and telecommunications, better housing in many rural areas and more help from the Government to get a result.
Council rates and charges alone are not enough; central
funding is the key to making a real difference.
KAIPARA DISTRICT COUNCIL
No mayoral contest here. Forty- four-year-old business manager Graeme Ramsey, from Baylys Beach, heads unopposed into his second term as mayor of the Dargaville-based district.
Issues of transport infrastructure funding are dominated, he says, by the amount of logs coming out of the district's pine forests.
Mr Ramsey points to the fact that annual maintenance costs on the 60km Pouto Rd, servicing 12,000 hectares of forest, costs his council more than it gets in rates from the entire peninsula.
"It's critical that we try to encourage growth and sustainable development without destroying what attracts people to Kaipara."
The council is seeking 10 elected members from 25 candidates in four wards - Dargaville (2), Central (3), West Coast (2) and Otamatea (3).
FAR NORTH DISTRICT COUNCIL
Opito Bay resident Yvonne Sharp won a majority of more than 3000 over her closest mayoral rival in a packed field in 1998.
Interest by potential mayoral aspirants appears to have waned since then, and only two candidates, both unknown in district-wide local body terms, are offering opposition next month.
Mrs Sharp, backed by most of her council, is a strong advocate of forming partnerships with central Government, agencies, iwi and service providers to advance essential infrastructure like local roading and communications.
"We'll never have satisfactory local roads until we enter into a strategic partnership with the Government," she says.
The Far North has to build on what it already has - activities like farming and tourism - and make the most of opportunities to develop what it hasn't got, Mayor Sharp says.
Eddie Harrop, a 52-year-old builder from Taipa, on the district's east coast, is a newcomer to local body politics.
Mr Harrop, who has specialised in sewerage systems for many years, says he has been directed by God to challenge for the mayoralty.
Just a few kilometres away, 28-year-old farmer Carl Maria, of Oruru, Mangonui, is another making his local body debut.
He sees the district's future lying in economic development, tourism and industry and wants to attract manufacturing to the area. He would also like to see some tangible benefits for senior citizens in the community.
Interest in the mayoral contest is likely to be eclipsed by heated struggles for some of the 10 council seats, especially in the district's eastern ward, covering the Kerikeri, Paihia, Bay of Islands and Kawakawa areas, where 10 candidates seek three seats.
A bitter war of words has been raging for months as Community First candidate, former Concorde pilot and now councillor Derek Ellis slugs it out with three other councillors, Johnson Davis, Dr Robert Lowe and Dugald MacDonald, plus Sue Shepherd, in The Proven Team.
Allegations, claims and counter-claims focus on issues as diverse as waste minimisation, water supplies, boat moorings, road sealing, works projects and what to do with the Whangaroa area's cash proceeds from harvesting pine trees in large council-owned forests nearby.
The contest in the district's mid-north and west coast (western ward, three seats), where 10 candidates are lining up, features the battle of a proposed Hokianga Harbour bridge. At least two old council hands are trying to make a comeback here.
By comparison, the northern ward (four candidates, three seats) looks almost tame.
The Far North district has six community boards - Northern, Hokianga, Kaikohe, Whangaroa, Kerikeri-Paihia and Kawakawa.
A total of 61 candidates are chasing 36 seats, six on each board.
NORTHLAND REGIONAL COUNCIL
Transport and the shaky future of rail in Northland tend to dominate a range of region-wide issues faced by the Whangarei-based seven-member council.
It must wrestle with the real prospect that the rail line north from Auckland could close within months, putting even more pressure from heavy logging traffic onto the region's roading network.
This would be a big blow for Northland, and an immediate job for the new council is to try to find a way of saving the line should Tranz Rail decide to pull the plug.
The council wants a continuing rail system complementing road and possibly sea transport, to handle the huge and increasing volumes of logs coming out of Northland forest blocks. Development of a good transport system is regarded as essential.
Elsewhere, work is needed on the recently released collective economic strategy for the region, while Northland's extensive coastal environment is likely to throw up issues like sea and seabed ownership following recent Treaty of Waitangi settlements for Maori claimants.
There is increasing pressure on some coastal areas because of demand for residential and commercial development, as well as issues of water availability.
Regional council cooperation with and between the region's three district councils, Whangarei, Kaipara and the Far North, must continue, says regional council chairman Jim Peters.
The Northland College (Kaikohe) principal, seeking his third term at the regional helm and his fifth term on the council, believes strong partnerships must be forged between all Northland councils to ensure they and the region have a future.
"We've had a boom year or so but we need that boom to continue because of our dependence on farming, tourism and forestry."
Seventeen candidates, nine of them from the Whangarei region (four seats), including former Whangarei mayor Stan Semenoff, are after the region's seven council places.
NORTHLAND DISTRICT HEALTH BOARD
The seven successful candidates elected to the Northland District Health Board will have to grapple with diseases like meningitis, tuberculosis and rheumatic fever.
These remain real health concerns for people in Northland, and along with depression, asthma and hypothermia, are all associated with the region's often poor housing and low socio-economic conditions.
In addition, Northland's immunisation and vaccination take-up rate is not as high as in many other regions and this adds to a raft of health-related problems.
Northland children have the worst dental health in the country. The region has no fluoridated water supplies and dental health funding appears not to reflect the needs of Northland children.
Overall health funding will be the big issue for the new board. Hospital services face a $6.9 million deficit just to continue existing services.
The region's poor health status, its large population spread throughout small rural, and often remote areas, plus the fact that half of all Northland schoolchildren are Maori, mean Maori health requirements will feature prominently in terms of future health needs.
The new board's challenge will be to try to ensure it does better than just maintain present health services if it wants to be instrumental in making a substantial improvement to the health of Northlanders.
Sixty-nine candidates are seeking the seven elected board seats - 30 in the Far North (three seats), eight in Kaipara (one seat) and 31 in Whangarei (three seats).
Four more members are appointed to the board by the Minister of Health, who also appoints the board's chair and deputy chair.
Feature: Local body elections 2001
www.localgovt.co.nz
By TONY GEE
Outside the Whangarei district, calls are growing through the rest of the region for upgraded infrastructure (especially roading), improved IT and telecommunications, better housing in many rural areas and more help from the Government to get a result.
Council rates and charges alone are not enough; central
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