There could be more seats around Wellington City Council's table, its eastern and southern wards amalgamated, and councillors at large introduced ahead of next year's local body elections.
The council is mulling over options to slice and dice the city after the decision to introduce a Māori Ward, which hastriggered a requirement to do a representation review.
A PowerPoint presentation from June, obtained by the Herald, outlines some of the options under consideration.
The city is divided up into five wards with the Lambton, Eastern, Northern, and Onslow-Western wards each represented by three councillors. The Southern ward has two councillors.
One option is to keep the existing ward structure. Another is to only have four wards by amalgamating the Eastern and Southern wards.
Other possibilities include bringing into play councillors "at large" to represent the whole city rather than a specific area.
One idea is to have three of at large elected members by reducing representation in the Onslow-Western, Lambton, and Eastern wards by one councillor each.
Another option is to divvy up the city into three general wards based on the Parliamentary electorates of Ōhāriu, Wellington Central and Rongotai. In this case four councillors would represent each ward.
A variation to this option adds two more councillors at large.
Lambton Ward councillor Nicola Young. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Lambton Ward councillor Nicola Young said the current structure worked "pretty well" but in an ideal world she would divide the wards into even smaller parts to have more direct accountability.
She said councillors at large would be like having list MPs.
Young said it would be harder for independent councillors to be elected that way and easier for people to come in on party tickets.
"It's far more expensive to campaign across the whole city and it's much easier if you're doing it under the party brand."
Three current councillors are on the Labour ticket and three with the Greens around Wellington City Council's table.
Onslow-Western ward councillor Diane Calvert also voiced concerns that having councillors at large would favour the resources of political parties.
She said she didn't want to tamper with the current structure.
"We're heading into major local government reform and undertaking anything different in this exercise could well be wasted."
Onslow-Western ward councillor Diane Calvert. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Fellow Onslow-Western Ward councillor Rebecca Matthews was also tentative about too much of a radical change in the midst of major local government reform.
But she said she was interested in the idea of councillors at large.
"For many people the wards is not a system that they identify with especially for renters who might have lived in two or three wards in a single council term."
Southern Ward councillor Fleur Fitzsimons also supported councillors at large.
"Residents really value their connection with their local councillor, but many of the issues facing Wellington like failing infrastructure challenges, our transport network, and the need to build more houses, are city-wide issues.
"So I think having some councillors with a city wide focus in this context makes sense."
Representation in Wellington City was last reviewed in 2018 and is usually only considered every six years.
