Rotorua's re-elected Mayor Tania Tapsell. Photo / Andrew Warner
Re-elected Rotorua mayor Tania Tapsell wants to build a strong council team, finalise the end of the emergency housing crisis and safeguard Rotorua Museum’s future in the first 100 days of her second term.
Tapsell, whose 12,380 votes were 3,386 more than her four mayoral rivals combined, also wants to ensure communication with Rotorua residents improves to avoid disinformation circulating.
Tapsell said she was “excited” to welcome new councillors Ben Sandford and Te Rika Temara-Benfell, and to be working alongside the returning Merepeka Raukawa-Tait again.
She wanted to be an “inclusive leader” and setting priorities as a new council would be an important tool to ensure “all councillors” got the chance to achieve their goals.
“We will be setting our priorities together on what we need to achieve,” she said.
“Building a strong, high-performing team is really important.”
After her mayoral win in 2022, Tapsell highlighted avoiding a “divisive” council as one of her key goals.
Three years on, that target remains, particularly in regards to her relationship with councillor Robert Lee. Prior to the election, Tapsell made it clear she did not want Lee re-elected.
Lee fell short in challenging Tapsell’s mayorship, but hung on to a council seat as the sixth-placed electee.
But Tapsell said campaign animosity was now behind them.
“We acknowledged we’ve had strong disagreements, but shook hands and committed to working together as best as possible,” she said.
“That’s what Rotorua deserves.”
Three years ago, putting in motion the wheels to halt Rotorua’s emergency housing crisis was also on the list of her first 100-day priorities.
That should crystallise soon, with only the two pre-established providers for the most at-risk people projected to be left by the end of 2025, dependent on government agencies relocating people out of motels.
Despite this, Tapsell admitted the council still had “work to do” around crime and social issues.
“Although we’ve improved things significantly, we really can’t get complacent,” she said.
Rotorua Museum was the long-term project Tapsell wanted to safeguard early on in her second term. Closed since 2016 due to earthquake damage and seismic issues, the project’s construction costs were fully funded, but exhibition costs still had an $8.3 million shortfall.
Tapsell called it her “number-one project”.
The newly elected council is expected to consider museum reopening date scenarios ranging from April 2027 to June 2028 early in its first term, as discussed in a June meeting.
“We are so determined to keep costs down that this is one we need to manage very carefully,” Tapsell said.
Last term was about fixing issues, Tapsell said, and she believed now was the time to put the council in a better long-term financial position.
The council’s 2024 Annual Report detailed current debts of $447 million – up $151 million since 2022 – largely due to investment in capital projects and infrastructure.
While Tapsell wanted to ensure rates remained “affordable”, she said “long-term strategies” were now needed to reduce debt.
“We’ve fixed a lot of the problems our city was facing,” she said.
But she believed the ongoing cost of debt would be “significant” for the community if not addressed now.
“That’s not a burden I want to leave my children or the next ratepayers,” she said.
Perhaps the most troubling period of Tapsell’s first term was the controversial Tarawera sewerage scheme.
Construction to replace septic tanks with a new mains network was completed in May 2025, and properties were now in the process of being connected.
But the project was fraught with issues, including protests, court proceedings and violent threats aimed at Tapsell.
She blamed this on “online misinformation” and believed there was plenty to learn from the experience.
“Without a doubt, it was the most challenging thing I think I’ve ever been through,” she said.
“Dealing with misinformation is a big challenge, so how can we communicate well to our community, and how do we listen early on before it becomes an issue is important.”
The abuse was not isolated to online. After verbal tirades at the coffee shop and car windows being smashed, one question remained: Why do it all again?
“I’m very mindful that as the first Māori female mayor in Rotorua’s history, there are large areas of our community that I didn’t want to let down,” she said.
“You can’t let petty issues stop you from achieving not only your dreams, but the aspirations that other people have for this place that we live.”
- LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.
Mathew Nash is a Local Democracy Reporting journalist based at the Rotorua Daily Post. He has previously written for SunLive, been a regular contributor to RNZ and was a football reporter in the UK for eight years.
Clarification
Tapsell did not say the museum was projected to reopen in 2027, as previously reported. The reopening information has been updated.