Grant Dally is running for mayor and a seat in the Maketū-Te Puke Ward for the Western Bay of Plenty District Council 2025 election.
Grant Dally is running for mayor and a seat in the Maketū-Te Puke Ward for the Western Bay of Plenty District Council 2025 election.
Local body elections are under way and eight hopefuls are vying for the Western Bay of Plenty’s top job. Local Democracy Reporting quizzed the mayoral candidates about key issues ahead of the October 11 election. We will publish those stories over the coming days.
Quick Bio
Name: Grant Dally
Age: 64
Resides: Te Puke
Profession: Former mechanical/production engineer and business owner, current councillor
Political party affiliations: None
Family: Married, two children
GrantDally wants a shared pathway from Te Puke to Tauranga if funding is available and he becomes Western Bay of Plenty’s mayor.
The pathway that would connect Rangiuru Business Park, Te Puke, Pāpāmoa and Tauranga city centre was a nice-to-have on Dally’s agenda, if it could be funded.
The council cut back cycleway funding to help reduce the rates rise, but if there was funding from the Government again for cycleways it would be welcome for the project, he said.
“There’s a lot of arguments around the council table against cycleways and putting money into that. But everywhere you go where you build these things, the people love them.”
Dally’s three top priorities for the district were water reforms and setting up the new water entity, spatial planning for the district’s future and hiring a new chief executive.
Interim chief executive Miriam Taris took on the role in March and would stay until a new one was appointed.
The spatial planning process was going to be important in the next term, especially for Te Puke, he said.
A lot revolved around spatial plans so it would be good to have Te Puke’s finalised, given it was delayed by water reform planning, Dally said.
When the council’s in-house water services were transferred to the planned separate entity it would be “quite critical” to ensure the council had jurisdiction over setting the costs so there wasn’t a “blowout,” he said.
A long-term goal Dally would like to see achieved was a bypass or alternative road for Te Puke to reduce congestion.
“Te Puke is in dire need of a third entry/exit point because the queues are just ridiculous in kiwifruit season, and it’s almost becoming a year-round thing.”
A direct link from Te Puke to the Pāpāmoa East interchange was the best option to solve Te Puke’s congestion, and this was something he would like included in a regional deal in future, he said.
Grant Dally wants a link from Te Puke to the Pāpāmoa East Interchange, which is currently under construction. Photo / Tauranga City Council
The Western Bay sub-region, including Tauranga, was one of three areas to sign a memorandum of understanding for a regional deal in July. The Government was expected to announce the first one by the end of the year.
Dally wanted surety of funding from the regional deal because it couldn’t “just all fall on the ratepayer”.
There were options for funding the projects – such as congestion charging, value capture and infrastructure funding and financing levies – but there wasn’t clarity on how these would be applied to the projects, he said.
