The first Meet Your Candidates event in Rotorua of this election will be held on Thursday. Photo / Laura Smith
The first Meet Your Candidates event in Rotorua of this election will be held on Thursday. Photo / Laura Smith
The election campaign is ramping up and Rotorua’s first local event for candidates to outline where they stand on hot topics will be held on Thursday.
The Rotorua Business Chamber is hosting a Meet Your Candidates event at the Arawa Park Hotel on Fenton St.
Chief executive Bryce Heard says it will kick off at 5.30pm with candidate introductions.
They will each get about five or six minutes to speak on anything they like, followed by questions from Heard about important election topics, then questions from the floor.
“So it’ll be a good chance for the electorate to interact with the candidates and see where they sit on the issues of the day.”
Heard stressed he would run a a tight ship; time-keeping would be strict and heckling from the audience would not be tolerated.
Audience members who registered ahead of time would be given priority to ask questions, he said. People could register as they entered the event, but he preferred registrations in advance.
Rotorua Business Chamber chief executive Bryce Heard. Photo / Andrew Warner
The chamber had booked a room for a big crowd, he said. “We normally get a big turnout.”
It hosted a similar event for mayoral candidates for last year’s local body elections and about 300 people turned up.
Heard said he expected all the candidates would attend.
Green Drinks and Forest & Bird are also hosting a public event next Tuesday at the Rotorua Citizens Club from 5.30pm.
National, Labour, Te Pāti Māori and Act candidates, as well as representatives from the Green Party and The Opportunities Party (TOP), are due to attend and the event will include environmental and sustainability-related questions.
Candidate nominations have closed. Voting opens on October 2, with election day on October 14, when all voting places will be open from 9am to 7pm.
Laura Smith is a Local Democracy Reporting journalist based at the Rotorua Daily Post. She previously reported general news for the Otago Daily Times and Southland Express and has been a journalist for four years.
