Kiri Gillespie: Cost spent on tidying up scruffy berms and reserves is worth it

Overgrown median strip at Hemo Roundabout, a tourism gateway to Rotorua. Photo / Andrew Warner

OPINION

Welcome to the beautiful Bay of Plenty - home of scruffy berms, dandelions, and reserves where the grass reaches shoulder height.

It’s not exactly the tourism slogan any of us probably want for our region but it appears to be the reality right now.

Public grassed areas have been in such a state that Rotorua resident Tracey McLeod said she spent 13 hours mowing council land.

The Tauranga City Council and the Rotorua Lakes Council have said they are playing catch-up on mowing services after a diabolical amount of rain this summer exacerbated grass growth - among other challenges - but McLeod’s frustration is understandable.

Cruise ships have returned to Tauranga Harbour. Photo / Bob Harding

You only need to take a trip to the dairy down the road or walk around the block to see scruffy and unkempt verges around the place. While I can handle a bit of messy-looking grass in suburbia, it’s the image presented to visitors to the city that concerns me.

Rotorua has worked hard to reclaim its crown as New Zealand’s tourism capital since Covid-19 ravaged the sector. In Tauranga, cruise ships have finally returned to the harbour since the outbreak shut off the international tourism tap.

I’d like to think we are doing all we can to showcase the beauty of our Bay of Plenty to visitors but I must question if that’s truly the case when we have grass reaching shoulder height, as McLeod claims, and knee-high dandelions.

Even Rotorua’s Hemo roundabout, considered to be the southern gateway to Rotorua, has been looking scruffy and unkempt.

Now, the Rotorua council may need to cut back on core services to prevent a forecast deficit of $5.6 million. The mayor, Tania Tapsell, was quoted as saying in a meeting last week: “Unfortunately, things like mowing just won’t be able to be done. That’s just one of many examples.”

The shortfall has been exacerbated by recent weather events, which have also impacted the Western Bay of Plenty District Council as it looks to spend up to $20m repairing roading infrastructure damaged with slips.

Some difficult financial decisions are looming for local leaders in the next few months and, on the face of it, trimming mowing services may seem to be a simple cost-saving measure.

But cutting maintenance budgets could contribute to bigger problems in the long term if we do not keep in mind how we are presenting our public spaces to tourists.

Our cities are finally buzzing again with visitors and we need to treasure them by presenting clean, beautiful places they will want to tell friends and family about and visit again.

Money spent maintaining our cities could prevent us from losing money if we don’t.