Letters: Ngongotaha development views differ

Housing subdivisions touted for Ngongotaha have raised concerns within the community. Photo/File

The mayor's statement "From the Mayor's Desk" (April 9) justifies the Special Housing Areas (SHA) strategy as due to "ongoing growth pressures".

What? The Government and council's Housing Accord on August 31, 2017 projected "medium growth" of 7.2 per cent for 2013-2023. Growth averaging 0.72 per cent per year will not pressure anything.

The housing affordability crisis in Rotorua reflects the huge difference between this projected average annual growth rate of 0.72 per cent and the 24 per cent average house price and 10 per cent average rental increases 2016-2017 (caused largely by the inflow of international money into the Auckland housing market).

Skiting about "ongoing growth" as the cause and inevitable consequence of "progress" is ridiculous and no basis for a plausible affordability strategy. Scolding members of the community for resisting "inevitable change" is silly. The council's decision to use the SHA Act to avoid notifying the community and limiting objections to adjacent landowners was not "inevitable" in my view.

32 per cent of the pushback against SHAs (by over 100 residents and ratepayers at the public information meeting at Ngongotaha on April 5) was against undemocratic decision-making. About 17 per cent was against using unsuitable land, 16 per cent against cultural offensive aspects, and 14 per cent against inappropriate social outcomes. About 9 per cent were each against inadequate infrastructure and the mass-housing model.

The mayor's reasons for ramming the SHAs strategy through were implausible to most.

It seems to me that over-promising and underachieving on housing affordability, 18 months before local elections, are resulting in growing desperation, with matching resistance.

REYNOLD MACPHERSON
Rotorua

Housing politics
A resident of Ngongotaha, I attended three meetings concerning the proposed housing subdivisions in our village.

Sadly, those who chose to speak up were, in the main, against the proposals. Instead of recognising that Ngongotaha is a part of Rotorua and shares its housing shortages, the complainants deemed the subdivisions should not proceed because more and increased densification of housing will bring problems with vehicles, water and drainage.

The possibility of two families having to cram into one house should be of more concern to those people rather than their being late for work due to traffic congestion.

There were some at the meetings who in my view were using them for political, and not social, purposes.

I refer to the Rotorua District Residents and Ratepayers Assn who were vociferous in their opposition to the subdivisions for the same reasons as above. Yet, in their own Spatial Plan, the RDRRA states that Ngongotaha is ready for increased densification of housing, and goes further to suggest that Ngongotaha is destined to become a dormitory of Tauranga. Their plan contradicts what they were saying at the meetings and suggests to me that they are more concerned with politics than the welfare of Ngongotaha.

JOHN PAKES
Ngongotaha