The Government is “building more houses” to deal with Rotorua’s homelessness crisis, the Prime Minister says, as a “housing boom” is evident by the amount of construction currently taking place in the city.
Chris Hipkins made the comments in an interview with the Rotorua Daily Post after the official opening of Wai Ariki Hot Springs and Spa, where he was asked what the Government was doing to address homelessness in Rotorua at a time when international tourists were coming back to New Zealand.
Kāinga Ora data showed 218 public and supporting housing homes had been “delivered” in Rotorua between November 2017 and the end of last month. This included the redevelopment of existing Kāinga Ora properties and purchases of new or existing houses.
There were 500 public and supported housing homes under construction or at the feasibility or planning stage in Rotorua.
Meanwhile, data in the Rotorua Lakes Council’s community and district development committee agenda from June 14 showed the number of net dwellings in the building consents has increased year on year since 2016.
As of April 30 2016, there were a net 158 dwellings in the building consent process in Rotorua, while the most recent data from April 30 2023, showed 703 net dwellings at this stage.
Hipkins said on Thursday the challenge in Rotorua was its population had been growing faster than housing for “quite a long period of time”.
“We’re working on building more houses because actually, that’s how you deal with the homelessness crisis.”
He said the Government had been working on building more state housing in Rotorua.
“Already, hundreds have been built and hundreds more are on the way.”
Hipkins said there was currently a “housing boom” in Rotorua. The was shown by the amount of construction taking place in the city.
“Working through the Housing Accord, we’ve seen the number of people in emergency accommodation almost halve. And we’ve got more work to do there but clearly we’re starting to really get to grips with that and get on top of it.”
The Rotorua Housing Accord was an agreement between the Government, the Rotorua Lakes Council and iwi to “progressively reduce the use of motels for emergency housing in Rotorua to near zero”. Rotorua mayor Tania Tapsell signed the agreement in December.
In March 2022, there were 708 households living in contracted and non-contracted emergency housing motels in Rotorua whereas in February this year, there were 375 households living on such motels in Rotorua.
On rising lake levels in Rotorua, Hipkins said the Government was looking at the issue of managed retreat throughout the country, particularly as a result of the cyclones and flooding in Auckland.
On June 3, Local Democracy Reporting reported a Rotoehu homeowner had gone from living her dream to her worst nightmare after Lake Rotoehu had risen two metres and water had surrounded her home.
“We’re working with the local councils around how best to compensate people in that situation,” Hipkins said.
He said decisions around managed retreats were made by local authorities.
“What we’re doing as a Government is working to support local authorities where they identify that houses or land use needs to change and we’re supporting them in that.”
After the Loafers Lodge fire in Wellington last month that claimed five lives, Rotorua mayor Tania Tapsell called on the Government to review and update legislation so buildings were made safer in the event of a fire and other emergencies.
Asked what changes the Government was looking at, Hipkins said it was looking “really carefully” at changes it may want to make around boarding houses and emergency or short-term accommodation options.
“There’s a difficult balancing act here - we don’t want to raise the standard so high that a number of providers end up shutting up shop immediately and turning people who are very vulnerable out onto the street. We also want to make sure that they’re safe in the accommodation that they’re in.
“We’ve got to work hard to get the balance right but we’re looking to make further change in that area.”
Wai Ariki Hot Springs and Spa opened to manuhiri [visitors] on Friday, and Hipkins said it was “fantastic” to welcome back international tourists to New Zealand.
“I think what we’ve got to focus on now is making sure that we’ve got a premium tourism offering for them.
“New Zealand’s a long way away from the rest of the world so we’ve got to really have an amazing offering for people to want to come here and to want to stay here.”
Hipkins said people would come from places around the world “just to have this experience”.
“This is the sort of thing that I think we can do more of - that we can offer more of this unique Aotearoa experience for our international tourists.”