It is Rotorua Community Hospice's biggest annual fundraiser and saw 10 amateur dance couples paired together and taught a dance to perform at a one-night showcase.
Rotorua Community Hospice chief executive Jonathon Hagger said, "This result is fantastic, particularly after cancelling the event in 2020, and all the challenges faced in the past year."
Rotorua Community Hospice gets about 50 per cent of its funding from Lakes District Health Board but still needs to raise $1 million annually to ensure it maintains a high level of support and service for the local community.
Harcourts Dancing for Hospice. Logan Nathan and Nadine Katene. Photo / Andrew Warner
September 8
Rotorua Lakes Council hopes to secure more than $113 million in Government funding for infrastructure developments to enable the construction of 5000 new homes in the city.
The funding bid is made up of $28.5m for central Rotorua, $23.7m for eastern Rotorua, and $61.5m for the west.
The council estimates the investment would yield an additional 5236 homes: 2151 in the east, 1320 in the west and 1765 in the central city.
The estimates are based on developments already being "actively considered", but the council believes there are more opportunities for further intensification in those areas.
It came as council officers presented its expression of interest in the funding to the Rotorua Lakes Council Strategy, Policy and Finance Committee meeting.
The council hoped to draw the funding from the $3.8 billion Housing Acceleration Fund, which was announced by the Government in March 2021.
When Jenny Jones was sent a letter criticising her family home for flying the Māori flag, she immediately did something about it.
She flew two more Māori flags.
The hand-written letter arrived in her mailbox on Friday last week. It said: "Congradulations (sic), you have won the prize for the most disgusting property in Glenholme. Some of us have pride in our area. You need to step up to the mark. Take the flag down."
Jones, 70, first moved into the house when she was three months old.
The home, on Ranolf St, has been in her family ever since and she moved back there after her mother died in 2010.
NZME launched its 90% Project in an effort to get that percentage of the population vaccinated by Christmas.
The 90% Project, was rolled out across the country to encourage New Zealanders to get the jab, along with information on how to get vaccinated and ways to encourage others to join.
We spoke to Rotorua nurses working on the frontlines of the Covid-19 vaccination rollout including Hayley Gerretzen who was a nurse in the surgical ward at Rotorua Hospital. Gerretzen said the vaccination rollout was "a cool thing to be a part of".
Covid 19 vaccination centre nurses Jacque Webber (left) and Hayley Gerretzen. Photo / Andrew Warner.
September 22
After much opposition, it was announced it was "unlikely" Rotorua would get a new managed isolation facility.
After a wave of local opposition to Rotorua taking on a fourth managed isolation facility (MIQ), Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said the tourist town was a "marginal" expansion option.
"It is unlikely now that we would set up additional MIQ facilities in Rotorua given the strength of the feedback we have had from them," he told RNZ.
With overseas Kiwis queuing to come home and too few MIQ spaces to meet the demand, the Government previously confirmed it was looking at adding facilities in Rotorua and Christchurch.
Rotorua's Sudima Hotel, a managed isolation facility. Photo / NZME
September 24
"Totally grey and washed out."
That is how former principal Linda Woon's husband used to describe her after a hard day at work.
Woon retired as principal of Otonga Rd Primary School in 2020 after working in education for 50 years - 30 of those as a principal across two Rotorua schools.
She said she loved her time as a principal, but it could be lonely.
Woon was among 1709 teachers and principals who left the profession in the Bay of Plenty Waiariki area in the past five years, and not returned as of mid-July.
That's according to Ministry of Education payroll records for state and state-integrated schools.
The number of leavers each year rose steadily from 276 in 2016 to 417 last year (2020). So far this year, to July 23, 133 had left and not taken up another position.
Former Rotorua principal Linda Woon. Photo / Andrew Warner
September 25
The masterminds behind an elaborate $4.2 million Rotorua-based cannabis growing operation set up bogus companies and leased buildings to grow premium crops that supplied drug dealers in bulk.
The drug syndicate partnered with a Unison foreman who tampered with wiring at their leased buildings to steal power, saving the offenders thousands of dollars but also helping to avoid suspicion.
Details of the sophisticated indoor cannabis growing operation were revealed after court documents were released to the Rotorua Daily Post.
More than $4.2m worth of cannabis was seized from Rotorua, Taupō and Hamilton commercial buildings linked to a major drug syndicate. Photo / Supplied
September 29
"Don't say sorry, this is beautiful."
Those were words Mitsy Mika said to a young mum who was giving birth in the passenger seat of a car parked on the side of the road south of Rotorua at 1am on September 26.
Mika was travelling to Reporoa from Taneatua with her 10-year-old son in her truck when she saw a car with its hazard lights parked on a grass median at Rainbow Mountain, on the corner of State Highway 5 and State Highway 38.
She saw a woman walking across the road, talking on the phone, and slowed down to ask if everything was okay.
The woman said she was trying to get the highway number because she had dialled 111 requesting an ambulance as her daughter was having a baby in the car.
"I was struggling to hear her so turned off my truck and then I heard a young girl in the car yelling, 'the baby is coming!'."
