Local elections 2025: Waipā mayoral candidate Clare St Pierre shares her views

Waipā mayoral candidate Clare St Pierre.

The Waikato Herald invited Waipā’s mayoral candidates to answer questions we prepared on key issues for local body voters.

Name: Clare St Pierre

I live in: Pirongia Village

1. What skills and experiences would you bring to the role of mayor?

I bring strong financial, analytic, governance and business skills to the role with a banking career, top-class academic qualifications in business management and governance, and over 10 years’ experience as a Waipā district elected member and RMA commissioner.

2. What would you do to address the growth of the district?

Waipā’s growth is creating opportunities as well as pressures, and both need to be managed well. This calls for giving continued priority to modelling and planning for new subdivisions and industrial areas.

Congestion is one of the direct impacts of urban growth, so addressing CBD traffic and parking, especially in Cambridge, are priorities for me.

Industrial nodes have their own needs - attracting new businesses, connecting them to others, staff recruiting issues and exploring additional opportunities through clusters and proximity.

3. What - if anything - would you do to balance the needs of urban communities with the needs of rural communities?

I definitely want to make sure rural communities aren’t left high and dry because of urban demands and, as a rural ward councillor for 12 years, I’m across many of their concerns. Making sure our villages have the facilities and amenities they need is a priority, and our rural communities do the most travelling, so we need to ensure our roads are well maintained and as safe as possible.

4. Would you support an amalgamation of all Waikato councils?

I’m a strong supporter of local decision-making at the right scale so that efficiencies are captured, but community identity and agency aren’t lost. So currently, I’m not behind an all-of-Waikato-councils amalgamation, but I’ve been part of the Waikato Waters Done Well CCO work, and it seems to make sense to explore with those participating councils options to join up operations and services.

5. What is your view on the future of Māori wards?

The Māori ward councillor has been a positive move for us by providing a voice to part of our community that wasn’t expressly present around our council table previously. This improves our decision-making.

6. In your view, what is the biggest challenge the district is facing over the next term? How will you approach it?

I see the biggest challenge as the water services transition and what our residual council looks like and costs to run. We all want the new waters CCO to be a success, but there are risks in the transition that need to be managed closely: performance monitoring of local service delivery, including actioning customer requests, the timing and delivery of new capital works so they co-ordinate logically with other growth infrastructure investment, and ultimately that communities feel their voice is heard within what will be a much larger entity than they are used to dealing with.

7. What new projects would you like to see the new council support?

I’m wary of any new projects that might demand more of struggling ratepayers. However, I’m interested in exploring alternative ways to fund projects whose capital cost isn’t in our current Long-Term Plan budgets, including the new Cambridge Library.

8. Why should people vote for you to become mayor?

With the highest rates rises in the country over the last three years and affordability pressures, a Waipā mayor with financial strengths is absolutely critical. I am the candidate with the strongest financial and governance credentials who can deliver on these, by setting a structured plan, agreeing targets and regular monitoring results, just like the Whanganui council did in achieving its 2.2% rates increase.