Cockle Bay Domain restored by community

On Saturday the weather was perfect for community planting day at Cockle Bay Domain as volunteers planted around 300 natives.

Led by Matthew Brajkovich, the Friends of Cockle Bay Domain have worked to restore the local environment by removing rubbish and planting natives.

Amazing how far this reserve has come in such a short space, thanks to volunteers and support from local organisations and council. And how much work a dozen volunteers can do in a few hours!

Point View Drive clean up a community effort

On Friday I wore my new gumboots to help fundraise for youth mental health. Today I wore them as part of a community effort to clean up Point View Drive.

This area isn't technically a reserve but is a well known lookout across East Auckland. Unfortunately some people use it as a dump site for bottles, rubbish and worse. So Howick Local Board member Mike Turinsky organised the community to clean up. Awesome to have so many people helping and we removed a lot of rubbish. Disappointed that it was necessary.

Over 30 volunteers helped collect and dispose of a big pile of rubbish in a good mornings work

Residents have been reporting these issues for some time without much success. I know Mike has been working to do what he can. Now we’ve dealt with the symptoms, he's working hard to resolve some of the systemic causes, hopefully with the broad public support we saw today he can get some traction.

Mike Turinsky thanking the volunteers and explaining the next steps

Macleans Park has new friends

Great first meeting of the Friends of Macleans Park, a new community group to reduce the pests and weeds in the park while replanting and improving the natural environment.

Plenty to do but volunteers (including the local college) are keen to get started and are led by local legend Matthew Brajkovich. Great to see this supported by Auckland Council Biodiversity team, Volunteers Manager Sarah and Pest Free Howick.

More to come so follow along at the Facebook page.

Is freedom camping free enough?

On Monday evening I attended the public meeting on the proposed Freedom Camping Bylaw.

The short version is that freedom camping is legal everywhere NZ unless expressly prohibited. This is governed by the Freedom Camping Act 2011 (from Parliament) and some of the rules are out of the hands of the council.

Councils have the ability to specify areas where it's restricted or banned but they need to be able to justify it. The grounds for restrictions can be to protect an area, access to an area or the health and safety of people in the area.

For Howick there are 12 sites where freedom camping is banned and a further 7 where it's restricted to self-contained vehicles. I encourage you to look at the online maps, but there's list of each here.

Are these the only places in our community where there needs to be a restriction or ban?

In addition, Auckland Council can

• apply a temporary ban or restriction on a place;

• provide exceptions or extensions for people;

• fine people who break the rules.

Once this bylaw is passed, changing these sites will not be quick or easy so it's important that we get this correct.

The Council is looking for feedback on this proposal up until Monday 18 February. Providing feedback can be done a few different ways, but online is super easy. There's a quick form including a really clever interactive map.

So make sure you get your thoughts through on this today at the Auckland Council website

Stickers no solution to illegal dumping.

While out in Flat Bush I came across some illegally dumped rubbish which is sadly a common sight. Stopping to report it, I noticed they had bright orange stickers on them. I was stunned to discover that these were from Auckland Council, noting that the illegal dumping was being investigated.

While I applaud Auckland Councils efforts to investigate and prosecute illegal dumping, putting a sticker on them is not the solution.

Removing these eyesores as soon as practically possible must be the first priority, followed by enforcement. Absolutely we must punish the perpetrators but an orange sticker isn’t stopping anyone.

Leave behind a warning sign that the location is being monitored but clear the site. Leaving it just encourages others and leaves locals to deal with the mess.

We also need to urgently review the inorganic collection to make it work!

We can do better than this.

Rising sea levels are putting our infrastructure at risk

Local Government NZ has released a report that shows the massive risk to infrastructure from climate change.

"At only half a metre [sea level rise] there is estimated to be $2.7 billion worth of council-owned infrastructure at risk - and that doesn't count the private buildings, the government buildings, whatever that's on top of that that's being served by that infrastructure.

"It goes right up to at three metres of sea level rise, it's estimated about $14bn of council-owned infrastructure at risk."

This is great leadership from Local Government NZ - the risk to infrastructure from Climate Change is very real and we must be planning for it now.

For Auckland with 1m seawater rise, they estimate:

• $1.4B for water (drinking, storm and wastewater)

• $78.75 for roading

• $373m for 390 public buildings (community facilities, council housing, council offices, playgrounds and significant other buildings/facilities).

Auckland has begun planning for this but we need to move faster. These costs are substantial and local government cannot shoulder this cost alone and requires a coordinated response.

Read the full report here.