The Board of Inquiry has delivered their draft decision and report. The decision is not the one we were hoping for, but isn’t too surprising. We thought at the end of the Hearing it could go either way.

You can find the report on the EPA website – the decision and report are 326 pages long, and the associated conditions are in a separate 96 page document. It’s worth reading through that, especially if you presented a particular situation in your submission, to see whether your needs have been adequately covered.

Obviously, we’re disappointed. 3 years of hard yakka to get to this point and we deserved something better than this. However, the game’s not over till the Minister sings, as it were, and this is only the draft report. Our job now is to go through it and the conditions and advise where errors of fact have been made. Under the RMA, we’re unable to comment on the decision itself to the Board.

The conditions may produce a situation where it is too expensive for the project to continue, which would be great for us. That’s why we have to read them carefully to understand the project implications.

The Board will produce the final edited version on 12 April and it’s only at that point we can really sit down and review our options. Because it went through a BoI, we can’t appeal the decision except on points of law, and we have to wait for the final report before we can tie any of those down. There are other avenues to explore, but I’m not going to discuss those until we’re ready to initiate – no point in letting NZTA know our plans in advance!

I want to reiterate to you that we haven’t given up. We’re short on resources (when haven’t we been?) but this is our home and our community and we’ll fight to the end. As I said at the Hearing end, I am very proud of the work we did, in the face of enormous odds, and very proud to be associated with the people of Kāpiti who submitted. I honestly thought we had done enough – now, I have to read the report to find out why the Board didn’t think so.

Kia kaha

Mark Harris
Secretary, Save Kapiti Inc.

Evidence is before the court!!!

With the generous help of our supporters, we have been able to submit powerful evidence in defence of our community to the upcoming Board of Inquiry (please see the Submitters’ Evidence on the EPA website).

It’s great to see such strong and compelling arguments and witnesses to carry the concerns of so many Kapiti residents forward in areas such as Urban Design, Town Planning, Geotechnical issues, Social and Economic effects and of course Traffic and Transport.

We have been able to pay for things thus far, but we need extra help to get  through the court process itself -a lawyer and 7 x expert witnesses and their time need to be accounted for!!

So…

Kapiti musicians have come together to support us in a one-off benefit concert on Saturday 27th October. All proceeds to the Save Kapiti Inc Board of Inquiry effort.

Top of the bill is a one-time re-formation of the late Leon Kiel’s band Groove Assembly, plus supporting acts Skapiti, The Intenders and Matiu Te Huki and My Golden Soul.

We have 200x tickets for sale at $20 or $25 each. If you can’t make it yourself…then sell a ticket or 2. Please leave no empty seats!!

UPDATE: There are 2 ticket prices – $20 and $25 – because the higher price includes a copy of the “Message to the Minister” 2009 CD which has been repressed just for this occasion. Our thanks to Paul “Boggy” Bognuda for organising this and the artists involved in the CD for giving their permission.  It’s a great CD and a number of songs from it were included in Bos O’Sullivan’s film “Through the Heart”.

Please contact Loretta (04) 904 0844  to book tickets, which can be paid for directly to our bank account  (Save Kapiti, The National Bank, Waikanae, 06-0592-008-6580-01 and put your name in the reference box) and can then be picked up on the night from our glamourous ticketing staff.

It will be a great night out of relaxing music and a chance to reflect on this long battle and mingle and chat with the team that have spent so long putting the case for Saving kapiti  together.

(Sales table, art auction, raffles and finger food also, so bring your spare coins!!)

Despite the cramped timeframe and the denial of our requests for extending it, we managed to get our submission finished and in on time (4:16pm, to be exact). Our experts worked hard to analyse the data and our BoI team also put in the hours to draft, crit and redraft multiple times. Big thanks to Nicky for coordinating the drafting and doing the polishing. So, now we take a (small) breather, and then we start collecting all the things we are going to discuss with the Board.

Here’s our final result, for your reading pleasure.

In other news, the EPA have published the Hearing Procedures (PDF)  for the Board and the timetable for the Inquiry. So, we now have a definite start date for the hearing of November 12.

Better living everyone!

1. Which proposal your submission is in respect of and the date of the application;
2. Who the submission is from (full name, postal address, a phone number and an email address. Note, though, that this will become public as the submissions will be published on the EPA website;
3. Explain who you are. You might want to state that you are an affected party because of the location of your property. You might want to state your education and experience in a particular area, your membership affiliations you have if they relate to what you are writing about and whether you have the support of an organisation or other people in your community;
4. Whether you support or oppose the proposal;
5. A summary of your key reasons for your submission in bullet points that are easy to read;
6. Whether you wish to speak to your submission at a Hearing.

Only 2 days left to get your submission in!  5.00pm on Friday 10 August is the closing time for submissions on the Mackays to Peka Peka Expressway proposal.

It doesn’t have to be huge – no novel required. Just put something in your own words about the things that concern you with the proposal.

The main title page is important. Make sure that all required details are present and correct.

Then list the issues that worry you, e.g. visual appearance, truck noise, changed traffic flows  etc.

Bullet points are fine. Sentences are better. Remember: if you don’t list it in the submission, you won’t be able to talk about it at the hearing. But if you do list it, you don’t have to talk about it at the hearing if you’ve found it’s no longer important. You don’t even have to speak at the hearing – but if you don’t say you want to in your submission, you won’t get a chance.

1-1.5 pages should be ample, but it can be as long as you want. Remember, though, the Board have to read each one. You don’t want them disregarding what you say because you took 300 words to say what you could have said in 10.

A Health Impact Assessment (HIA) of the Kapiti expressway shows there are likely to be significant health impacts for anyone living within 200m of the proposed road.  Public health lecturer Dr Marie O’Sullivan, who has been commissioned to research and write the report, says most households interviewed along the route have an existing health condition which would be exacerbated by being located next to a motorway.

The HIA was independently commissioned by concerned members of the public so that individuals can easily get factual information on the health effects of living next to a major road based on independent research.  It includes information from peer reviewed scientific literature and organizations around the world including the World Health Organization (WHO) and the British Medical Association (BMA).  Dr O’Sullivan says “NZTA have not included information on health impacts in any of their 36 reports on the effects of the expressway.  It is dangerous to assume that there are negligible or no health impacts from a project this big.  When the British Medical Association says that long term exposure to air pollutants decreases life expectancy, it’s a good idea to pay attention”.

Click here to read the Health Impact Assessment (PDF 2MB)

One of the services they provide is the Friend of Submitter:

Richard Peterson of Harrison Grierson Consultants Ltd has been appointed as an independent ‘Friend of Submitter’ to provide assistance to potential submitters. This service is available to advise people on the process for lodging submissions, how they might capture their views in a submission, and what steps they will be required to take after their submission is lodged. Mr Peterson cannot advise you on whether to make, or what to include in a submission.

See their website for contact details. Richard will be hosting drop in sessions in our communities, and in Wellington. See the timetable below.

The EPA also told us that it was most likely that the hearings would be held on the Coast as well, as the Board is keen to come to the community, rather than the other way around. They do seem to be doing their best to make the process as equitable for us as they can, but we’ve made the point that NZTA has a lot more cash and resources to throw at this than ordinary citizens. They said that was a point worth making in our submissions.

Speaking of submissions, we have just put up Anna’s presentation from the Submission Workshops as well as an example Submission that one of our committee members has written, and had a tick from the lawyer on. You can see the level of detail that you have to go to (or not go to, which is more important). Remember that you will have almost 10 weeks (according to the EPA) between the Submission close off date and the hearings to gather your detailed evidence, so you only need to cover the points in your submission that you want to speak to. If you don’t mention it in the Submission, you can’t speak about it at the hearing. The timeline will be decided by the Board once they get all the submissions in and work out how long they need to prepare for the hearing.

More news as we get it.

Friend of Submitter Sessions

Thursday 26 July 2012

Saturday 28 July 2012

Tuesday 31 July 2012

Monday 6 August 2012

5.30 pm – 7.30 pm:   Rimu Meeting Room, Coastlands Shoppingtown, State Highway 1, Paraparaumu (Countdown Entrance)

Environment Minister Amy Adams officially called in the Mackays to Peka Peka Expressway proposal today. We received the Call in notice this afternoon So, the clock is finally ticking for submissions. My calculations say that the closing date for submissions will be 3 August, but I’ll confirm that when it appears on the EPA website.

The board of inquiry will be chaired by retired High Court Judge Sir John Hansen. Also on the board are Environment Commissioner David Bunting, Glenice Paine and Mark Apeldoorn.

It’s a relief to finally have it underway, to be honest. We’ll put up any more information here as we receive it. Keep Calm and Carry On!

Expressway Submission Workshop – Raumati

The Board of Inquiry for the Expressway will be asking for submissions soon. (No, we don’t know when yet. We are still waiting on the Minister to make the official decision.)

Save Kapiti is holding a free workshop at Te Ra School, Poplar Ave Raumati, Wed 27^th June, 7.30pm-9.00pm. Anna Carter, Planning Consultant, will explain what needs to go into a good submission. Contact Rachel Mackay wilmac@paradise.net.nz or 04 9701374 for information.