Lobbying Leads to Listening on Trees

Thanks no doubt to the amount of email traffic flying around on the issue of tree nominations for scheduling in the Whau Ward the Local Board had a change of heart at their meeting tonight in New Lynn.

After listening to a public forum plea by Mels Barton to not only allow the public to nominate trees via their Board, but to be proactive and encourage public involvement in the process, the agenda debate took an interesting turn.

The recommendation that the Whau Local Board nominate trees itself for scheduling was lost, with only mover Catherine Farmer (Future West) and seconder & Chair Derek Battersby (Independent) voting for it. Members Duncan McDonald, Kathryn Davie, Sandy Taylor and Lily Ho all voted against.

Battersby then moved a recommendation that the Board invite nominations from the public for scheduling. This motion was amended by Catherine Farmer to enable the Board to advertise to encourage nominations and this was eventually supported unanimously by the Board.

So common sense finally prevails and the good people of the Whau ward will be able to nominate notable trees to be included in the District Plan schedule via their Local Board by 31 March.

Unfortunately those nominations will not actually be supported by the Board, who clearly don't want to be seen taking sides with the trees, but at least they will be passed onto Council for processing rather than being blocked.

In fact Duncan McDonald seemed more concerned about the fact that he might be prevented from sitting on consent hearings for chopping trees down until it was pointed out that there wouldn't be any more of these once the blanket protection was lifted. Sorry Duncan you'll need to find another job after 2012 - you can thank Nick Smith for that one!

So lets hope the Whau community takes the opportunity to nominate all its culturally, historically and ecologically notable trees to its Board so that beyond 1 Jan 2012 there may be some greenery left in the Whau.