By Mark Flyger: CFO – Modern Transport Group of Companies & Council Candidate Hamilton West

If you think cutting Council spending means reducing essential services, you would be wrong. What needs to be cut is unnecessary spending.

A case in point – and there are many – is Hood Street.

In 2009, Hamilton City Council undertook a $5M+ “upgrade” of Hood Street. The project was poorly planned and badly executed. Retailers were angered as both sides of the street were dug up and customers stayed away. Despite concerns raised by Council, Police and the public, planners still proceeded with low-lying “rain gardens” at a cost of $300,000. Many of them had to be removed after ACC issued a hazard notice due to safety and maintenance problems.

Who was to blame? According to Council – no one. The then-chief executive said “there was no single action, organisation or individual” responsible, while senior Council engineers admitted there was never any clear definition, control or communications around the project. The Council said it had “learnt lessons”.

Have they?

Sixteen years later Hood Street retailers – what’s left of them – are again facing disruption. This time, the street lights are being sanded and repainted (supposedly to extend their life by 20 years) and the rain gardens renewed. The budgeted cost? $268,000 (cite)

Even basic scheduling is a problem: scaffolding was erected a week before the All Blacks–France match at FMG Stadium – during a week of forecasted rain. Council staff were warned; scaffolding went up anyway, had to be removed and then re-erected the following week.

Lesson learnt? No.

Meanwhile on Victoria Street, “new” street furniture is being installed. The original plan was to bolt the seats to cobblestones – until someone pointed out the cobblestones aren’t actually fixed. Only then did Council decide to concrete them in place – in exactly the same location where they previously tried to install bike racks, until local businesses stopped it on safety grounds. Council appears to have forgotten that.

Across both projects there is no planning, no consultation with affected businesses and no regard for the cost and disruption those businesses must bear.

These “upgrades” could have been completed in half the time and for a fraction of the cost.

Have lessons been learnt?

Clearly not.

But I suppose they don’t have to, it is not their Money it is Yours…

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