Rearranging Deckchairs isn't an Emergency Respose
You put the climate projects in, you take the climate projects out...
Good news this week: the threatened deferment (or cancellation?) of the Wheels to Wings – Papanui ki Waiwhetū major cycle route didn’t come to pass. This was news was tempered however by the decision made by the Council1 with respect to the spending of cash from the central Government’s Climate Emergency Response Fund (CERF).
Background: the Council’s capital programme is resource-constrained not funding-constrained. The limiting factor on the amount of construction activity the Council can undertake is the capacity of Council staff to plan and manage projects and of the Christchurch construction sector to deliver them. In recent years the evidence has been that around $400m in capital projects can be delivered in a financial year2, of which around $100m is in the transport area.
New money that needs to be spent in the coming financial year on projects not eligible for other funding means that already planned and funded projects need to be pulled out of next year’s programme to make room for projects brought forward from future years in the City’s Long-Term Plan that meet the criteria associated with the new money.
The agenda for this week’s meeting included a staff report recommending adding $34.5m in CERF projects to the Council’s transport capital programme for the 2023/24 financial year, while deferring 32 other projects with a total budget of $11.7m. The Wheels to Wings cycleway was on the hit list, along with public transport improvements, EV charging facilities, sections of the Ōtakaro-Avon and Ōpāwaho River major cycle routes, and more.
Side note: ahead of this week’s meeting, I found out via Cr Templeton’s Facebook page that Councillors had recently received a briefing on the Wheels to Wings, including the design, options considered, “…the extensive consultation process and why staff do not recommend deferring it”. There was no heads-up as a courtesy to our Community Board that this briefing had taken place or that the project was included in the ‘defer’ list for the upcoming meeting, and the contents of the briefing still hasn’t been shared with the Board. I’m mildly appalled to find myself now using the Council’s official information (LGOIMA) process to access the information presented to Councillors at their briefing. I’ll let you know how I get on in a future post.
On the day: the way this all played out at Wednesday’s committee meeting can be seen from the meeting minutes (and minutes attachments) and from the video from the meeting (split into a presentation from staff and Q&A and debate on the motions).
Staff brought a reduced list of CERF projects to the meeting - 11 of the original 14, with a capital cost of $25.7m. (The three previously-proposed projects that were excluded have “heavier” resource requirements and lower scope definition, said staff, and were more likely to be difficult to move through consultation and scheme design in the timeframe required by the terms of the CERF funding.)
Staff also brought a revised recommendation to defer 24 projects valued at $4.4m in order to reallocate resource to complete the CERF programme. It was emphasised by staff that the rationale behind the inclusion of CERF projects and the deferment of other projects was resourcing and deliverability considerations - it wasn’t just a question of swapping in and out a certain dollar value of projects. There seemed to be no prioritisation of projects according to the degree of emissions reduction associated with them.
The whole point of the Council’s application for CERF funding, said staff, was to accelerate Council climate response projects. Imagine my surprise then, when I found there was not one comment in the agenda, or question of staff at the meeting, on the climate response benefits of any of the projects added or deferred, or of the overall net climate impact of the set of decisions being made.
Ultimately, there was a near-unanimous decision on the day to accept the revised staff recommendations. The Wheels to Wings cycleway was saved, but other cycling projects, along with EV charging facilities and more, have been deferred. Will the spending of CERF funding translate to a net climate benefit? Without analysis of the climate impact of the projects being added and deferred, who knows?
Perhaps the city will simply deliver about the same climate impact but with some ratepayer relief by accessing some Government funding? If so, can this really be considered an ‘emergency response’?
Frankly, it seems cynical to me to apply to an ‘emergency response’ fund in the certain knowledge that success would mean the funded projects would displace others in the Council’s work programme rather than being additional. I wonder how the responsible Minister would feel if it turned out the Council’s use of Climate Emergency Response Funding was to have no net climate benefit? Personally, I’d want my money back so I could spend it elsewhere on interventions that would genuinely reduce New Zealand’s greenhouse emissions. I plan to write to the Minister asking them to take a look at the Christchurch situation.
Question for readers
What are your thoughts on the decisions made this week, and on the decision-making process? Please let me know.
The CCC’s Finance and Performance Committee is a ‘committee of the whole’, comprising all Councillors and the Mayor. The Committee is chaired by Cr Sam MacDonald.
Looking ahead, the Council’s planned capital spending remains around $400m for the coming financial year, excluding the new stadium and the post-fire recovery of the wastewater treatment plant. Future years currently look higher but will likely be adjusted down during the next Long-Term Plan process.
Sorry about the late response btw. Have just found my way to your substack. The article is still very relevant wrt to some of the oddities of Council processes and the way discussions/ thinking can get channelled.
Thanks Simon. Wow! I can't believe that you are having to LGOIMA information presented to councillors. One might expect that the information would at least be available to Community Board members. And yes, I completely agree that having a "bang for buck" analysis as part of the conversation would give a bit more credence to the decision process. Even a "back of the envelope" estimate would have been better than the current nothing.