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Post by Brent George on Dec 10, 2019 4:37:40 GMT
The West Coast often doesn't fit within the 'normal' rules for planning and building and the environment. And this is yet another example: Stuff - Politics: 10-Dec-2019
But why should it have too? The Coast is a unique environment with a seemingly symbiotic balance of human habitation and natural flora and fauna. (With a few exceptions perhaps...) So why should a national environmental "rule" about wetlands (in this case) that may be suitable for many other NZ locations be enforced on the West Coast when it is obviously nonsensical?
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Post by Brent George on Feb 25, 2020 4:33:11 GMT
And a related story "at the heart of the debate"... Stuff - Politics: 21-Feb-2020One of the many that will percolate through over the next wee while I expect.....
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Post by Brent George on Apr 24, 2020 3:02:07 GMT
Councils around the country are being made to identify wetlands and SNAs in their districts, including on private land, in line with the Government's national policy statements on freshwater and indigenous biodiversity. But council leaders and Iwi working on a new district plan to cover the whole coast are asking if Māori reserves could be exempted from the regime. This may be challenged by the West Coast Regional Council: Stuff - National: 24-April-2020
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Post by Brent George on Jun 10, 2021 20:23:15 GMT
Far North District Council - Have Your Say Document Feedback period closes midnight Friday 11 June.Our District is home to a range of unique landscapes, species and habitats, many of which are under threat. Council is required to identify these habitats and to protect them through a District Plan. While there are already rules in the current District Plan to manage these habitats, we are now required to identify these areas and manage them more specifically in a new District Plan. This new plan is still in draft. STOP PRESS: The Mayor for the Far North DC - John Carter - met with Associate Environment Minister Hon. James Shaw and Minister of Local Government Hon. Nanaia Mahuta on 10-June-21 to discuss concerns with the progression of SNA implementation in the wake of a significant landowner outcry over the "taking of private land holdings". The Ministers have written to Councils around New Zealand encouraging some of them to stop their work on designating land to be significant natural areas (SNAs) in the interim. Stuff - Politics: 09-June-2021Massive public opposition against new significant natural areas biodiversity classifications for thousands of hectares of land. Stuff - Pou-Tiaki: 26-May-2021Ngāti Hau iwi say they are concerned about Northland councils’ project to identify significant natural areas (SNA), saying it is yet another plan to control Māori-owned land in the Far North. Last year the Far North District Council and the other Northland councils worked on a project to map and identify (SNA) within each district. Mapping identifies approximately 42 per cent of the Far North district contains these potentially sensitive environments. This is an increase from 30 per cent when it was last mapped in the 1990s.
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Post by Brent George on Jun 13, 2021 23:07:46 GMT
The Detail: What is the issue with Significant Natural Areas?The Detail is a daily news podcast produced for RNZ by Newsroom and is published on Stuff with permission. Stuff - National: 14-June-2021
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Post by Brent George on Oct 27, 2021 2:06:41 GMT
Most farmers have no intention of destroying native bush just to get in ahead of new rules protecting significant natural areas (SNAs), a West Coast farmer and District Councillor says. West Coast Regional Council Chairman Allan Birchfield is advising landowners to clear potential SNAs if they can legally do so, before the new combined district plan draft comes out next January. Stuff - Politics: 27-Oct-2021
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Post by Brent George on Nov 22, 2021 21:43:05 GMT
Grey area for significant natural areas on West CoastStuff - National: 23-Nov-2021Farmers who agreed to protect native bush on their land 15 years ago should not have to go through the significant natural area (SNA) process again, Grey District Council leaders have declared. The Grey council representatives threw a spanner in the works at this month's meeting of the Tai o Poutini Plan committee by taking an independent stance on the issue of SNAs.
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Post by Brent George on Dec 13, 2021 4:55:42 GMT
Significant natural areas great if you have the space - West Coast farmerStuff - Politics: 13-Dec-2021
Telling farmers to protect what they've been protecting for a hundred years was never going to go down well on the West Coast. But having a significant natural area (SNA) or even several on your land need not be an outrageous imposition – if you have scale. At least that's been the experience of one of the region's biggest landholders, Ken Ferguson, of Waipuna Station. The Grey Valley spread he farms with his brother Mark has been in the care of their family since the 1860s and has 60 hectares set aside in significant natural areas.
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Post by Brent George on May 18, 2022 3:45:00 GMT
Bumpy path for significant natural areas to be recognised on the West CoastStuff - National: 18-May-2022After years of heated debate, significant natural areas (SNAs) will be identified throughout the entire West Coast, the Te Tai o Poutini Plan Committee has decided.
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Post by Brent George on Jun 19, 2023 19:55:45 GMT
Council 'more interested in the line on the map than the actual landform' - farmer in legal battleStuff - National: 20-June-2023A Dunedin farmer took a local council to court after a large chunk of his property was mapped as being part of a significant landscape. Bruce Norrish appealed a decision by the Dunedin City Council (DCC) to the Environment Court, which released its decision this month. That decision noted Norrish had owned and farmed a 80ha property at Pigeon Flat Rd, about 9km north of Dunedin, for over four decades. But aspects of that property came into dispute when the DCC mapped half of his property as coming inside a new area found to be of a Significant Natural Landscape (SNL), as part of the Second Generation Plan. Norrish was concerned that the SNL would interfere with his use of his land, which includes a pine plantation
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