CCC representation review: What is it and why does it matter?

Current Ward Boundaries in Christchurch

Christchurch City Council is currently reviewing the way we vote for our local councillors and community board members.  All councils must review representation across their territory and ensure that it is fair and that every ward has similar sized populations.  Every three years, half of the country’s territorial local authorities go through this process.  Many reviews are not a big deal, however for Christchurch this year, it is.  

Why?  Because people have moved since the earthquakes so the existing wards are very uneven and need considerable changes.  In addition to this, Banks Peninsula District Council amalgamated with Christchurch City Council in 2005 and were permitted to vary their representation from what the Local Government Electoral Act law stipulates while the new arrangements bedded in.  Ten years is adequate bedding-in time, so now the Banks Peninsula communities need to be brought into some kind of alignment with other parts of the City. 

Halswell is affected by both the shift in population to this side of the City, and by the  need to ensure that Banks Peninsula communities are both in a ward of similar population size to the other wards in the City and in wards that do not feel wrong or “foreign.”  

The wards as they stand do not serve Halswell particularly well, given that Halswell arguably has no councillors and no community board members actually living in the area.  Both of the Councillors that represent us live in Riccarton and our community board members are mostly Riccarton and Hornby based, with one in Hoon Hay/ Hilmorton (I must add here that I’m NOT casting aspersions on the community board, who are all nice people. I am just commenting that they do not live in our community).

Interestingly, figures indicate that Christchurch has a very low number of councillors per head of population when compared to other cities in New Zealand.  In Christchurch, each councillor represents 27,435 people, whereas in Wellington, for example, there are about 14,102 people per councillor and in Dunedin there are 8,823 per councillor.  Many feel that we should increase the number of councillors to bring ourselves more into line with other Councils around New Zealand and because of the extra work resulting from the earthquake.   

An idea being presented is to have 20 wards around the City and Peninsula with a councillor from each one.  This would bring it more into line with representation in other cities and, arguably, spread the load a bit more the Councillors who are currently managing a huge amount between them.  There would be one community board for every three wards so the number of community boards would be similar to what we have now.

 

What do you think? Do you have any thoughts about this?  Would you like to know more?  The Council have talked to many people about this and are now running workshops to get feedback on their ideas.  They are keen to hear what people think.  

There will be a workshop about this on Thursday 12^th March 2015 in the Harvard Lounge at 31 Corsair Drive in Wigram.  You can find out more at http://www.ccc.govt.nz/thecouncil/haveyoursay/representativereview.aspx.  If you can’t attend look at the forms on the webpage and provide your views there!    

Market Progress February 2015

The Halswell Community Project team would like to extend a very big thank you to St John of God Hospital, our lovely stall holders and all the people who came to our market on Sunday 25th January. Thanks also to Craig Crawford of Evolution Creative for the design of our posters and signs. 

We estimate around 1000 people popped in to check out the place and the market, and we heard some pretty enthusiastic comments about the site.  The vege vendors did a roaring trade and many people bought some food or coffee and had a picnic in the lovely grounds.   Many just perused the craft, clothing, plant and second hand stalls looking at what was on offer.

For those of us in the Halswell Community Project who have been working hard to get these markets running it was heartening to see a very diverse range of people turning up and enjoying the market and the grounds.   These numbers really help us because they make it more likely that our vendors will return for future markets.



The Community Project team also got the news in late December that we have been allocated $10,000 by the Canterbury Community Trust to help us get consent to run the market on a regular basis.  We still have some negotiating to do with the site owners and we'll need to think about how the site might work if we want to go weekly in a year or two.   Still, it is now starting to feel as if we have a good chance of getting this baby off the ground!   We look forward to our next market and the St John of God Picnic on the 22nd February 2015 and hope to see you there.

Like the Halswell Community Market page on Facebook for regular updates and information about the stall holders and any deals coming up at the market!

Timebanking: What about it in Halswell?

Timebanking is catching on around New Zealand and around Christchurch.  What is it?  Well it is a kind of barter system but it is one that helps people get to know their community and the skills available within it.  As such it is also a way to build community.

In timebanking, you register and then you can then advertise your services – and these might include anything from cleaning, gardening, woodworking, handyman skills, fixing electronic stuff, sewing, mending clothes, cooking, helping others with their computer, babysitting, driving someone somewhere, or anything you can think of!  You can also advertise for someone with skills. 

The beauty of a timebank is you might garden for Bob but then you might not need Bob’s skills in return.  Instead, you can use the skills of Felicity who might build you a bookshelf.  Bob might then deliver leaflets for a community group (yes community groups can join the time bank too!) and Felicity might get someone to help her with her computer.  This broad marketplace makes easy to swap skills across the community. 

People can accrue time or they can gift some of their time to a community group of their choice or to the community chest.  The community chest might be used to help out people who need assistance but who may not be well enough (for example) to pay back the time.    

At the Halswell community Project, we are starting to think about starting up a timebank.  We see it as a long term project and are interested in talking and meeting with anyone who thinks this might be a good idea and who might be prepared to start trying this out in Halswell.  We’d like to start small and try things out so we can iron out the kinks before we build into something big.  

What do you think about this?  Is it of interest?   Comment below or get in touch with us through our website at  www.halswellcommunity.net.nz.

Why is it taking so long to set up a market?

I’ve talked to a lot of people about setting up the market and people are always surprised that it is not as easy as they thought!  Why is it taking us so long to get going?  Here's a couple of reasons:

1.  We need consent from the City Council.  This process is going to cost us in the region of $10,000 (and no that is not a mistake!) in council fees and planning costs.  Clearly, we are not going to make enough money out of the market as is is currently running to pay for that, so we need to convince any potential funders that this market is a going concern.
   Applying for funding takes a lot of time – not so much for writing the applications, but for waiting until decisions are made.  It usually takes a couple of months for these decisions to come out and if you miss out (as we have recently), then you have to start again and find another suitable funder, make an application and wait to hear a decision.  Until we have the money, we can’t really get going because a large part of the money is needed to pay the planners who can help us put our application together.
2. Before we can even apply for consent we need to find a long term home – and we need to be sure about it because consent is granted for a site, and if we need to shift sites, then we need to get another consent.
   St Luke’s Church cannot be that home because, as many of you will know, the parking around there is terrible, and there is no way that we would get consent to do a weekly market on any site on State Highway 1.
   The CCC consent team have told us to avoid CCC public land because doing so means a lot more hoops to jump through, and the costs go up as well. They recommend a school site or something similar.
   So we are interested in using one of the schools in the area as a site for the market. At this stage, we are waiting until Halswell School can be in the running because we think that perhaps this would be our best bet, if they are up for it. At the moment, they are not, because of the building that is still going on there.

Having run a few markets last year, we now know that we can run a market, although we are not getting the numbers that might make us thinkg we could do it weekly at this stage.  To be convinced we need to see good numbers turning up this year.  Good numbers also would encourage us to continue putting in the work and energy needed to do this.
So please, do make the effort to come along and to tell your friends about it and get them along too.  The more people that come, the better the range of vendors will be which will make the market more varied and fun.  If we are to pull this off, your active support is critical!

Business Mentoring talk to the Halswell Business Network

On Monday 15^th Jill Taiaroa from the Canterbury Development Corporation came and spoke to our Halswell business network. Jill has been involved with business mentoring since It started in 1991 and gave us a useful overview of the service.  She gave us a brief history and outline of the business mentoring services which was started in 1991 and has been very successful in helping many businesses right across New Zealand. 

The service is available to small businesses in Canterbury.  Businesses pay a $150 + GST registration fee which provides access for to free business mentoring for two years. This is possible because business mentors work completely voluntarily.  They are usually retired businesspeople that come from a range of backgrounds who make themselves available to the business mentoring service.  They are people who step forward to pass on some of the things that they have learned working in their own businesses.  They provide a CV and are checked by the teams of people who administrate the service around the country.

Jill and her small team at CDC field enquiries, find out what a business most needs and then matches them with a mentor according to their needs. Over the two years some businesses may have a few different mentors who can each help them with different aspects of their business. 

You can find out more at  http://www.businessmentors.org.nz/ and you can also apply for mentoring from that website.

Jill’s talk elicited many questions and quite a bit of discussion amongst the businesspeople that attended that went on for some time after she left.  Overall it was a pleasant meeting – thanks to Kate for providing food and drink and to all who helped make this meeting happen. Thanks also to Jill for coming to speak. 

Any others who were there - please add something that you found very useful or interesting from the meeting in the comments below (it might also be useful and interesting to other business people who could not make it to the meeting)

Markets starting up again

It’s spring and we are working to get our community markets off the ground again.  So grab a bag and a sunhat, and come on down to St Luke’s Church Grounds and have some fun.

Our vision for these markets is that they are for the community and as much as possible by the community.  What does that mean? 

The Halswell Community Project has the goal of supporting other community organisations, local businesses and all Halswell residents.  We already do this with our Website (Halswellcommunity.net.nz), community E Newsletter and Halswell Community Facebook Page.

The markets are another step.  At a recent meeting, some of our young people commented that there is nowhere in Halswell that is central where people can hang out and bump into other people.  This is something that the HCP Committee have noted for some time, and one of the reasons why we are setting up the market.  It is one way of providing a regular place for local people to get together and bump into other people.  We were really pleased to see people chatting to others and having their kids playing together out the back while they did so. 

A local family business and their stall at the Market in early 2014

We also see it as a way to support local businesses and clubs.  Quite a number of local groups clubs and businesses were vendors at our markets last year, and it is shaping up that way this year.   For clubs, having a stall at the market is a good way to both fundraise and raise awareness of their activities.  For businesses it is mostly a good way to raise awareness of their goods and services.  This is what makes our market quite different to most of the other markets around Christchurch and the reason why we call this a community market.   

We want to find ways to make it even more useful for the local community.  We are, for example planning to have a notice board on site where people can put up their notices.  If you have suggestions then let us know below.

We DO need more stalls that sell food – cheese, fruit and veges, bread and even meats.  If you know anyone who might be interested in selling any of these things then let us (and them) know!  

And do come down to St Luke’s (where the playcentre is) in Halswell Road, meet some of your neighbours and support the vendors that are there.  We‘d like to see this market grow  into a weekly market but it needs more people coming to it before that can happen.