Lone voice opposes sale

Catherine Stewart

Tauranga councillor Catherine Stewart was the lone voice opposed to selling a prime council-owned site in the heart of Mount Maunganui.

The council yesterday considered offers to buy the 8100sq m Maunganui Rd property that houses the head office of kiwifruit marketing company Zespri. Prior to that, it was the Mount Maunganui Borough Council offices.

Among the decisions was a resolution to confirm the sale of the land in order to begin transactions with the successful bidder.

It was passed 9-1 with Cr Bev Edlin abstaining from the vote and leaving her chair for the short debate, before the council went into confidential to discuss the "multiple offers" received for the poperty at 384 to 410 Maunganui Rd.

Cr Stewart said afterwards that a lot of the people who made submissions on the sale of the block that included the Mount Library wanted all the land kept.

"It was not only about today but tomorrow and future generations. The thing about the Mount peninsula was that there was not a lot of land left."

She said the Maunganui Rd block was one of the crown jewels, as far as land was concerned.

"To purchase land at the Mount will cost a lot more in the future than it does now. If we ever had to buy a site like that in the future, the council would have to pay a premium."

A public announcement on the successful tenderer and sale price was expected to be made tomorrow, once all the parties to the process had been notified about the outcome of the meeting.

The land was offered for sale by private treaty. Marketing material said the new owner would have the opportunity to redevelop the site from the expiry of the Zespri lease in three to four years. The lease returned income of $525,000 a year. "Rarely does such a substantial development site become available in the heart of beach-side Mount Maunganui," Colliers International said in its marketing material.

Proceeds from the sale, expected to exceed $3 million, will be used to reduce debt.