Hearing for camping submissions

Larry Foster

Opinion

There are no official council meetings this week, but the council's Regulatory Hearings committee will be hearing submissions on the draft Freedom Camping Bylaw 2021 on Wednesday.

Consultation on this bylaw ran from March 1 to April 5, 2021, collecting 341 submissions with the 11 proposals receiving between 59 percent and 80 percent support. The draft Freedom Camping Bylaw 2021 replaces “summer camping” (which was camping in registered camping areas with a paid permit) with “seasonal freedom camping”. The draft bylaw establishes seasonal freedom camping from Labour weekend to April 30, providing for the same multi-week camping in tents and vehicles previously undertaken at our summer camping areas. Seasonal freedom camping will require a permit, chemical toilet, and compliance with council's camping conditions.

Our 2016 bylaw established a small number of permitted freedom camping areas, being the Marina carpark, Kaiti beach and Makorori carpark. These areas had large capacity of 20 to 30 vehicles each. The high number of campers has been identified as having detrimental impact on adjacent public facilities, the environment and public access to those areas.

The draft bylaw seeks to better manage this through the establishment of five smaller, restricted freedom camping areas in and around the city.

The main changes to council's current freedom camping offering in the city, as consulted on, are:

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The region would be restricted to self-contained vehicles only, except for the seasonal freedom camping areas.

Freedom camping on streets and in carparks in the Gisborne urban area, Wainui, Okitu, Sponge Bay and Makorori would be limited to five small restricted self-contained vehicle-only areas at Midway carpark (6 max), Kaiti Beach (8 max), Bright Street carpark (4 max), the Pines (4 max) and Makorori (8 max).

After the consultation process, staff are now recommending four changes to the draft bylaw.

1. Council creates a seasonal freedom camping area in Waipiro Bay and by subsequent resolution closes that area pending further consultation with Iritekura Marae and other affected parties.

2. Clause 9 (1)(e) be amended to clarify enforcement officers do not have the authority to enter private vehicles.

3. Council deletes the Pines carpark Okitu from schedule 2 of the draft bylaw.

4. Council increases the number of carparks available for freedom camping as follows: Midway Beach from 6 to 8 carparks; Kaiti Beach from 8 to 12 carparks; Makorori from 9 to 19 carparks.

The other freedom camping sites are: the Motu rest area; Tokomaru Bay North and South (winter only, from May 1 to Labour Weekend).

The restricted seasonal camping areas (Labour Weekend to April 30) are: Doneraille Park; Turihau Beach South, North and Point area; Pouawa Beach; Waihau Beach; Tolaga Bay; Kaiaua Beach; Tokomaru Bay South and North; Waipiro Bay. Maps of all sites are shown in the Draft Freedom Camping Bylaw 2021.

There are issues surrounding freedom camping such as homeless people and itinerant or seasonal workers living in vehicles. These issues have wider economic and social origins and are beyond the scope of a freedom camping bylaw to address. The council's bylaw is neither capable nor a suitable mechanism for managing homeless people and itinerant or seasonal workers living in vehicles. Our enforcement officers encounter homeless people every day. In most cases they know the people and their vehicles as they have spoken with them many times before, and report that for the most part homeless people adhere to the freedom camping rules better than other groups. Enforcement officers will continue to be sensitive and use discretion when dealing with homelessness, offering assistance where possible, and only using infringements when deliberate non-compliance occurs.