A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.
Opinion
It’s no surprise that roading makes up the lion’s share of the $1.168 billion requested from the Government in the Cyclone Recovery Plan released this week by Gisborne District Council — $820 million, or 70 percent of the total.
The funding request (yes, request — not an allocation as we
incorrectly reported last Saturday based on a misleading council media release) uses upper estimates for roading investment, probably wisely . . . the range for the rebuilding of local roads is $305m-$420m of “immediate funding required to be safe, protected and connected”, and $200m-$400m “required for resilience”.
This is just for the local roads that GDC is responsible for; investment required for our state highways is listed as “unknown” — something for Waka Kotahi to work out, hopefully based on plenty of engagement with local communities, but it would be a fair assumption that fixing and building resilience into SH35 and SH2 would cost around a further $1bn.
Other big expenditure items in the recovery plan are $73m to build resilience into the city’s main water supply system; $39.8m to restore damaged stopbanks and accelerate flood protection projects (eg the Waipaoa western side upgrade); $49.4m to instal processing facilities for woody debris; and $25.2m for the core response such as silt removal, recovery and risk assessments.
It also requests $65m for the continuation of 20 Jobs for Nature projects, focused on recovery and climate resilience, for the next three-to-five years. The district already received $65m for these projects, for employment and biodiversity outcomes, as part of Covid-19 response funding over three years.
