Mayor celebrates end of long road

CHB Mayor Peter Butler shares and celebrates the news at the CHB District Council offices with staff members Bridgette Winchester (left), Nicola McKay, Karen Bray and Jenny Kingston. Photo / Nicki Harper

Central Hawke's Bay Mayor Peter Butler's phone was red hot within moments of yesterday's result announcement, with calls of congratulations from supporters, and other mayors around the district touching base.

The odd "whoop" could be heard out the back of the CHB District Council offices, where staff were celebrating closing the door on a long period of uncertainty surrounding the reorganisation campaign.

Mr Butler said he had no idea what to expect leading up to the final result but concluded that "it went out to the whole of Hawke's Bay and Hawke's Bay has spoken".

In Central Hawke's Bay, yesterday afternoon's provisional result showed 3608 people voted against amalgamation while 2608 were in favour and the voter return was at 64.55 per cent - 10 per cent higher than the return for the local body elections in 2013.

"I think people listened to the arguments and because this was a single-issue item there was a higher voter turnout," Mr Butler said.

Although not a landslide, he took the result as endorsement of the stance he adopted when elected and has held ever since.

"When you think at the last election, I was only 300 votes in front of Trish Giddens who campaigned on amalgamation - we now have a 1000-vote majority."

He expressed relief that the process was now over.

"This has been hanging over our heads for quite a few years and it has not been possible to make any changes while the prospect of becoming an amalgamated council has been in the background.

"Changes could have happened quite some time ago, but even within our own council when we have suggested something there's been a reluctance to move until amalgamation was resolved."

He thanked the councillors who had supported his stance, Maitland Manning, Terry Kingston, Mark Williams and Sally Butler.

He said he held no grudges against councillors whose opinions had differed and that he was looking forward to "just getting on with it".

He said he would be focusing on pushing shared services and more streamlining and collaboration, even though his stance was at odds with Hastings mayor Lawrence Yule.

"I go to Napier or Hastings about once every 10 days and am very happy to work with Lawrence and the Hastings council - they're our next-door neighbour."

A key platform in the pro-amalgamation lobby's campaign in Central Hawke's Bay was to question the ability of the district's ageing and declining population rating base to sustainably fund and improve existing services in the district.

Mr Butler said this was not a huge concern.

"We are going to have the dam - that will happen in Central Hawke's Bay and when it does CHB will be the mightiest little district to live in."