KEY POINTS:
A property developer and a landscaper face fines of up to $10,000 after illegal earthworks carried out during a Northland development damaged an area of conservation land, including four historic Maori sites.
Developer Trevor Alexander Love and Russell landscaper Christopher Mark McSweeney have admitted damaging conservation land while working on a housing development on the Purerua Peninsula in the Bay of Islands last year.
Love pleaded guilty in the Whangarei District Court to interfering with natural features of a conservation area, and McSweeney admitted interfering with historic features of a conservation area.
Tauranga company Springfield No. 1, which jointly owns the land being developed, has also admitted taking topsoil from a conservation area.
Other charges against Love, McSweeney and Love's company, Cobham Investments, were dropped.
The charges were laid by the Department of Conservation after an officer noticed earthworks on a private development had encroached on the adjacent Opete Creek marginal strip.
Marginal strips aim to protect the natural environment and provide areas for public access and recreation.
A summary of facts said that as a result of the earthworks 570m of the strip, which was naturally undulating, had been smoothed over. In some parts the entire width of the strip was affected by the earthworks.
Vegetation and soil from the Crown-owned conservation land was stripped and illegally stockpiled on the development site.
Love told a conservation officer he had authorised the work on the marginal strip boundary and said his intention had been to remove gorse and other weeds and regrass the area.
The illegal work was carried out between February 20 and April 10 last year.
Love said he was aware of the marginal strip and had not asked the department for permission to carry out any work on the land.
McSweeney told the conservation officer he had been contracted to do landscaping work for the development next to the strip.
He was aware of where the marginal strip boundary was and said he, too, had not sought permission to carry out work on it.
The summary said an archaeologist had surveyed the marginal strip and discovered four historic Maori sites had been affected as a result of the earthworks.
Love, McSweeney and Springfield No. 1 were to be sentenced by Judge Laurie Newhook yesterday but the case had to be adjourned because of a dispute over the extent of archaeological and environmental damage caused by the earthworks.
A disputed facts hearing and sentencing is scheduled for November 19.
Love and McSweeney are each liable for a fine of $10,000 or a year in jail.
- Northern Advocate
