Northland's three mayors want to ditch NRC

Northland's three mayors have fired a shot across the bows of the Northland Regional Council and signalled their intention to sink the ship.
The mayors of Whangarei, Kaipara and the Far North  say they will commission a review of local government in Northland with a view to establishing three unitary authorities to replace the three district councils and the  regional council.
This would make the three councils - Whangarei, Kaipara and the Far North - all-powerful within their own areas and remove the layer of local government  occupied by the NRC.
The decision was made at Monday's meeting of the Northland Mayoral Forum, which involves the three mayors - Whangarei's Stan Semenoff, Far North's Wayne Brown and Kaipara's Neil Tiller - and NRC chairman Mark Farnsworth.
The NRC supports a review but think the best solution may be a single authority administering the  region from a yet-to-be-determined southern boundary to Cape Reinga.
The three mayors think Northland is too large and too diverse an area for a single governing body.
 Mr Farnsworth said he was extremely disappointed the mayors were advocating a solution "before investigating thoroughly what is the best solution for Northland".
"There are a whole lot of options that have to be considered methodically and properly - three unitaries is just one of them. Northland can't afford to have fractious fighting over local government re-organisation."
The mayoral pre-emptive strike was announced yesterday in a surprise supplementary item at the beginning of a Whangarei District Council meeting.
 Whangarei district councillors voted unanimously to authorise Whangarei chief executive Mark Simpson, in conjunction with the two other councils and the NRC, to engage a consultant to investigate reorganising local government in Northland.
Mr Simpson said the trigger for the review was the reshaping of Auckland into a super city, a model for removing one layer of local government.
The Auckland model was expected to be rolled out into other areas "sooner or later" and the forum had decided it was timely to get proactive about investigating removing a layer of governance in Northland.
Cr Merv Williams proposed the motion on the review, with Mr Semenoff saying he had earned the right because of his long-time support for unitary authorities.
"If we don't take the opportunity to say what we and our community want for our future we are are going to be told where we are going to go ... and we don't like being told where to go," said Cr Williams.
Cr Warwick Syers said three unitary authorities would make for greater efficiency.