Papamoa residents' petition opposes emergency housing 'village'

Social Housing Minister Alfred Ngaro says he is disappointed to hear that people were opposed to a development that would help other ordinary Tauranga families. Photo/File

A coalition of Papamoa residents has lodged a petition opposing the development of an emergency housing "village" in the suburb.

The opposition has disappointed the minister leading the development.

Papamoa's Grahame Smith, who helped organise and circulate the petition, said 112 people who lived near the Opal Drive site had signed the petition, copies of which were presented to Tauranga City Council and Bay of Plenty MP Todd Muller on Monday.

A 19-unit village is planned for the vacant 6500sq m council-owned block in Opal Drive, where families could stay and receive support until they were ready to move into permanent accommodation. The average stay would be about 12 weeks.

Housing New Zealand and the Ministry of Social Development have lodged a resource consent application for the village with Tauranga City Council.

Last month they were aiming to start shifting pre-assembled houses on to the site in late August.

The housing would be managed by a local transitional housing provider, yet to be appointed.

Grahame Smith said neighbours of the site were outraged at the deal being done before consulting the community.

Mr Smith and the other Papamoa residents who organised the petition called for the Memorandum of Understanding to be cancelled and for the council to withdraw the land for lease.

Mr Smith said the neighbourhood had met with Bay of Plenty MP Todd Muller and Mount Maunganui/Papamoa ward councillor Steve Morris and were waiting for further information to be provided by the council and the minister's office.

Mr Muller confirmed he had attended two meetings in the homes of worried residents.

He said he had heard their concerns and explained the rationale behind emergency housing and later fed their concerns back to Social Housing Minister Alfred Ngaro, the council and the ministry.

Mr Ngaro said he was disappointed to hear people were opposed to a development that would help other ordinary Tauranga families.

"Many families are in situations that we could all find ourselves in, were an unfortunate set of circumstances to happen."

Those might include people unable to find or afford a new rental after theirs was sold, or people struggling with a reduced income after a separation or injury.

"The point is these are local families and they need our help."

He said the community had been told about the proposed plans as early as possible, once the details were clear enough to share and lodge a consent application.

"We've been extremely open with the community, offering a contact person for people to call and speak with and have even held a drop-in community meeting last week where people could raise any concerns they had with both council and ministry officials."

Tauranga City Council communications manager Aimee Driscoll said the council had received the petition on Tuesday afternoon.

"Under our standing orders, we are required to receive all petitions at a suitable council meeting. This will be included as an agenda item at the next council meeting on Tuesday, July 18 at 1pm," she said.