Bruce Morris: Residents denied chance to defend their patch

Shane Waugh's new neighbours will be patients of a youth drug treatment centre. Photo / Amos Chapple

Opinion

If we're honest, we're all a bunch of nimbys. We want pubs, shopping centres, mental institutions, night clubs and prisons in our wider communities ... but not next door, thanks.

It may often be counter-productive to the best interests of our communities but who wants a funeral director, electricity sub-station or massage parlour as their neighbour?

No one, of course. So we are told what's planned, given the chance to have our say and hopefully a decision is reached that balances community needs with community rights.

Well, that's how it should work in an open democracy. But not in Lloyd Ave, Mt Albert.

As the Aucklander has reported, a "no need to tell them" attitude by Auckland Council staff has allowed a secure youth drug-addiction treatment centre in Lloyd Ave without any reference to people living next door or down the road.

The issue goes back to 1957, when the old Mt Albert Borough Council gave planning consent to establish Warrengate Hospital as a private hospital and rest home.

That status changed last year when the property moved into the hands of the Odyssey House Trust, which began operations this month.

Perhaps not surprisingly, Odyssey House kept the plans to itself. It has a reputation as an excellent drug and alcohol addiction treatment provider, but its management knows those credentials count for little when the strategy brings them to a quiet suburban street in middle Auckland.

Keeping the neighbours in the dark may seem a strange way of getting the local community on side, but it's probably better for Odyssey than thunderous public meetings undermining an initiative designed to save young lives.

The council, though, has no moral defence.

It argues that a consent made by another authority in another age fits with a dramatically altered set of circumstances in 2011 - a designation granted to a private hospital for elderly people switched overnight to a secure unit for young drug offenders.

Ian Smallburn, central resource consents manager, told the Aucklander the council didn't need to issue a new resource consent or notify the neighbourhood.

"Based on the information supplied, the council concluded the proposed activity was within the scope of the existing planning consent," he said.

Putting aside the fact the courts might find flaws in the argument that a secure unit for drug addicts could somehow ease itself into the legal status of a rest home, the council decision showed disregard for the rights of the local community.

Surely the council officers owed a duty of care to its home-owning citizens? The answer would be obvious if they had asked themselves this simple question: would we want to know beforehand if Odyssey chose to establish a treatment centre in our street?

Yet people living in Lloyd Ave were not given even the courtesy of a message declaring a fait accompli before the news was flushed out at the eleventh hour, less than a month before the first residents moved in.

A man living next door, like others in the street, received evasive answers when he asked site workers and the council what was planned.

The way he was treated contrasted with his own experience when he planned house extensions. He was required to tell his neighbours and gain the approval of all the directors of the former Warrengate Hospital.

Council staff surely know this would never have happened in the "moneyed" suburbs, not that Mt Albert could be regarded as hard-up.

Odyssey House wouldn't have tried it in Remuera, knowing the QCs would be lining up to defend their patch.

What is there to defend in Lloyd Ave? Firstly, there are the concerns over security. Elderly people in wheelchairs posed no risk and were part of the social fabric of the suburb.

But young drug addicts, many presumably with a criminal background? Who would welcome such unfortunates as neighbours?

Secondly, the selfish business of property values. Who can blame people for being angry at getting no say when their council endorses a consent that could have a direct effect on house values in the area? Would you want to buy a house across the road from a drug-treatment centre?

So much of this is about nimbyism. But mostly it is about a council that has failed a community by making decisions in a vacuum without thought for the people it serves.

It's not just about rich people protecting their pockets; it's about the right of citizens to know what is happening around them. If you doubt that, ask yourself if you would want to have your say if a drug-treatment centre was to be established in your street.

It's a question the staff at Auckland Council and the good people on the Odyssey board - judges and QCs among them, steering fine work in their field - might like to think about. Everyone knows the answer.

* Bruce Morris, a former deputy editor of the Herald, lives in Mt Albert but not within the immediate area of the treatment centre.