Rotorua Mayor Tania Tapsell will travel to Japan and China in April for a sister-city visit, but the council says the $10,000 cost will be balanced out by other income.
Tapsell’s husband and baby daughter will travel with her, but she says this will not cost ratepayers or the council.
At a meeting last Wednesday, elected members approved the cost of her visit to Beppu in Japan and to Wuzhong District of Suzhou City in China.
An interpreter from New Zealand would join her for the Beppu leg.
The purpose of the 18-night trip was to renew community ties between Rotorua and the cities and to renew and seek new commercial relationships.
Income generated by Rotorua hosting future delegations was expected to cover the cost, from the average yearly income of $23,500.
Beppu City Mayor Yasuhiro Nagano invited Tapsell to attend the geothermal city’s 100-year anniversary celebrations.
In the agenda for the meeting, council chief executive Gina Rangi said Tapsell’s host in Beppu would cover the cost of lodgings, meals and transport as well as attendance at events for the mayoral party, totalling three people for two nights.
Other accommodation costs ranged from $235 per night at the Hilton Tokyo Narita in Japan and the Suzhou Marriott Hotel in China to $454 a night at Amanek Beppu Yula-Re in Japan. The total accommodation cost was just over $3000 for the official portion of the trip.
Rangi said the trip to Wuzhong would “optimise the opportunity” presented by the trip.
The mayor would have five non-working days in Tokyo following the celebrations in Beppu before travelling to China.
Speaking to Local Democracy Reporting after the meeting Tapsell said she was not sure what she would get up to in the Tokyo down-time.
“I’ve been fortunate to travel to many places in the world but it [Japan] has been my favourite country so far.”
Tapsell told the council she considered the trip an opportunity to remind potential visitors from both cities Rotorua was “back in business” to tourists.
Her interpreter was a Rotorua resident from Beppu, and Tapsell said her going was crucial for enabling key visits. The interpreter would join her for the celebrations.
These included visiting Beppu Shosei High School, which had been involved in a student exchange programme that had brought about 8000 students to Rotorua since 2001.
Tapsell told colleagues her family would cover her husband and daughter’s costs.
Councillor Trevor Maxwell said Tapsell and her pēpi would be “excellent ambassadors”.
He said, considering the costs, the trip was of tremendous value.
Rotorua’s two other sister cities are Klamath Falls in the United States and Lake Macquarrie in Australia.
It is part of an international Sister Cities programme aimed at fostering communications across borders to promote the mutual exchange of ideas, people and materials in cultural, educational, youth, sports, municipal, professional and technical projects.
The last time any Rotorua elected member visited Wuzhong was in 2017, and the last visit to Beppu was in 2016.
Laura Smith is a Local Democracy Reporting journalist based at the Rotorua Daily Post. She previously reported general news for the Otago Daily Times and Southland Express, and has been a journalist for four years.
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Armed police stood guard as the patched members were led out in handcuffs.