Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown. Photo / Michael Craig
An unmarked security car has been placed outside the apartment of Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown this past weekend and new CCTV cameras will be installed following personal social media comments that council and security officials have deemed threatening enough to require precautionary measures.
The mayor has been in the firing line from some people over the past week following the official final speedway race at Western Springs nine days ago and a video that Brown posted on social media, explaining an Auckland Council decision last October to spend $11 million to redevelop Waikaraka Park to accommodate speedway.
That video and council’s decision have drawn plenty of vitriol and name-calling comments, some of which have gone beyond politics, to target the mayor personally.
One user had stated on Facebook, “How’s the family, Wayne”. In another post seen by the Herald, the user stated, “Coming to see you Wayne”. Another post warns him to “be careful crossing the road”.
“I don’t think they’re interested in how my family is,” says Brown.
Recently, his wife Toni had been at home when the doorbell of the couple’s inner-city apartment was rung but the visitor had hidden to avoid being captured by the doorbell video camera. “There’s nobody there.”
Brown said it was disconcerting, especially for his wife.
“You get a bit unnerved and a bit suspicious,” says Brown, who advised council officials on Friday of the situation.
The chief executive, along with a council security adviser, made the call to place an unmarked security car outside the mayor’s inner-city apartment this past weekend, with a security worker keeping an eye on anyone coming to the door and to act on anything suspicious.
Brown said of the comments: “It’s kind of subtle, but it’s definitely threatening to the point that when I told the staff at the council, they decided to put a person outside, watching the building.”
CCTV cameras will be installed this week, which will be monitored centrally by the council.
“They’re adding my place of residence to all the other things they monitor around the city. We’re now officially a place of interest,” says Brown.
“Is it necessary or unnecessary? Well, who knows? I didn’t make that call. That’s what it is. It’s no more than that and no less than that, but on the other hand, it is disconcerting and the professionals made that decision. I didn’t. That’s not my skillset. I don’t know where the line is, but they do.”
The costs of the precautionary measures are expected to be low.
Brown pointed out the Prime Minister had constant security. “In the scheme of things, mine’s quite a big job.”
He said of the Western Springs decision, and supporters who wanted the sport to stay at the venue: “I get that they’re not happy, and I get that they’re able to say, ‘We’re going to vote you out, you plonker’, or something like that. But this is a family thing.”
He said he’d not encountered that type of personal threat or response in his years of public service.
“I expect some people to be pissed off. With nearly everything I do, there is a group of people who say it’s terrific and there are at least one or two people who say, ‘No, not a good idea’. I get that but they don’t say, ‘How’s your family?’ ... like, really?
“They’re entitled to say, ‘We don’t like your decision’. I get people are not happy with everything I do, or that the council does.”
Brown was one of 11 councillors who voted for the Waikaraka Park upgrade.
“I can only do things with the approval of the council, of course. You can’t do anything without the majority of the council, [but] I get that they can be angry at the mayor for that. I get that. I accept that.
“But we haven’t had this sort of thing and we haven’t had the absentee door-knock-type thing happening. That’s different.”
Brown stood by the council’s decision, saying it meant more value for money for ratepayers with Waikaraka Park accommodating alternate weekends of stock cars and speedway, while Western Springs could be developed for other uses.
The current Western Springs promoter had lost more than $1 million and had decided against putting in an expression of interest to use the stadium in future.
But opponents don’t believe the council has followed a proper process and say they believe there are strong grounds for a judicial review.
Save Our Speedway advocacy group spokesman Jason Jones was unaware of any personal threats towards Brown, and said he did not condone such behaviour.
Jones said emotions had been running high, especially since Brown posted the social media video last week in which Jones claimed the mayor had made incorrect comments about attendance rates at Western Springs.
The council had made a “disgraceful and unlawful decision” that would be subject to further legal action, he said, but that did not justify any personal attacks.
“We do keep our discussion open on our Facebook page. We invite open comments, but nothing that’s nasty, of course. There’s certainly nothing that I’m aware of, and I’m one of the people [who] monitors it.
“Not to say that there isn’t anything, because obviously we can’t track the whole lot. There’s a lot of activity, but certainly I’m not aware of any threats at all.”
He said the mayor had made comments that had enraged a lot of passionate people but he believed any threats would be empty.
“It’s a peaceful community, but they’re just feeling very hurt at the moment.”
In his social media video on Wednesday, Brown explained the council’s decision to move speedway from Western Springs.
“To be clear, I think speedway has a place and I want to see it flourish.
“The promoter told us that speedway at Western Springs just isn’t financially viable anymore.
“And it puts a burden on the ratepayer of $1.2m a year for something that only 12,800 people went to last year. That’s [fewer] than go to a corner dairy.”
After the video was posted, Jones disputed the mayor’s figures, claiming there would be more than 12,800 at some individual race meets.
Jones said last week: “It’s not true at all. We filled that place up on Saturday night. The truth is, Tātaki Auckland Unlimited will not give our attendance numbers anyway because they class it as commercially sensitive. So what the mayor’s banging on about here is rubbish.”
Yesterday, Jones said that most of the social media comments he had seen centred around the council’s “dishonesty” and information that backed up that allegation. “In principle, I cannot disagree with these.”
Another speedway supporter, Albany Ward councillor John Watson told RNZ he was rallying against what he called an “engineered eviction”.
He claimed the council had not consulted those affected, including speedway fans, thereby ignoring its obligations under Local Government Act.
“There is also a bit of a steely resolve amongst quite a big section of the speedway fans ... real anger, I’d say, at the way they have been treated.”
Editor-at-Large Shayne Currie is one of New Zealand’s most experienced senior journalists and media leaders. He has held executive and senior editorial roles at NZME including Managing Editor, NZ Herald Editor and Herald on Sunday Editor and has a small shareholding in NZME.
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