KEY POINTS:
Franklin should remain Franklin and not be cut off at Pukekohe, Pokeno or the Waikato River, Franklin Mayor Mark Ball told the Royal Commission of Inquiry on Auckland Governance yesterday.
Speaking on the first day of public hearings at Pukekohe, the mayor of the Auckland region's southern-most council presented a case to leave Auckland and become part of Waikato.
Franklin District is currently divided between Auckland and Waikato for regional council purposes.
The Royal Commission, chaired by retired High Court judge Peter Salmon, QC, started the first of 18 days set down for public hearings.
More than 3500 public bodies, organisations and members of the public have made submissions on the biggest shake-up of local government in Auckland since 1989, when 29 territorial local bodies were reduced to seven plus a regional council.
The thrust of Franklin District's submission is that the area has a rural focus and should not be part of an urban metropolitan Auckland.
Mr Ball said Franklin was a rural district that worried about issues like floods, droughts and fire.
It did not want to be part of Auckland's "obese urban sprawl". It preferred to remain the region's fruit and vegetable bowl and provider of roast beef and lamb spit.
Throughout his presentation, Mr Ball waved a computer disk at the commission containing the vision and future for Franklin set out in a growth strategy for the next 50 years.
The council had support for its position from the Pukekohe Business Association and Enterprise Franklin.
Business association president Greg Hicks said: "If we have an issue we can go straight to councillors or the mayor. Would it improve under a greater Auckland or southern city arrangement? We don't think so."
Not all local submissions supported joining Waikato.
Dairy farmer Brain Matheson, whose family have farmed in the Hunua Ranges for five generations, said he would rather Franklin stayed a part of Auckland.
"Auckland is coming south, so let's be in it," he said.
This position is shared by many farmers in the northern part of Franklin - and by Federated Farmers.
Environment Waikato chief executive Harry Wilson, whose council is keen to keep a holistic approach to the management of the Waikato River, warned of the dangers of placing an environmental protection agency in a single council.
He said it would be extremely hard for a single council to be the poacher and gamekeeper when it came to monitoring and enforcing environmental standards.
"I can envisage the situation where politicians make the call to prosecute themselves," Mr Wilson said.
A group of seven Manukau City councillors, the Pakuranga community board and the Bucklands & Eastern Beaches Ratepayers & Residents' Association called for a version of an eastern city or community councils, separate from Manukau.
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www.royalcommission.govt.nz
