Glenholme residents packed the Arawa Bowling Club for a public meeting. Video / Andrew Warner
Kāinga Ora will reveal tomorrow its revised housing plans for a controversial empty section of land in Devon St.
A community drop-in session will be held at Arawa Park Hotel between 3.30pm and 6pm where residents can see what Kāinga Ora is calling “revised plans” for 54 Devon St.
Residents have held three public meetings about the proposal out of concern there could be too many houses on the site and fears over tenants causing issues in the neighbourhood.
The Government housing agency bought the section for $650,000 and told residents via a letter drop earlier this year it had planned to build six two-storey homes on the 1280sq m site — which could include four two-bedroom terrace homes and two three-bedroom duplexes.
But Kāinga Ora regional director Darren Toy later said in a statement to the Rotorua Daily Post the plan would be to build at least three homes on the site.
Kāinga Ora Bay of Plenty regional director Darren Toy. Photo / Andrew Warner
More than 400 people attended a public meeting on November 28 at Arawa Bowling Club organised by Save Glenholme Group to express their concerns about the plans for the site and hear from Toy face to face.
Toy said the plans were yet to be finalised and it would take about a week, but he would let the community know as soon as he had them. The meeting also discussed concerns around Plan Change 9 — which would change the District Plan to allow building intensification that could have houses up to six storeys high in residential areas.
Toy told the public meeting the Devon St development wouldn’t be three storeys high.
“I’ll tell you now, three storeys doesn’t fit ... I’ll put that to bed tonight.”
Save Glenholme Group spokeswoman Hozumi Daiya said they had encouraged group members to attend the drop-in session.
She said if they could not stop the development from going ahead, they wanted to ensure there were only two houses on the site at the most, and wanted assurances from Kāinga Ora it would put good tenants in the properties.
She said there were lots of elderly people in the neighbourhood and she would like to see assurances contractors would work on the site only between 9.30am and 4.30pm and not on weekends and public holidays to reduce noise and traffic issues.
