Having run the local butcher shop for the past 47 years, and with one of his employees ready to retire, Kawerau mayor Malcolm Campbell had planned to go back to work there full-time when he retired from the mayoralty.
"A personal disaster hit us 11 months ago, when my shop was ram raided and we lost our business here.
"Then [regional councillor] Bill Clark told me he was going to retire. That's what sparked the whole journey off as far as running for regional council."
As one of the longest-serving mayors in New Zealand, Campbell said he was determined to go out "on my own terms".
"I went out of business on somebody else's terms and I've vowed never again."
He said switching councils and running for the Eastern Bay constituency of the Bay of Plenty Regional Council was "a whole new kettle of fish" for him.
"It's all about the environment and pest control, but most of all, on the governance side of it, it's all about regulations and making sure that everything's up to scratch."
He said how the region managed climate change was the biggest challenge ahead.
As he stated at the candidate's evening in Galatea a couple of weeks ago: "What's happened down in Marlborough, Nelson and Tasman is a real wake-up call for us here.
"If you can consider a metre of rain, it's quite unfathomable, but if it dumped up in the Urewera or up in the back of the Rangitaiki watershed we could have quite a disaster that is unimaginable.
"So that's something you've got to be really conscious of. As a councillor, you can't fix it because it's nature but you can certainly mitigate against the damage to life and property as best you probably can."
Environmental pressures and siltage on Eastern Bay rivers and waterways was also something he felt he had a good understanding of, from his many decades of jet boating and kayaking and talking to other people with connections to the rivers.
The silting up of the Rangitaiki River was concerning, though he says people are too quick to point the finger at farming.
Campbell Meats in Kawerau was destroyed by a ram-raid and fire in October 2021. Photo / Supplied
"It's due to a lot of things. I wouldn't blame it all on farming. Anyone that knows the environment up there will tell you that. Who better to get that knowledge from than the locals that have farmed it for the last four or five generations?
"I don't care what anyone says, the average farmer today has environmental stewardship within their psyche, because they know that without it they won't survive."
The Tarawera and Whakatāne rivers were also under pressure.
He said stopbanks were something that were going to play a big part in people's lives.
"Over the years, through no fault of the people that live there, people's sections have been allowed to encroach on them. That's why you have to be very careful in how you play this. Because those stopbanks do need regenerating.
"I think the most important thing is that everyone is treated fairly and with a bit of empathy. That means that it doesn't matter if it's in Whakatāne or Ruatoki or in Galatea, everybody has to play by the same rules."
He said the Eastern Bay was lucky to have had Eastern Bay farmer Doug Leeder as the current regional council chairman and he hoped he would be returned to the role.
"Doug is sharp, and he's always been available for Kawerau. I've got to take my hat off to him. More so, my mate Bill Clark, who I call an eco-warrior. He's a rough diamond, and I guess for him to have survived over in Elizabeth St, [Regional House, in Tauranga] says a lot about the guy.
"We are one of the fastest growing regions in the country and it's going to be even more important to have the right people on board to take us through that."
He said it was important to maintain good relationships with councillors from Western Bay, Tauranga and Rotorua, something he has worked hard to establish over his time as mayor.
"I'm pretty open and honest and probably a bit forthright at times and outspoken, but that's okay. I try not to be offensive. I think you've got to do it in a way that you don't get yourself offside with your peers. You'll get shut down."
He emphasised the fact that the Eastern Bay makes up 60 per cent of the land mass of the Bay of Plenty region, 80 per cent of the biodiversity and has six of the Bay of Plenty's eight major rivers running through it, but only 17 per cent of the voting population.
"The councillors that have been on the regional council for the past two terms now, and some of them longer, they know the Eastern Bay and they know they can't run it from Tauranga.
"They could have outvoted us in the last term and gone down to one representative, for Eastern Bay, but they didn't."
With the Kohi Māori constituency, that leaves three councillors for the Eastern Bay.
"It's a big job for three people, let alone two", he said.
The other candidates for the Eastern Bay seats are Leeder, Mawera Karetai, Russell Orr and Sarah Jane Van Der Boom.
