Mayor Steve Chadwick (left) and Rotorua Lakes Council chief executive officer Geoff Williams. Photo / Andrew Warner
The Rotorua Daily Post is looking back at the stories of 2021. Here's what made headlines in June.
A world-class adventure attraction will be developed at Rotorua's Waipa Valley Mountain Biking Hub offering a new activity targeting domestic tourists.
Ropes and Thrills Rotorua will be New Zealand's first aerial adventure park and will be open by December.
It is being built by entrepreneur Alex Schmid, who built the Redwoods Treewalk.
Schmid told the Rotorua Daily Post he'd secured a site at the growing mountain bike hub and was looking for strategic financial and operating partners to join him in the venture.
Either way, he said the development was consented and it was hoped building would go ahead in October and November - taking four weeks to construct - and be open for business in December.
It could have been Rotorua's equivalent to a royal wedding, but popular politician Tania Tapsell and her husband, Kanin Clancy, opted for exactly the opposite.
The couple have announced they eloped to Queenstown on December 1 last year [2020].
With the bride dressed in a classic strapless white wedding gown, Tapsell and Clancy took a helicopter to the top of a mountain in Queenstown and got married. The pilot and a photographer were the only others there.
So why the secret?
"We wanted to do it our way with no fuss and just focus on what's important and that's our love for each other," a still beaming Tapsell told the Rotorua Daily Post.
Children desperate for counselling are waiting up to six weeks to get help while some schools are picking up the tab to pay for their own experts as mental health and wellbeing problems spiral.
Primary and intermediate schools say they're doing what they can with what little they have — with one Rotorua school spending $1.5 million over 15 years on counselling for students.
Experts say more children are dealing with trauma, depression, and anxiety, while the housing crisis has others bouncing from school to school.
But a Budget 2021 promise of funding for a programme targeting mental health support for 5-12-year-olds was welcomed by those on the front line.
Rotorua Hospice was one of three Bay of Plenty hospices to announce it would not offer assisted dying services when the End of Life Choice Act came into force in November.
They say assisted dying is not in line with the hospice philosophy.
Under the act a person who wishes to receive assisted dying and thinks they meet the eligibility criteria can ask a health practitioner about the process.
Health practitioners cannot raise assisted dying with a patient - the patient must raise the issue themselves first.
Rotorua Community Hospice chief executive Jonathon Hagger said the organisation, which had 350 referrals a year, would not be providing euthanasia services.
"We have taken this position because we fully support the philosophy and aim of hospice which is to neither hasten nor postpone death."
An average of more than $400,000 is being spent each week on Rotorua's emergency housing.
Ministry of Social Development figures revealed to the Rotorua Daily Post Weekend after an Official Information Act request show $21,075,039 was spent on emergency housing grants in Rotorua for 2049 clients between April last year and March.
It averages out to $405,289 each week and represents more than half of the amount spent in the whole Bay of Plenty region.
However, the grants have been labelled "dead money" and a "band aid" by one social agency; others say the money would be better spent building houses.
Rotorua Lakes Council's "organisational realignment" - which has seen seven deputy chief executives appointed - had so far cost $51,842, which was expected to rise to about $75,000.
The cost was revealed by council chief executive Geoff Williams in an interview with Local Democracy Reporting on Thursday, following a public furore.
A former mayor, Rotorua's MP and a current councillor are among those who have criticised the changes, calling for an independent review of the council.
Local Government Minister Nanaia Mahuta, however, has taken a hands-off approach to the controversy, stating there was a high bar for government intervention.
Williams said the costs - which were in addition to two salary rises totalling about $28,000 - were exclusively consultants' fees.
Jordan Watson can see why people may scratch their heads at him being a paid YouTuber.
"Like, what is it they do?
"But it's full-time, and it's a lot of pressure," he says.
Watson, 33, is the savvy creator-entrepreneur of the tongue-in-cheek How to Dad "Kiwi bloke" parenting channel, which has 1.19 million subscribers.
People have viewed his YouTube videos more than 142 million times and this year he received his 1 million YouTube subscribers plaque.
He spoke to Carly Gibbs.
Angela Swann-Cronin, a former RNZAF pilot, spoke about love and courage.