The priority should be to create a liveable city that is business-friendly, writes Bryce Julyan

Editorial: If Mayor Len Brown can keep the Auckland Council's rates to a rise not much above 2 per cent next year he will be doing well.

Auckland Mayor Len Brown is proposing a rates rise of between 1.9 per cent and 2.9 per cent in next year's election-year budget.

Twenty Auckland Council staff are set to lose their jobs when five visitor information centres are closed as the result of a cost-cutting directive from Mayor Len Brown.

Editorial: Having produced the big 30-year Auckland Plan, the council is now obliged to produce a more detailed 10-year plan to be called the "unitary plan".

A Hawaiian fire dancer performance at the Rugby World Cup and a leather iPad case are among the items slapped on rate-payer funded credit cards.

With changing land uses at the eastern end of the waterfront comes the opportunity to re-think Quay St to serve today's public needs, writes Bob Harvey.

Auckland Council is considering cutting the number of unelected council-controlled organisations from seven to four.

Special report: In the final of a two-part report, Bernard Orsman looks at how the seven Auckland Council-controlled Organisations are shaping up in their duties for the Super City's 1.3 million residents.

Auckland ratepayers are spending $13.1 million a year to pay for seven boards of directors, seven chief executives and seven executive teams who run much of the Super City.

Mayor's efforts to increase public scrutiny of bodies that run three-quarters of Auckland only a partial success.

Proposal to outlaw liquor 24/7 in parks, cars, streets and cemetery to plug existing gaps.

Auckland Council has spent $12,300 on preparations to chop a limb off a pohutukawa tree that is obstructing a West Auckland footpath. But that money's now been wasted.

"There is real excitement about the waterfront and Aucklanders are asking us: 'What's next?' Bob Harvey explains.