Waikato District Council held its inaugural meetings yesterday evening at Ngaruawahia. The new Mayor Aksel Bech and 13 councillors were sworn in and Eugene Patterson was named as Deputy Mayor by Aksel Bech. Tilly Turner and Lisa Thomson were also appointed to the Raglan Community Board.
At the inaugural Raglan Community Board meeting held today, Ross Wallis was elected Chairperson, nominated by Satnam Bains and seconded by Dennis Amoore. Chris Rayner was appointed Deputy Chairperson, nominated by Dennis Amoore and seconded by Councillor Lisa Thomson. New members Lisa Thomson and Tilly Turner were also sworn in.
Waikato Regional Council is meeting this afternoon at 2:30pm where they will also vote for their Chair and Deputy Chair. Given that the Rates Control group of candidates has 7 of the 14 seats there’s a very good chance the council will end up pulling a name out of a hat to pick the Chairperson, like they did 3 years ago.
Raglan residents are voicing concern over a proposed 15-metre 2degrees cell tower planned for the corner of Robert and Long Streets.
The tower would replace an existing 7.6-metre streetlight pole and require resource consent for exceeding permitted height limits under national telecommunications standards
Residents say they were only notified last week, with just a handful of nearby households receiving letters. Concerns centre on the tower’s visual impact, proximity to homes, and its position on the approach path to Raglan Airfield.
The last tower to be installed in town was by the water tank on the main road where Vodafone chose a location obscured by trees. The installation was still opposed by residents but they were unsuccessful in their attempts to prevent the tower from being installed.
A public on-site meeting with Councillor Lisa Thomson will be held at 2 pm on Saturday, 1 November, at the reserve outside 2 Long Street, where residents can share feedback before Council decides whether the consent will be publicly notified
Submissions of concern can also be made through Waikato District Council’s Antenno app or by emailing proposedtower@gmail.com
And Raglan has made it into the surfing news again but for an unusual reason this time. A surfboard has turned up on our shores after being lost 2400 km away off Tasmania’s coast in May 2024.
Kite surfer Albarito Bueno found the mussel-covered board half-buried in sand dunes and traced it back to its owner, Liam, after posting photos online.
Oceanographer Dr Edward Doddridge says the board likely drifted via the East Australian Current or Antarctic Circumpolar Current, calling it “quite the adventure.”
The board is now being reunited with its owner, whose family happened to be in New Zealand for a wedding.
Lastly, John Lawson has unearthed some historical statistics about the Maori Ward Referendum. Although this year’s vote to have Maori wards in the Waikato District was lost 10,065 votes to 9,358, the last time our district voted on the issue in 2012 it was a profoundly different story with 10,111 against and only 2517 for with nearly 4 times as many voters supporting Maori wards at this election.