Rotorua’s
Draft Economic Development Strategy Framework presented to Council on 11
December was pitched by a senior official as an “all-of-community response”
based on the so-called principle of tatau tatau (us together), and as a “blueprint”
for both short-term economic recovery from Covid-19 and long-term economic
development.
This analysis is offered to counter the hostile interruptions to my questions by the Chair, Mayor Steve Chadwick, and what I see as the naïve positivity of her manufactured narrative in the Covid depression. It defines an economy as the sum of transactions between different agents who produce, distribute, trade and consume goods and services. It shows that the framework is unbalanced and divisive, and that it will perpetuate what I regard as the misappropriation of ratepayers’ resources.
The
foundational claim, that the framework was developed using a collective
approach, is false. The approach recognized the values and contribution of
partners, meaning iwi, local business, local providers and government. It did
not recognise the values and contributions of diverse residents and ratepayers as
well as the entire agribusiness sector, who, along with forestry and wood
processing, are helping sustain Rotorua’s GDP through the Covid-induced
collapse of international tourism. It did not admit Council’s persistent waste
of ratepayers’ resources through vanity and legacy projects and through
subsidies and capital grants going to organizations politically aligned with
the Mayor.
This false collectivism
is coupled with pre-eminence being given to the Te Arawa 2050 Vision. It has supplanted
the Council’s Vision 2030 which has been unrevised since 2014 but which became
obsolete with the advent of Covid-19. Council’s short-term economic recovery
and long-term economic development strategies are now primarily serving Te
Arawa’s Vision. This is illustrated by how the framework document uses glossy
visual imagery and the Maori language to ‘socialise’ a mayoral preference for
(at least the symbolism of) co-governance. This approach is undemocratic and
divisive propaganda because it promotes the interests of a 38 per cent minority
over the interests of all in our community who legally expect respect for their
equal human rights.
The framework
uses a fake theoretical distinction between short-term ‘economic recovery’ and
long-term ‘economic development’. In my opinion, given the impact of Covid-19,
this false dualism should be abandoned in favour of ‘economic reconstruction’.
Why? As the depression broadens, the prospect of ‘economic recovery’ loses
plausibility - because we can’t recover the past. And ‘economic development’
assumes that trustworthy foundations exist for ongoing engagement and growth in
our economy, when the facts point remorselessly to failing businesses, falling
investment and rising unemployment, homelessness and criminal behaviour.
It is time for
a more pragmatic framework of ‘economic reconstruction’ to encourage all
economically active agents and organisations (people, families, enterprises,
and governments) to rediscover their primary purposes, resources, and
opportunities in a significantly different context. They should be encouraged by
Council to reorganise themselves and their priorities and services, and to
create fresh products and productive economic relationships with others, and
increasingly, to do so without subsidies and grants that distort economic
reality.
The framework
makes a false virtue of partnerships. There are partnerships and partnerships.
The Council partners effectively with central government and voluntary organisations
to support families enduring hardship, with much more to be done about housing.
It partners with institutions and industry organisations to encourage the
development of educational, retraining and employment opportunities. It has, in
general, partnered effectively with sector group leaders since lockdown to
identify possible reconstruction strategies, central government agencies
offering support and capex investment programmes, and the boards of CCOs.
On the other
hand, it also partners with selected interest groups, such as the
mountain-biking community, to transfer ratepayers’ wealth through subsidies
that, sadly, retard business reconstruction. And it partners with selected
private corporations, most especially in tourism, to transfer ratepayers’
wealth via investments and asset maintenance deals without any prospect of a return
to ratepayers. This type of partnership is a form of crony capitalism and
pre-empts healthy economic reconstruction. Council urgently needs more economically
critical leadership to discriminate better between reasonable economic strategies
and healthy partnerships and those that are not.
Finally, the
framework prematurely announces three Agreed Key Priorities, each with an
Action Plan to be detailed, followed by “stakeholder engagement” prior to final
revisions. The first Agreed Key Priority is ‘Rotorua, a place of choice’ to be
clarified as ‘Brand and Identity’, ‘Major Place Development’ and ‘Destination
Development’. The second is ‘Rotorua, the future of forestry’ to be clarified
as ‘Forestry Future’s Plan’, ‘Place-Making Initiatives’ and ‘Centre of
Excellence’. The third is ‘Rotorua, ready for business’, to be clarified as
‘Advance a Vibrant City Centre, Emerging Sectors’, Infrastructure and Planning’
and ‘Commercial and Industrial Land Development, Residential Land Development’.
Since most of these priorities have been promised repeatedly since 2014,
residents and ratepayers will regard them with scepticism.
There is
another equally strong reason for scepticism. The framework stresses the
importance of collaboration with key partners - specified as central government
agencies, local iwi, business leaders, industry organisations, tertiary and
research institutes, and private funders, to ensure that strategies, plans and
timelines are aligned. Residents and ratepayers are neither listed as key
partners nor apparently considered worthy of collaboration, and recall that
most consultations are not authentic and about implementing solutions
predetermined by officials.
A crucial
missing component here is a critical awareness by Council leadership on the nature
and importance of good governance. The Auditor General has recommended eight
elements; having a coherent strategy, having clear roles and responsibilities
that separate governance and management, leadership by setting a constructive
tone, involving the right people in robust debate who then speak on message with
a unity of voice, investing in effective relationships built on trust and
respect, being clear about accountabilities and transparent about performance
against them, managing risks effectively, and ensuring that elected governors
have good information, systems, and controls.
In my
professional view, after a year as an elected member of Council, Rotorua’s Draft
Economic Development Strategy Framework lacks external coherence with the need
for economic reconstruction, illustrates a case where management has been
allowed to subvert governance roles, exhibits divisive leadership that
continues to misappropriate ratepayers’ scarce resources, reflects engagement that
has been manipulated to prevent critical feedback and debate, enables abusive
and hate speech tactics to destroy trust and respect between elected members,
undermines accountabilities and the transparency of performance evaluation,
uses cavalier risk management, and is over reliant on subjective information,
arbitrary systems, and sloppy controls.
Dr Reynold Macpherson is Chair of the Rotorua District Residents and Ratepayers and an elected councillor, Rotorua Lakes Council. His PhD from Monash University was in organizational science. Prior to retirement he served as Professor of Professional Development at Auckland University, CEO of Waiariki Institute of Technology and as Foundation Chancellor and CEO of Abu Dhabi University. He can be contacted at reynold@reynoldmacpherson.ac.nz or at 021725708.
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