The next (and final for the year) Waikanae Community Board meeting is scheduled for 7 pm tomorrow in the Waikanae Boating Club at 97 Tutere Street, where it was held in March.

The interesting item, #8, is the “Waikanae Beach character assessment.”

The possibly contentious item is the preceding one: “Transpower: proposal to remove trees at Waikanae Park.”

Regular readers will remember Transpower’s obstinate refusal to bury their power lines underground in conjunction with ‘Ewy’ construction a couple of years ago (see the earlier posts on it). Are they adding insult to injury by wanting to attack public park trees?

There are no accompanying pdf’s on the council website on either, so’ll you need to come along to get the details.

A reader has sent us a message: “Drone flying yesterday evening above Kotare Street. I hope the owner knows that NZ Civil Aviation Authority rules state that the owner needs the permission of every person and property they fly over.”

Anyone can take pictures in or from a public place, but not in situations where people have a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Privacy is a issue that we relate to, as a few years ago the manager of the neighbouring Parkwood property business suddenly removed privacy-providing hedging on his side of the boundary without consultation, requiring a replacement fence, which he opposed.  (His lawyer, Mr Ranford, sent us an intemperate letter saying that our reasons for wanting boundary privacy and security were “spurious and unacceptable” — astonishing.)  We went to the Disputes Tribunal and got the fence built.

Another of Waikanae’s leafier streets.  The flag flying in the centre was an Irish one.

A sign outside the Tutere Gallery. Also, the translations in French, Spanish, Korean and Dutch.

It matters because Google now has almost complete dominance of search engine traffic.  The alternatives, Bing (Microsoft) and Yahoo have only a small percentage of it.

This subject is also covered in this Whale Oil blog post, in which Cameron Slater says, “Truth is absolute, not a consensus agreement based upon a majority vote.”

Originally posted on Nwo Report: Google has announced plans to completely purge independent media outlets from their search engine just in time for Christmas. Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Google’s parent company Alphabet, announced that Google is now working aggressively on a new algorithm designed to “de-rank” websites that go against popular mainstream opinion. He…

via Google Announces Christmas Ban Of Independent News Outlets — Rangitikei Enviromental Health Watch

Another great Karl Webber photo. 🙂

Seen yesterday afternoon when the temperature reached a pleasant 26ºC.

— here is a detailed map of the area from the NZTA (click for the big version). This looks west with Fairway Oaks at the top left. The accompanying e-mail is below.  There don’t seem to be any immediate plans to do anything with the land and landscaping other than maintain it, which is good.

Hi Geoffrey and Eva,

I can confirm that if NZTA identify any land that is surplus to NZTA requirements, NZTA have to follow the Public Works Act 1981 disposal process as stated below.

NZTA carries out required maintenance on land it owns until disposal/sale of the land.  Therefore, in terms of your query regarding whether NZTA has any “plans for the land other than to leave it the way it is now”, the answer would be, aside from maintenance, no.  The intention is for NZTA to dispose of any surplus land as soon as practicably possible.

Key Steps for Disposal of Surplus NZTA Land

Disposal of The Transport Agency’s surplus land is directed by the Public Works Act 1981.  The Act defines a detailed process and timeframes once land is declared surplus.  For details please refer to Sections 40 – 42 of the Act.

The following provides an overview of the process.

1.       Land identified by the Transport Agency as surplus to NZTA requirements

2.       Other Crown Agencies or Local Authority confirm any requirement they have for a Public Work to NZTA

3.       If not required by a Crown Agency for:

a.       roading purposes;

b.      any other public work; or

c.       an exchange, then

4.       Property is to be cleared through DOC & Heritage NZPT (confirmation of any requirements); if/when cleared

5.       LINZ decision (section 40 PWA) is required as to whether the property is offered back to the former owner,  their successor/s, or an adjoining owner

6.       If no offer back or preferential offer is required (cleared section 40 PWA), then the surplus land if offered to Iwi via:

a.       Maori Protection Mechanism; or

b.      Right of First Refusal

(depending on whether a Treaty Settlement has been signed)

7.       If not taken up or acquired by Iwi, then the property is offered for sale on the open market by public tender (for a minimum of 4 weeks), private treaty, or by public application.

NB: This process can take between 1 to 3 years.

Thanks,

Liz Little — Senior Property Manager, NZ Transport Agency Property Disposals

This afternoon we had afternoon tea with Roger, the KIN Associate Editor, in the Front Room café in Tutere Street (strictly it was afternoon cider, wheat beer and coffee. 🙂 )

We are admirers of each other’s websites and we share objectives: uncovering taxpayer rip-offs, particularly through council corruption, exposing bad management and bad managers both in government and business, fighting the poisoning of the eco-system with the vast overuse of pesticides, 1080 in particular, and the promotion of arts, culture, positive hobbies and sport.

He has been a Kapiti resident for 51 years and taught at Kapiti College for 14 of them.  Now retired, his work for the KIN website is voluntary, as is that of all the others involved with it, whether as writers or artists including editor Alan Tristram’s son who does the excellent cartoons.

Being independent and not concerned about offending advertisers, we can tackle issues that the other media are reluctant to.

He has the physique of an active sportsman, so it doesn’t surprise that sport is one of his major interests and pursuits. All of us are looking forward to a real summer with lots of outdoor activity to make up for last year. 🙂

The Kapiti Independent News website.