Chairman's Annual Report 2011

Naseby Vision 2011 AGM Chairman’s Report

A good deal of our focus over the past 12 months has been on activities relating to Naseby’s 150^th jubilee in 2013. We’ve assisted with the establishment of a 150^th committee which is ably led by Stew Francis, who is supported by a number of our committee and other members of Naseby Vision and from communities across the Maniototo.

We have 3 projects underway which are aligned to the celebrations. The first of these will be the publication of a substantial history of Naseby which is being written by today’s guest speaker, Keith Scott and ably assisted by a local editorial reference group. We’ve been fortunate so far to have received seed funding for the book from Dr George Mason. George lives in New Plymouth but has strong family connections with Naseby and you may recall that he funded the labels on the Recreation Ground trees.

We’ve also been fortunate to have also received $4000 from the Otago Community Trust for the project. Hilary is a dab hand at writing funding applications and we have a number of other applications in the pipeline to ensure that the book is fully funded, by its release in late 2012. It’s our desire that proceeds from the sale of the book will go to support the Museum, as an on-going funding source.

Our two other 150^th projects are the Historic Trails project and the completion of the headstone restoration programme at the Naseby Cemetery. 10 headstones were restored last year and the monumental mason is currently working on the second 10. We’re hoping to raise funding to repair the remaining damaged headstones in the next few months, so that the work will be completed in time for the 150^th. Funding for this work has come from the Historic Cemeteries Conservation Trust of New Zealand and from a small number of the descendants of people who are buried in the cemetery.    

Another part of the restoration work involving the Chinese section of the cemetery is currently on hold, awaiting a survey with ground penetrating radar.

Despite the progress that’s been made at the cemetery, we were disturbed to learn from the monumental mason last week, that a marble cross which was part of one of the headstones that was being repaired had been stolen. This is the second theft from the cemetery in recent months. You may recall that two of the recently planted Ginko Bilbao trees that were kindly donated by George Mason were stolen earlier this year. These were recently replaced thanks to a donation by one of our members, Annie Villiers and her son Feng.

The Historic Trails project will link in with a similar Maniototo-wide trails project that is being managed by Project Maniototo. We have successfully applied for a 16 week work grant from DSW and Otago Community Trust for a Project Green Worker to research and establish the local trail which will cover the sites of significant buildings and events, both within Naseby and in neighbouring areas, such as the various mined gullies surrounding the town and out as far as Kyeburn diggings. DSW’s work brokers will soon begin the search for an appropriate person.

Over the past few months we’ve been working on a plan to develop a closer relationship with Naseby’s business community with a view to helping stimulate growth and finding ways of eliminating the barriers to doing business in Naseby. We have arranged a meeting of local business people next Wednesday and I’m pleased to say that the response to date has been great and we expect most of our businesses will be represented.

The other business-oriented project is the establishment of an alternative cycle route from the rail trail into Naseby. We have been working closely with the CODC, the Community Board and the Rail Trail Trust and we hope our plan to establish a loop from the trail at Brinsdon Road which will eventually take riders back to Ranfurly by Back Road will receive final approval at the CODC’s  meeting next Tuesday.

The suggestion for an alternative route came out of the Naseby Community Plan process last year. It’s designed to encourage riders to visit Naseby by a safe alternative route and to stay an extra day exploring our great town and hopefully leaving a few dollars behind as well!

After years of lobbying, cell phone coverage for Naseby is now finally on the horizon. Vodafone, as part of the Government’s Rural Broadband Initiative, is currently looking at a range of sites in the area which will ensure Naseby and other parts of the Maniototo which are currently poorly served, will have excellent coverage of signals from all of the mobile phone providers  – Telecom, 2 Degrees, Telstra Clear and Vodafone.

Our committee is always looking for innovative ways of improving services within our community and one of the more “outside of the square” projects that we have been considering is the possibility of Naseby having community-owned wind turbines. We’ve been talking to members of the Blueskin Bay Committee that is looking to establish a small wind farm in the Waitati area. We’re doing some preliminary research, however we are a long way away from having anything tangible to discuss at this stage.

Finally, I’d like to thank our committee for their dedication to Naseby Vision and in particular to all things Naseby. I’m honoured to be able to work with such a great team of people. My special thanks goes to Hilary who devotes many hours to Naseby Vision – an organisation could not wish for a better secretary!

In closing I’d like to pay a special tribute to John Steele, who has resigned this month from the committee. John is a great guy who has done an enormous amount for the community over a number of decades. He has been a great contributor to Naseby Vision and its projects since the inception of the organisation. John is standing down to focus on some health issues and on behalf of the Naseby Vision team I would like to convey our sincere thanks and our very best wishes to John for a speedy recovery.

 

2010 Community Plan

The 2010 Naseby Community Plan is now available.

This is a large PDF file (1.1 MB) - please be patient while it downloads after you have clicked the link.

WATER METERING

WATER WATER EQUAL SHARES - OR - SOME ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS!

The ongoing installation of water meters throughout Central Otago raised the ire of Naseby residents recently. Given that the permanent residences in the town number just 65, the initial water allocation before charging commenced was ridiculously low 168 cm.  To add insult to injury, the charge for every unit used over and above the basic allocation was the highest in the district at $3.47!  The charges for units exceeding the basic allocation for Cromwell, Alexandra and Clyde were considerably lower.  Understandably, Naseby Vision was very concerned about the obvious inequity.  This concern resulted in the presence of Murray Washington, the CODC's Manager of Assets and Contracts, as the guest speaker at the AGM in 2009.  As he became aware of the depth of feeling, as well as the obvious inequities, he agreed to look again at the Naseby situation.  Some months later, Naseby Vision received from Council a number of options for comment.  After some considerable discussion a preferred option was agreed on, with a secondary option to boot,and these options were sent back to the Council. Naseby Vision appreciated the opportunity to have input into this contentious proposal.

However, at the next Community Board meeting, when the Board was to approve the planned changes, it became apparent that the options put forward by Naseby Vision had somehow gone astray!!  It also became apparent that Community Board members had never received the options put forward by Naseby Vision!!  Again, thanks to considerable time and effort on the part of Stuart Hore, a Naseby Vision committee member, the Community Board were presented with a compelling argument for change to the number of units per household before charging commenced. 

The nub of Stuart's arguments was that, if you added the number of permanent residences in Naseby plus the businesses, you came up with approximately 65, the remaining non-permanent residences (averaged out at an occupancy rate of 52 days/year) equated to 40 permanent households making a total of 105 equivalent permanent households.  By dividing the annual consumption figures of 55250 cm (the so-called free units) you arrived at an average of 526 units per permanent household (the CODC's proposed new allowance was 365 units).  Any allowance under this amount (526) did not allow the ratepayer the amount of water paid for in the uniform annual charge.  Through Stuart, Naseby Vision strenuously opposed the low allocation and recommended a minimum allocation of 500 units before excess charging applied.  As well, it recommended that these excess charges should be costed at production costs only and should not include infrastructure, loan and other costs already met under the uniform annual charge. Basic allocation for households is based on a usage of 250 L/person/day, a standard measure.

Stuart's presentation took place during the public session, before the Community Board meeting proper.  It was with much delight that Naseby Vision saw its recommendations accepted by the Community Board during the main meeting, and the committee believes that this was a significant milestone for the organisation.  This is just a brief outline of the work involved in getting some sense into the process and any further information about the initial proposals, the options put forward and finally chosen are available from the Secretary - nasebyvision@gmail.com