Councillors hammered senior Tauranga City Council staff with questions in a meeting to discuss a highly critical review that found the Mount Maunganui landslide tragedy was preventable.
By Ayla Yeoman of Local Democracry Reporting
On Tuesday, councillors formally accepted the findings and recommendations of former High Court Judge Paul Davison’s external review into the council’s actions before the slip.
Six holidaymakers were killed in the January 22 landslide into the council-run Mount Maunganui Beachside Holiday Park.
Tauranga mayor Mahe Drysdale said he has apologised to the families for the "failings" of his council. (Source: 1News)
Davison found the landslide risk was known by the council and the organisation missed opportunities, over 27 years, to take actions that could have prevented the deaths.
Davison attributed this to systemic failures and found no individual accountable for the tragedy. He made 10 recommendations to the council for systemic change.
Council chief executive Marty Grenfell told the meeting Davison’s findings were clear, the organisation accepted them “without qualification” and it was committed to implementing every recommendation.
Grenfell has faced public questions whether he should resign following Davison’s report, but has repeatedly said he is the best person to drive the recommended changes.
Tauranga City Council's chief executive Marty Grenfell told Breakfast he knew the organisation "better than anybody" and maintained he was "best placed" to address the issues uncovered in the review. (Source: Breakfast)
Councillors probed how the council handled information before the tragedy, including why some monitoring appeared to have stopped, how reports about risk were escalated and why these did not make it to council meetings.
Deputy Mayor Jen Scoular, who represents the Mount Maunganui ward, asked Grenfell if he was "surprised" Davison described systemic failures across the organisation.
Grenfell initially dismissed the question, saying they were Davison’s findings and he accepted them.
After further questioning from Scoular, Grenfell said he was "obviously very, very disappointed" that council systems, processes and decision-making had failed to escalate key information over that period.
Scoular asked the council’s general managers if they were surprised.
Regulatory and community services general manager Sarah Omundsen said she was “really disappointed” the information had not been escalated and responded to.
Strategy, partnerships and growth general manager Christine Jones, who joined the council in 2001, said it was “disappointing” to become aware of information she had not previously known about.
Operations and infrastructure general manager Reneke van Soest said she was in her eighth or ninth week in the role when the landslide occurred.
She said she is the accountable general manager for Mauao and the campsite.
She said she had made observations where operational risk management could have been improved, had she known what would happen.
"The external review makes it clear that enduring change requires improvements of systems, processes, governance arrangements, and culture."
Scoular said the report talked about the required training and responsibilities for staff and that staff did not have the required training.
She said Grenfell had signed the contract of a staff member who had admitted they did not have the required training.
Councils repeatedly found to have failed with known hazards, unclear responsibility and action coming too late. (Source: 1News)
She questioned what the process was for staff appointments to ensure they were suitable for their new roles.
Grenfell said contracts would usually be signed off by a manager but this case came during a restructure process that affected 160 staff, with 110 jobs removed.
“Anybody that was appointed to a position as part of that restructure process essentially was appointed by me as the chief executive, ultimately having the final decision on the new structure and the make-up of that.”
Councillor Glen Crowther asked Grenfell how he factored in risks to ensure all responsibilities and roles were covered after the restructure.
“There was a very careful and deliberate process, understanding and assessing not only the impact on service delivery, but also on managing risk,” Grenfell said.
Crowther said he could not find monitoring reports for Mauao between 2022 and 2024, and asked if staff knew what happened.
Grenfell said he did not have an answer.
Councillor Rick Curach asked whether the council should accept the review findings without qualification while further questions and other formal processes were underway.
The Government, WorkSafe, Police and Coroner have opened inquiries into the tragedy.
Lisa Maclennan who lost her life in the landslide and her husband Travis desperately tried to warn campground authorities. (Source: 1News)
Council general counsel Andrew Hough said his opinion was irrelevant and warned councillors against straying into factual matters that would be considered by the Government inquiry.
Crowther and Curach debated whether the council should “accept” or merely “note” the findings, with Hough advising there was a material difference between the two words because accepting the report implied agreement with its findings and recommendations.
Ultimately this was dismissed and the councillors agreed to accept the findings as recommended by council staff.
Several councillors said Davison’s report was sobering and difficult to read but argued accepting it was necessary to show the council was serious about change.
Tauranga Mayor Mahé Drysdale said the report marked the end of Davison’s work, but only the beginning of the council’s journey to change how it managed, identified and escalated risk.
“We absolutely can change what we do differently in future and how this organisation operates,” he said.
He said the council’s challenge was to ensure the recommendations were embedded so the organisation became better at managing, escalating and dealing with risk.
LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.
SHARE ME