Statement from South Dunedin Action Group

Some progress has been made in starting a dialogue between South Dunedin and City Hall but the council needs to work hard to rebuild trust, says the South Dunedin Action Group.

11 months after the floods that badly affected South Dunedin, St Clair, St Kilda, Tainui and parts of Musselburgh and Caversham a meeting was held yesterday with the Mayor, senior Council staff at the instigation of the newly formed South Dunedin Action Group (SDAG).

While the Council acknowledged it had got things wrong in maintaining and managing key infrastructure such as the pumping stations and drains, it was still not prepared to acknowledge that the flooding was made considerably worse by these issues.

To some extent Council has admitted the effect of the pumping station issues in the November 2014 report by saying that flooding would have been about 200 mm less had the pumping station been working properly - and that would have saved water entering many houses and buildings.

That admission has become somewhat lost with later comments by the Council that even if the whole system was working optimally, serious flooding would still have occurred.

It is important that the community receives consistent evidence-based information on the causes of the flood and we note that there is considerable engineering knowledge and expertise of our stormwater and waste systems existing within the South Dunedin Action Group.

Council did however agree that it could improve its performance around civil defence preparedness and communication with communities about how to deal with a major event such as a flood.

The SDAG tabled numerous questions that need detailed answers from the Council and it was agreed that another meeting would be held soon.

The Group stressed that better communication was needed with the wider communities affected by last year’s floods and a commitment to South Dunedin’s future.

The SDAG will soon call another public meeting in South Dunedin to report back to the community

ENDS

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