Building boom results in big increase in resource and building consents

Our planning and building control staff are working flat out to process a big increase in the number of applications for resource and building consents, but are sometimes falling short of meeting our 20-day processing target for building consents.

Certifications for subdivisions so far this financial year (from 1 July) are up 44% over the same period last year. We've issued 23% more resource consents in this same period compared to the same time last year and building consents are up 12%.

There have been 30% more newly built houses and other buildings compared to the same period last year.

This indicates a strong demand for housing and other development in the Coromandel but comes during a chronic shortage of skilled planning and building consent staff nationally. We are competing with councils across the country to both retain existing staff and recruit new staff.

There are currently four vacancies on our planning team, which processes resource consent applications, including for subdivisions. And our building team has six vacancies.

We're working hard to fill these vacancies and we hope to be up to full strength early in the new year. In the meantime, the issuing of new titles and associated development will continue to put pressure on our current resources. We expect building consents and customer enquiries to continue to increase.

We're managing this at the moment by outsourcing more consents but we're currently working to the maximum levels our contractors can take.

"We'd like to thank our customers for their patience and understanding during this time," says our Community Environment Manager Barry Smedts. "I'd like people to know we are working very hard to remedy this situation and we hope to be meeting our targets for processing these applications very soon."

You can keep track of how we're meeting our building consent timeframes on our Apply for a Building Consent web page www.tcdc.govt.nz/step10 We'll be updating this page every month.

For more information on building, planning and consents, go to www.tcdc.govt.nz/regulatory

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