A six-week public consultation to gather Wellingtonians’ views on restoring the Central Library service in the heart of the city has ended with significant input from residents.

“With more than 1360 submissions and counting, Wellingtonians have shown we are passionate about the future of our Central Library,” says Wellington City Council Mayor Andy Foster.

“I want to thank the many people and organisations who took the time to share their views on the future of the Central Library, and our staff for facilitating this discussion.

“Council is now looking forward to hearing the supporting oral submissions later this month, as well as seeing the survey results and more technical information. We are listening very carefully to our community, and all this feedback will help guide the decisions we need to take in October.”

Receiving such a strong number of submissions, and with a few more expected to arrive by mail today, Libraries portfolio holder Councillor Fleur Fitzsimons says we will get a clear picture on what Wellingtonians want and need from a library service in the city.

“From what I’ve been told, many submissions include additional well-considered and detailed responses from both a community and individual viewpoints, which is fantastic. We will also have the benefit of the views of people who joined the recent events in our communities, with the Planning for Growth team.”

The final submissions are being collated by an external research agency, along with the themes collected from public comments on the Council and Wellington City Libraries social media posts during the submission period.

Wellington City Councillors will also be presented the results of an independent representative survey of 1000 residents from the Wellington Region.

Councillors will hear from approximately 60 individuals or organisations who will start providing oral submissions on Tuesday 22 September.

A Council report will outline the results of the consultation and engagement process, together with updated costs of the options for the Council to debate at a Strategy and Policy Committee Meeting planned for Thursday 22 October 2020. This meeting is open to the public and will be live streamed on the Council’s YouTube page.

As the agenda for this meeting has not yet been set, please visit the Council website closer to the meeting date to confirm the time it will be presented. We will publish a copy of the Council reports on the Council website by Friday 16 October.

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