Community Meeting At Spring Creek To Address Flood Protection

Thursday, 18 September 2025, 2:44 pm
Article: Kira Carrington - Local Democracy Reporter

The residents of Spring Creek will have an opportunity to have their questions answered at community meeting for the flood-prone township.

Marlborough District Council confirmed the meeting will take place at the Spring Creek Community Hall at 7pm on October 1.

Council said the meeting would include a presentation on the stop bank design and an overview of the construction programme, as well as a public Q&A and the opportunity to speak to councillors and staff one-on-one.

Council said the mayor Nadine Taylor, councillors, council staff, contractors and consultants will all be present.

A second meeting will take place on November 19 to provide more detailed information about the works, slated to begin this summer.

Taylor hinted at plans for a community meeting following the June flood event, that forced residents to evacuate for 24 hours and return to a flooded neighbourhood.

Council chief executive John Boswell told Local Democracy Reporting in July, that while there were concerns about the Wairau River stopbank during June’s flooding, the stopbank held better than expected.

“The bank itself held up really, really well ... it was performing exactly as we hoped it would,” Boswell said.

The stopbanks were first damaged in the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake and were put at further risk in the wake of the 2021 and 2022 floods.

Work on repairs was scheduled to begin at the end of last year, but was pushed back a year to the start of 2026.

Boswell said that said rebuilding a stopbank from scratch was no easy task, and required time to get it right.

“You can't just repair a stopbank overnight,” he said.

Boswell said the delay was caused by a combination of design finalising, funding and material sourcing, and works on the northern side of the Wairau River.

Residents have voiced their frustration at the lack of action on stopbank repairs, leaving their homes vulnerable.

Hathaway St resident Susan Robertson told Local Democracy Reporting she was ‘thoroughly pissed off with the council’ as she evacuated her house in June.

“How many years have they known about this?” Robertson said.

“It's not good enough. If a councillor lived down here, the mayor lived out here, it would be done.”

-LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.

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