Rotorua Council Axes 19 Jobs, Says Nursery Retail Arm ‘Not Sustainable’

Tuesday, 23 September 2025, 3:15 pm
Article: Mathew Nash - Local Democracy Reporter

Nineteen jobs will be disestablished as part of a Rotorua Lakes Council restructure that will also see its nursery close to the public.

While the nursery’s retail arm would close, the council says it will still grow plants for city gardens and provide plant hire to local businesses.

The facility on Queens Drive has been growing plants and seedlings for Rotorua’s public spaces since the 1960s.

The council said in a Friday media release that six of the 19 disestablished roles were already vacant and 15 new roles would be created.

Redeployments were possible.

The restructure was part of the continued reintegration of former council-controlled organisation Infracore into the council organisation.

Former InfraCore parks and open spaces staff members are being reorganised into five core teams covering asset maintenance, cleaning, gardening, arboriculture and sports and mowing.

The council said the nursery closure will be “staged” over the next few months – with no final public closure date given.

Supplying outside buyers will stop after winter 2026.

The statement said Rotorua’s public gardens and parks would not be affected by the change.

The council began consultation with impacted staff and respective unions in August before finalising the changes this month.

“Our staff are passionate about what they do and want to provide excellent services, and they have been very engaged in the change process, providing a lot of feedback for us to consider,” said council’s general manager of community experience, Alex Wilson.

Wilson thanked staff but said it had been decided the current operation was “not sustainable”.

“The decision to close the retail part of the nursery wasn’t made lightly and is based on a review of its viability,” she said.

The council provided figures indicating the nursery had been losing an average of more than $70,000 a year, with $134,000 lost in the past financial year.

Plant sales had also dropped by more than a third in four years. As for the remaining nursery assets, council chief executive Andrew Moraes said that would be a decision for the next council.

“What we know about the nursery is that significant capital investment of at least $2 million would be required to bring it up to a minimum operating standard,” said Moraes.

He said that would also then add to overall ongoing operational costs.

“Rates fund renewals and upgrades – so we need to ensure that decisions about council assets are strategic and cater for current and future needs while also taking affordability into consideration.”

Rotorua Mayor Tania Tapsell told Local Democracy Reporting the decision was difficult but would “help to improve” the council’s financial position while still providing “great gardens” for the community.

“While trying to create better services as well as find efficiencies and savings we’ve unfortunately found that the nursery had been operating at a financial loss for sometime now,” she said.

“We know that our public gardens are loved and enjoyed by many locals and visitors so are happy to confirm this wont change.”

Amalgamated Workers Union New Zealand, which has members in the nursery workforce, previously urged the council to reconsider the closure and “explore genuine alternatives”.

At the time, the union called the decision “deeply disappointing” and “short-sighted”, and noted some affected staff had been with the council for “decades”.

Mayor Tania Tapsell previously said the change proposal was driven by the council’s “intention to improve community services” and “reduce cost” to ratepayers.

Local Democracy Reporting approached the union for further comment for this story.

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

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