Category: Public Media

Source: Radio New Zealand

Confidential documents discovered in a former Wellington mayoral desk sold to a member of the public should have been destroyed, a review has found.

It’s also revealed the desk was checked three times before its sale.

In September last year a stash of more than 200 papers were found in a locked cupboard within the desk bought from the Tip Shop, a second-hand store at the city’s landfill.

Furniture from the Wellington Town Hall was sold there during the building’s redevelopment.

The council has been investigating how the items were sold, and why confidential documents were not removed from them.

The documents were dated between 1988 and 2004, during which time Sir James Belich, Dame Fran Wilde, Mark Blumsky and Dame Kerry Prendergast were mayor.

When the papers were discovered, Dame Kerry said they were “potentially incredibly damaging”.

The agenda for next week’s Audit and Risk committee meeting show the “desk privacy incident” will be discussed.

The council carried out an internal review and also commissioned Grant Thornton to carry out a review, the agenda shows.

The Grant Thornton review found the storage of the documents – which included personal information like names and email addresses – did not follow council policy.

It said a number should have been destroyed, and others should have been destroyed after seven years, while two should have been archived.

“From an interview with an ex-Mayor, we understand the documents were created and deliberately stored outside of the WCC filing system as they were considered confidential to the Mayor, due to the nature of the documentation, reflecting the Mayor’s responsibilities regarding the Council Chief Executive and elected members.”

It was unclear whether the council knew about the documents, but mayoral staff would have, it said.

The desk had been checked for documents three times as it was moved from place to place – once in 2013 and twice in 2025.

The last inspection was at the Tip Shop, where “all drawers were found to be empty, and the item was cleared for removal and sale”.

The review said there was no evidence to consider whether the locked cupboard was not noticed, or if it was noticed but not checked.

“While WCC were unaware of the documentation in the locked cupboard in the desk, there were three opportunities for the

cupboard to be identified, opened and the documents retrieved,” the report said.

“The disposal processes do not appear to be consistent with the requirements of the Council Privacy Policy to ensure ‘everything reasonably within the power of the agency is done’.”

Elected members were not bound by council policies but the council could do better by giving greater support around record-keeping, it said.

The council’s “key challenge” was increasing the awareness of risk and the importance of following policies among staff, it said.

It recommended the council establish an asset disposal policy, strengthens its procedures, improves information management training, and enhance “relocation controls”.

The council’s internal review found it breached two privacy principles: storage and security, and retention.

It accepted both reviews’ findings and has since updated Tip Shop’s operating procedures, commissioned a formal asset disposal policy, strengthened its relocation and furniture checking processes, and enhanced “elected member transition processes to support the return of confidential physical documentation”.

It’s also considering mandatory information management training, and has checked remaining furniture in storage to ensure no more documents were “overlooked”.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/confidential-wellington-council-documents-found-in-sold-desk-should-have-been-destroyed-review-finds/

Source: Radio New Zealand

Further calls have been made for more to be done about dangerous dogs, in the wake of Tuesday’s fatal dog attack in Northland.

Mihiata Te Rore, 62, was killed by a pack of three dogs at a property in the small town of Kaihu on Tuesday. She was the third person to be killed by dogs in the region in four years, and fourth nationwide.

It has prompted calls for change from as high up as the prime minister, meanwhile RNZ has been contacted by multiple dog attack victims who have shared their frustration at what they say is a lack of action by authorities.

Local Government Minister Simon Watts said he had been exploring non-legislative options to help councils deal with the issue.

But multiple organisations have been calling for a change at a policy level, including the SPCA, which said the Dog Control Act was “hopelessly out of date”.

Whangārei man Jade Campbell was among the dog attack victims calling for more to be done.

“They stick their head through the hedge and bark at us, and they’ve frightened the missus off the bottom of the section with the boy, the boy’s only two years old,” he said.

“They’re aggressive, they’ve come over and killed our cat.”

He said the council hadn’t done anything in response.

Campbell believed owners should have the legal right to destroy a dog if it roamed onto their property.

“A bite and a couple of shakes will kill a young child easily, so the law basically says I have to wait until the dog kills my son before I can kill the dog.”

Under New Zealand law, it was only legal to kill a dog if it was actively attacking a person or animals.

Whangārei District Council’s manager of health and bylaws Reiner Mussle said they investigated every complaint they received, including Campbell’s case.

“Unfortunately, the cat was found in a decomposed state and there was insufficient evidence available to determine how it died or to establish that a dog was responsible,” he said.

“While historic dog footprints were identified on the complainant’s property, these indicated that dogs had been present in the area at some point in the past, but there was nothing directly linking those footprints to the death of the cat.”

Mussle said they were actively monitoring the issue of non-secured dogs in the wider area, and taking action where required.

But the issue is not just in Northland.

More than 200 children aged under 15 and nearly 3000 adults were attacked by dogs in Auckland between July 2024 and June 2025.

Papatoetoe resident Krish had been chased through the street by roaming dogs. His cat had also been killed.

He said more needed to be done.

“It’s been a pretty devastating loss for our family, so I’m trying to make it my mission over the next few weeks to actually get something done about it,” he said.

Krish had engaged lawyers about his case, and wanted to speak to his local MP about boosting enforcement for unruly dogs.

“If you have an off-leash dog, there needs to be more punishment for it, almost like an instant impound or severe fines, or just no off-leash dogs almost,” he said.

“And then possibly looking into banning dangerous dog breeds or unleashed dogs.”

Police said the dogs involved in the Kaihu attack were with Animal Control and would be destroyed.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/calls-for-tougher-penalties-to-stop-roaming-aggressive-dogs/

Source: Radio New Zealand

The larva of a stripey fish could be the key to preventing a chronic and painful swelling condition that’s a common side effect of some breast cancer treatment.

Lymphoedema usually affected the arms or legs and could be caused by cancer treatments that remove or damage the lymph nodes. There was currently no cure.

The condition could be congenital or caused by an injury, but it mostly occurred as an unintended consequence following breast-cancer treatment.

Auckland University scientists discovered a molecule in zebrafish larva that offered hope of eventually treating or preventing the condition.

Lead researcher Dr Jonathan Astin, told Checkpoint, the larva of zebrafish were often used to answer scientific questions as the larva was almost completely transparent, making it easy to fluorescently label any organ system.

Astin said the way a human embryo developed was initially almost identical to a fish embryo – so the hope was what was discovered using zebrafish could be directly translated into understanding human development and disease.

In Astin’s lab, the lympahtics of the fish were tagged to help understand how lymphatics form and how lymphatic diseases could be treated.

The scientists discovered a growth-promoting molecule, known as ‘insulin-like growth factor’, or IGF, accelerated the growth of lymphatic vessels in zebrafish, so it had the potential to repair damaged vessels.

“What we’ve done subsequently is grown human lymphatics in a dish and put this human IGF on and that has been able to stimulate human lymphatic growth,” Astin said.

“Finding the molecule in fish allowed us to identify it might be therapeutic and find the human version.”

Astin said lymphoedema was often seen in breast cancer patients, with some estimates that around 20 percent of patients who had lymph nodes removed as part of breast cancer treatment having lymphoedema develop in one of their arms.

The condition was very difficult to cure once a person had it, Aston said, because the fluid build up caused tissue damage which could be hard to reverse, but the hope was it could be prevented.

“The plan would really be prevent it form occurring in the first place, so we hope by identifying this new IGF, it may be part of a treatment cocktail where we might be able to provide these lymphatic stimulating growth factors to patients who have lymph nodes removed in order to prevent the onset or the incidents of lymphoedema.”

Any possible treatment would still be many years off, Astin said, as work was still being done to understand whether it could stimulate repair and the it would need to be tested for safety.

“But this is the first new lymphatic growth factor we’ve identified in many years.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/how-a-tiny-fish-could-lead-to-treatment-for-a-painful-chronic-condition/

Source: Radio New Zealand

The lawyer for convicted sex offender and former Gloriavale leader Howard Temple claims jailing the 85-year-old was excessive.

Temple was sentenced to 26 months’ jail in December for indecencies on multiple girls and young women.

He immediately appealed and has been on bail.

His lawyer, Michael Vesty, argues the sentence is excessive given Temple’s age, bail conditions and cognitive impairment.

Vesty said it should be reduced to two years or less to allow for home detention.

The Crown said the offending spanned many years, despite a previous police warning, and affected a large number of victims.

Justice Paulsen reserved his decision.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/gloriavale-leader-howard-temple-appeals-excessive-jail-sentence/

Source: Radio New Zealand

Thames Coromandel District Council says a sinkhole has formed near the Onemana Wastewater Treatment Plant.

In a post online the council says it suspects treated wastewater may have entered a local wetland, potentially entering a stream that flows to the beach.

It says the sinkhole is on private property near the wastewater treatment plant’s subsurface irrigation field.

Onemana is a coastal community on the Coromandel Peninsula, north of Whangamata.

“As a proactive step, we are erecting signage by the Onemana Drive Carpark advising people not to swim, fish or collect shellfish in the area around where the stream discharges until further notice,” it said.

The council said it was turning off the irrigation disposal that is closest to the sinkhole, carrying out water sampling and would monitor the site to ensure no further deterioration or land movement.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/wastewater-may-be-flowing-to-a-coromandel-beach-after-sinkhole-forms/

Source: Radio New Zealand

Courts will have to grapple more and more with AI fakes and it might take law changes to keep them out of trials, the government’s chief legal advisers say.

Crown Law’s long-term insights briefing to a parliamentary select committee on Thursday morning turned quickly to questions around the reliability of evidence in the age of deep fakes.

The ability of generative artificial intelligence (such as large-language models that generate text, or image generating AI) “to facilitate the production of fake evidence will increase and could challenge evidential integrity in the justice system”, said its long-term briefing report.

It was a growing global problem, it said.

“Is it what the Crown or the Defence say it is? Does it have the truth that the particular photo or text purports to have, or is it fake?” Deputy Solicitor-General Madeleine Laracy told the select committee.

“These create really tangible problems during trials” that they only had the normal tools of admissability to try to deal with.

The briefing suggested two ways to tackle it but both had big implications; for instance, lawmakers could bring in a new “admissability threshold” but if that meant all digital evidence was checked for reliability that would “impose a significant additional burden” on both sides in criminal trials – and this in an already log-jammed system.

MPs asked: “Have we seen fake evidence from AI in courts today?”

Laracy noted one case she was familiar with, where the defence challenged the metadata that sat behind Crown evidence. This went back to asking what other “human evidence” there was to support that the evidence was reliable.

When RNZ asked Crown Law for more details, it said the case was still before the courts which had ordered broad suppression.

The briefing said there were numerous examples overseas where counsel and self-represented defendants had been reprimanded for using cases that had been “hallucinated” (made up) by AI.

It referred to a case in London in 2025 that cited a New Zealand commercial case where a draft about “apparently non-existent cases” led to a challenge.

Solicitor-General Una Jagose KC said the fake in a case presumably could be anything – “it could look like an email … It could look like a recording of a person who makes an admission”.

Crown Law’s 31-page briefing said current cases suggested this was not widespread but Crown prosecutors told them about the “early signs … [that] signal that authenticity challenges will become more common as technology advances”.

“In one case there was an allegation during cross-examination of a Crown witness that Crown evidence was doctored in some way. In another, a Crown prosecutor was questioned (without basis) about using GenAI to write submissions.

“Media reports also indicate a self-represented defendant in a murder trial claimed that CCTV footage relied on by the Crown was fake.

“The Crown challenged the evidence given by the accused and he in turn alleged the Crown had produced false CCTV and other evidence.”

The question became how to adapt – prosecutors, for instance, would have to become adept at recognising what defence evidence to challenge, and to respond to defence AI challenges, said the briefing.

“If the problem of fake evidence becomes widespread, it could become standard police procedure to analyse any evidence that will be relied on by a Crown witness, to enable assurances to be made to a future jury of its authenticity,” said the briefing.

It was also anticipated they would need more experts who could testify about the integrity of metadata, said Jagose.

“The real challenge” was around defence evidence because it did not have to give the Crown a heads-up on it to allow time to check it, Laracy said.

“Verification procedures could delay trials which would not be desirable,” said the briefing.

The courts are already log-jammed and backed-up.

The committee discussed if that might require law changes for notification periods around evidence that might pose AI questions-of-origin.

The briefing discussed that, and a second “high level strategic” of the “admissability threshold”.

Labour MP Vanushi Walters asked about the reliability of the advice that prosecutors might be getting from AI.

The Solicitor-General imposes a two-part test that has to be met to go ahead and prosecute, around if the evidence is sufficient and the public interest.

Jagoes said so far, there were no guidelines on that and there might come a time that AI made those decisions more efficient.

“I suspect that, well, I’m the Solicitor-General till next Friday, but I suspect that the Solicitor-General will always be anxious that criminal prosecution decisions are being made by a human because of the judgment and all the requirements and all the balancing of the public interest that needs to go into it.

“Maybe machines will be able to do that in the future but that’s a very long way away I’d say,” said Jagose.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/ai-and-deep-fakes-becoming-problematic-for-courts/

Source: Radio New Zealand

A person has died after being pulled out of the water at St Clair Beach in Dunedin.

Police say they were called to the beach at the south of the city just before midday on Thursday.

The person was unresponsive after being pulled from the water and could not be revived despite medical treatment.

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LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/person-dies-after-being-pulled-from-water-at-dunedin-beach/

Source: Radio New Zealand

The chair of Wellington’s new water entity will not promise the Moa Point wastewater treatment plant will be fully fixed by July, when it takes over.

Tiaki Wai board chair Will Peet also will not give “absolute confidence” that people will be able to swim on south coast beaches next summer, but says he will provide updates about that in the coming months.

But he says the entity has a good shot at significantly improving Wellington’s water infrastructure, despite having to deal with serious problems.

Directors of the water entity met on Thursday in central Wellington.

Tiaki Wai is replacing Wellington Water and inheriting the region’s assets – providing drinking water, wastewater, and piped stormwater services from July.

It is also in line to inherit the extensively damaged Moa Point, which after a major failure earlier this month was sending millions of litres of raw sewage into Cook Strait every day.

Officials are currently tight-lipped about the cause of the delay, or when the plant will be fixed, citing an independent Crown review and insurance processes.

But Wellington Water chief executive Pat Dougherty previously said 80 percent of the electronics were damaged and some equipment parts may need to be brought in from overseas.

Peet said he expected to get an “operating plant of-sorts” by July, doubted it would be fully-fixed.

“There’s a lot of work to do with the plant, I think they’re still discovering what the state of things are. We will be getting some updates over the next while – I wouldn’t be making commitments that all things will be in and done in 90 days – not at all.”

He said he was working through the specific details of the transfer agreement with Wellington City Council, including making sure the plant was able to do what it needed to.

“If there are any changes we’ll come back and let people know about what that is, but right now the focus is not about the legal agreements and the funds – it has to be on the recovery and minimising the amount of sewage going into the south coast.”

Peet said he would not comment on what caused the plant’s failure while an investigation was underway, though he said he was “interested” to find out like everyone else.

Asked whether he could give absolute confidence people would be able to swim at the beaches next year, once the entity had controlled the plant for months, Peet said he would provide updates on that in the future.

“I don’t think anybody in my position should give you something that says absolute confidence because that wouldn’t be the right thing to do. I’ll be able to give you more of an update on that in the coming weeks and months, as we know more as we get closer to taking over.”

(h) ‘A lot to be done’ before July – officials

During the Tiaki Wai board meeting, establishment director Dougal List said progress had been made in the asset transfer agreements, but there was “a lot of work still to go” before day one.

The complex paperwork and financial arrangements were currently being worked through with councils, List said.

Peet agreed, saying there was “a lot of work to be done”.

Wellingtonians – those living in Wellington City, Porirua, Hutt City, and Upper Hutt – would receive a separate water bill from 1 July for water services.

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Peet said the organisation was “well in train” with being ready from July.

New chief executive Michael Brewster, who previously led Tasmania’s water utility, would start at the organisation on 2 March.

“Look, Moa point is a significant issue, but I don’t want to take away from all the other stuff that’s going on… there’s still Seaview, Titahi Bay, Karori wastewater treatment plants operating.”

The new entity had been promising more investment in Wellington’s chronically underfunded water infrastructure – but warned it may come at a higher cost.

Asked whether he was confident Wellington’s water infrastructure would improve, Peet said: “It will, but it will take some time.”

“I am confident that things will improve, we have got a very different makeup to what Wellington Water and the councils have had – we have got a good shot at making this significantly better.”

But he said there was 800 kilometres of the network where pipes had passed the end of their life, and “serious problems” to deal with.

“It didn’t take five minutes to get like this, it’s going to take longer than five minutes to fix.”

He said it was likely water bills would increase, but expected Wellingtonians to ask what improvements they were getting for that higher cost.

Already people are paying about 30 – 40 percent of their rates on water services, a spokesperson said.

On 25 March Tiaki Wai will release its water services strategy, which would give people a pricing strategy for their water bills, which will be different, depending on where they live in the region.

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LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/no-guarantee-moa-point-will-be-fixed-soon-water-chair/

Source: Radio New Zealand

A controversial high-rise development has been approved in Mt Victoria in Wellington, despite strong opposition from neighbours.

The proposal for the seven-storey, 32-unit Mayfair apartment block was first lodged in late 2024, after the Wellington City Council relaxed rules about what could be built in character areas.

In his decision, Commissioner Alistair Aburn said the proposal’s effects on townscape were “acceptable and consistent with the outcomes anticipated under the recently revised and now operative District Plan (2024) provisions, which provide for residential buildings of at least six storeys in the High Density Residential Zone”.

He found that any adverse effects on the Elizabeth Street Heritage Area would be “less than minor and therefore be acceptable”.

Opponents to the development include filmmaker Dame Gaylene Preston and former Wellingtonian of the Year Ralph Highman.

Highman shares a private road with the development.

He said 25,000 truck movements were planned over two years in the construction of the apartment block, and neighbours had safety and access concerns.

“One of the developers’ main plans has been to rip up the pedestrian pathway to try and make it safer. I mean, on what kind of planet does ripping up a pedestrian pathway make a driveway safer? If you’ve got your kids walking up and that driveway to school each day, obviously, that’s a big concern.”

Dame Gaylene is a long-time Mt Victoria resident.

She said the development would require extensive geo-tech work, which was “crazy” given recent weather events.

“Particularly in light of what happened last weekend in Tauranga and other places in New Zealand… Hauling 5000 cubic metres of Mt Victoria out from the mountain, it’s on a slope, and carting it away down a shared driveway on 10-tonne trucks, with permission to do that over two years… I think that is a crazy sort of development to be putting there.”

In his decision, Commissioner Alistair Aburn acknowledged that there could be “no debate” the proposal would involve substantial earthworks over the majority of the site.

Council officials had noted that those earthworks had the “potential to result in adverse effects in terms of site stability, erosion and sediment control, dust emissions and visual effects.”

However, a council engineer had reviewed a Geotechnical Assessment provided by the applicant and concluded that the earthworks effects, “including site stability, erosion and sediment run-off”, and dust emissions could be appropriately managed during the construction phase.

Aburn said he was also satisfied that the visual effects of the proposal would be limited to the construction stage and would be “fully mitigated” once the building and site landscaping had been completed.

It was appropriate that the final shared driveway layout and detailed design plans were provided to affected residents and invited them to forward comments to the Council’s compliance monitoring officer, he said.

Ralph Highnam said opponents now had 15 days to decide whether to appeal the decision to the Environment Court.

The developer of the Mayfair apartment block, Forma Group, was approached for comment.

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LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/controversial-high-rise-development-approved-in-wellington/

Source: Radio New Zealand

Wellington Water has announced a new board chairperson after Nick Leggett stepped down amid the Moa Point plant failure.

Bill Bayfield was appointed into the leadership role after having served on the water company’s board since September 2023.

Leggett stepped down from the job following the sewage plant failure which occurred two weeks ago – and had been sending tens of millions of litres of raw sewage into Cook Strait each day.

He said leadership carried responsibility, and stepping aside would allow Wellington Water to focus on fixing the problems and restoring public trust.

Bayfield acknowledged Leggett’s work in the role.

“On behalf of the Wellington Water Board, I would like to thank Nick for his valuable contribution and leadership over the past few years during his time as chair.”

Bayfield had been chief executive of Canterbury and Bay of Plenty Regional Councils and was also the CEO of water regulator Taumata Arowai.

He would take on the role as board chair effective immediately.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/wellington-water-appoints-bill-bayfield-as-new-chairperson/

Source: Radio New Zealand

Parking changes in Hamilton city have come with a hefty price tag for drivers, with infringements more than doubling.

The total value of tickets in the central business district was also nearly five times higher the year after the changes were introduced. But the council said Hamilton central is still cheaper than most other cities in the country.

In October 2024, Hamilton City Council reduced the previous two hours free parking on central city streets to one hour free parking and required all cars to be registered via a streetside kiosk or parking app to receive the free parking and pay for more if needed.

At the same time, the government increased penalties for people misusing mobility parking and also increased the parking infringement and towage fees (which are not set by local councils but by central government).

Data released to RNZ under the Official Information Act showed that the year after the city changed to zoned parking, 5434 drivers parking in the ‘green’ zone (closest to Garden Place and the heart of the city) were issued with fines valued at $316,414. This compares to less than half that number of infringements, 2528, in the 12 months before the change.

Those fines had a total value of $64,645 and were in a period before the government changes.

Zooming in on the city’s main road, Victoria Street, the cost of fines issued rose by nearly 400 percent.

In the 12 months before the changes were introduced, 876 parking tickets were handed out with a combined value of $22,643.

Those numbers soared in the 12 months after the changes when 1461 parking tickets were handed out with a combined value of $90,470.

Despite this substantial new cost for some drivers, the council’s head of transport, Gordon Naidoo, said parking in Hamilton’s central city was still inexpensive compared with other city centres in New Zealand.

“Hamilton’s first hour of free on street parking is uncommon among major cities, which positions our city as one of the more affordable places for short stay parking,” Naidoo said.

RNZ asked whether the large increase in fines represented the fact the public either did not understand the changes or didn’t find them workable.

However, Naidoo said the increases were an expected part of people adjusting to the changes.

“Some drivers fail to register their vehicle for the first hour of free parking, which results in an infringement. We believe the system is workable for the public, but like any parking system it requires ongoing monitoring and clear communication to ensure people understand what is expected of them,” Naidoo said.

What the system did not have was the support of the mayor.

Mayor Tim Macindoe campaigned to return the city to two hours free parking and told RNZ that continued to be his position.

“I continue to advocate for the return of two hours’ free parking to make the CBD more welcoming and accessible, which is better for retailers, businesses and Hamiltonians. Parking arrangements from 1 July 2026 will be considered as part of the 2026/27 Annual Plan, and I have asked the new CBD revitalisation sub‑committee to include this in their work.

“However, the final decision rests with the full council, and due process must be followed,” he said.

The data provided to RNZ shows that not all fines were collected as revenue for council.

“The ‘value of infringements’ figures represents the amount issued, not the amounts paid,” said the council.

This was because fines could be disputed, withdrawn, or referred to the courts.

In the 12 months since the parking changes, $2,235,906 of fines were issued in Hamilton central.

Just over 68 percent of that amount, $1,664,143.78 was actually collected by the council.

Generally, Naidoo felt the current set-up, while not perfect, helped encourage turnover in high demand areas while still providing longer stay options where appropriate.

“This supports retailers, hospitality, and visitors by reducing the time people spend searching for a park. A good parking system isn’t just about enforcing rules or issuing tickets. It’s a tool for shaping how people move, access, and experience a city. We want people to find a park when they need one and get on with their day,” Naidoo said.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/parking-fines-more-than-double-in-hamilton-after-changes/

Source: Radio New Zealand

It’s not “panic, panic” yet, but Ngawi crayfishers are keeping their fingers crossed that a failed bridge reopens soon on Wairarapa’s south coast.

While the bridge at the Turanganui River on Lake Ferry Road reopened on Wednesday, the bridge over Hurupi Stream on Cape Palliser Road remains shut.

The bridge, known as the ‘Banana Bridge’, has been deemed structurally unsafe after severe flooding earlier this week.

The road is the only route in and out for the more than 100 people trapped on the south coast, prompting food and medicine to be delivered by helicopter on Wednesday evening.

An update on the status of the bridge is expected on Thursday, following an urgent notice from the South Wairarapa District Council and subsequent assessment by a civil engineer.

“The bridge, often referred to as the Banana bridge, could pose a serious safety risk,” a council spokesperson said.

“The bridge must not be used under any circumstances until it has been inspected and formally cleared by a qualified engineer.”

Ngawi fisherman Andrew Sim told RNZ in his 40 years on the coast, the Banana Bridge had never gone down, and crayfishers and their stock were currently stuck.

“I think there’s nine of us here, six of us are finished [the season’s fishing], three still going to mop up the little bit they’ve got left,” Sim said.

“They’re probably a little bit left in the lurch to get their product out.”

He said the live lobsters were usually transported by truck out of the fishing settlement.

“I’ve got a big boat if worst comes to worst, I can transport it to Wellington.

“It’s not panic, panic at this stage, but it’d be nice to know where it’s heading.”

Crayfisher Lance Maindonald was also eagerly awaiting an update on the bridge.

Maindonald, who has been unable to get into Ngawi due to the bridge closures, said he was hoping to board a boat from Wellington to take him there.

Sim said his stepson was among those who needed to collect the last of his catch but was also trapped on the wrong side of the bridge.

“We’ll know a bit more later on.”

RNZ has contacted the council for an update.

Sim said he was almost out of medication when the helicopter arrived on Wednesday with supplies.

“The chopper’s come in… and my goodness, what a haul of food that got delivered out to here.

“That went beyond all expectations, that was fantastic. Everything from fresh fruit, vegetables, meat, toilet paper, dog rolls, cat food. Basically, everything you needed to keep you alive for several days, that’s for sure.

“It was unbelievable.”

Sim didn’t expect there would be traffic “will-nilly” on the road any time soon, but hoped it would at least reopen to residents and those who needed to get in and out.

However, he said there were “certainly a lot worse places” to be stuck.

“We’re pretty blessed out here.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/crayfishers-in-cut-off-wairarapa-hope-bridge-reopens-soon/

Source: Radio New Zealand

A man found dead in a Tauranga park, sparking a homicide investigation, has been named as Dax Rodney Holland.

He was 54.

Detective Senior Sergeant Natalie Flowerdew-Brown said police were called to the Wharepai Domain on Saturday around 2pm following Holland’s body being found.

A homicide investigation was launched following a post-mortem on Monday.

“Police continue to ask for anyone who may have seen any unusual or suspicious behaviour around the Wharepau Domain prior to 2pm on Saturday 14 February, to please get in touch,” Flowerdew-Brown said.

“Anyone with information is asked to contact Police online at 105.police.govt.nz, clicking “Update report”, or by calling 105.”

The reference number is 260214/8937.

People can also give information anonymously through Crime Stoppers on 0800 555 111.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/02/19/dax-rodney-holland-named-as-man-found-dead-in-tauranga-park/