Annual Meeting of Members
9:00 am Sunday 30 January 2022 At the Dunes Golf Clubhouse
Agenda:
1. Welcome MRAI Members & Guests:
Murray McLean, Deputy Mayor and Councillor for Mercury Bay
Tony Fox, Councillor for Mercury Bay
Deli Connell, Mercury Bay Community Board
Heather Bruce, Whitianga & Mercury Bay Community Manager
Greg Jenks, Coastal Restoration Specialist
Len Salt,Thames-Coromandel Mayoral Candidate
2. Apologies
Mayor Sandra Goudie
Mohamed Imtiaz, TCDC Infrastructure Manager
Scott Simpson, MP for Coromandel
Rekha Giri-Percival, Mercury Bay Community Board
3. Minutes of the Annual Meeting held 1 Feb 2021 were circulated in the MRAI February 2021 Newsletter
4. Chairman's Report [Mark Bedford] - APPENDED
5. Treasurer's Report [David Macdonald] - APPENDED
Audited Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31 March 2021
6. Matarangi Reserves Management Group Report [David Macdonald, Chair and Sue Karl, Secretary] - APPENDED
7. Matarangi Community Trust and Matarangi Land Holding Ltd update
8. Invited Speakers
9. General Business and Open Forum
Community Camera thank you to Mark Hall
Erosion
Retirement of Alan Cunningham
MRAI Constitution amendment
Committee Nominations
10. Meeting Closure
Reports for items 4, 5 and 6 are APPENDED, these reports will be taken as read.
Item 4: Chairman’s Report
Matarangi Ratepayers Association Inc
Annual General Meeting 2022 - Chairs Report
I would like to extend a warm welcome to all members and guests to our AGM and also acknowledge the ongoing support from our local TCDC Councillors and our community Board.
2021 has been a challenging year for our country in general and our local community and their families in particular. It is indeed encouraging that we are able to gather today in light of previous Covid restrictions.
MRAI, through its committee, continues to represent its members in many forums that not only benefit ratepayers but also our wider community. This year we have provided donations to the Rings Beach wetlands group, funded the restoration of the security cameras, helped to support the local Community patrol, liased with TCDC on many issues including the three waters, the Beaches subdivision and of course the ongoing Open Space discussions. I am also personally providing a leadership role in the Ōmaro Spit Restoration project. Our current membership has increased slightly to 290, and I would thank you all for your continued support and encourage you to promote membership to other ratepayers.
Easter 2021 saw a major initiative from MRAI to respond to TCDC’s Long Term Plan consultation, particularly as it related to the ongoing discussion around protection of the Open Space in Matarangi. We were somewhat blindsided when a third option was added to the plan without consultation with us of DO NOTHING and that was indicated as the preferred option for TCDC. In typical Matarangi community style, you rallied behind us and we were able to present to TCDC 658 written submissions that the majority clearly enunciated that the Do Nothing option was not acceptable. Thank you, one and all, for this magnificent support. Further deliberation from TCDC provided a resolution that TCDC would continue to work with the Matarangi Community to provide a long term solution around the complex issue of permanent open space protection. Along with myself, Alastair MacCormick (Matarangi Community Trust) and the Directors of Matarangi Land Holding Ltd, we have continued to work with Council on this issue which still remains unresolved.
Ōmaro Spit Erosion Project
Along with Gavin Walker, Alastair MacCormick, Ray Fanning, Graeme Osborne and myself have been working on a long term solution for this serious erosion issue. We have engaged Greg Jenks from Tauranga who has extensive experience with coastal erosion and restoration and the high level plan can be found under “news” on our website ourmatarangi.com . We will need the support of the entire community for this project and Greg will be available for a Q and A session following this AGM. Members of the public will be most welcome to attend.
MRAI continues to work closely with, and has a good working relationship with TCDC, especially in the infrastructure areas but especially the issues with water. I would like to particularly thank Grant Short for his untiring analysis of water issues from the publicly available information. This work is ongoing and is particularly important as we need a better understanding so we can ensure the future development can be adequately catered for. We will endeavour to answer any questions you may have, and those that are not resolvable at the AGM will be added to our future discussions.
Deputy Chair, Harry Karl, (also an active member of the Reserves Management Group) will retire at the AGM and I would like to convey my sincere thanks to Harry for his huge input not only to MRAI but also to the entire Matarangi community and wish him well for the future. Thanks also to Kieran Mullins, who has stepped down from her Secretary and committee role.
A vote of thanks also to our honorary auditor, Alan Cunningham, has also indicated that this is his last year and again our sincere appreciation of your work. To that end, there will be a proposed constitutional change to move away from yearly audits but there will still be the opportunity for our accounts to be audited at the discretion of the committee, should the AGM so decide.
The results from new committee members nominations will be announced at the AGM where I will formally welcome our new committee members.
Once again, sincere thanks for your continued support.
Mark Bedford
Item 5: Audited Financial Statements to 31 March 2021
Item 6: Reserves Management Group Report
MATARANGI RESERVES MANAGEMENT GROUP
REPORT FOR 2021
Whilst the Reserves Management Group only met twice with TCDC representatives during 2021 we maintained regular contact throughout the year. Given the Covid outbreak, our ability to work together as a team was hampered by lockdowns and social distancing.
Despite this we were able to complete the following tasks:
Village Green Area Dune Planting
The small number of the Reserves Management Group, in conjunction with TCDC planted a section of the dunes with 1200 plants to the left of the walkway down to the beach at the Village Green entrance. This task was undertaken during lockdown hence the limited number of people attending and those that did social distanced. Unfortunately, Te Rerenga School were very keen to be part of this project however, due to Covid & lockdown, were unable to participate. In December a small number of volunteers weeded this planted area and a special mention should be made to our resident Recreational Services employee who willingly removed all the weed piles from the Reserve.
Tennis Courts
A group of volunteers lead by Chris Palmer arranged two working bees to clean all the Council owned Tennis Courts including the courts beside the Shopping Centre which are privately owned. TCDC received a request from The Pickleball Club seeking permission to mark one of the Courts situated in Matai as a playable Pickleball Court. This court currently does not have a tennis net installed. The other court is set up for tennis.
Village Green Playground
The Village Green Playground refurbishment is planned to go ahead in May/June of this year. The Reserves Management Group received a donation of $5,000.00 from the Matarangi Library. RMG’s intention was to use these funds for additional play equipment. However, TCDC regulations means that we are unable to use these funds for this purpose. After discussions with Richardson’s Real Estate (Keith Goodall) who are the administrators of the Matarangi Library, it was agreed that these funds would be used to provide vandal proof picnic tables, benches and shade trees.
Other
It was disappointing to see that some people appear to get a lot of enjoyment from playing basketball with beer bottles at the basketball hoop on the Village Green. A big thanks goes out to all those people who painstakingly picked up all the shards of glass strewn through the playground.
David Macdonald Sue Karl
Chair Secretary
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