Greetings from your Community Board

Highlights of our recent meetings

Our last meeting was on 9 March. Some of the highlights are included below. You can watch all our meetings via livestream.

• We received public forum presentations from local groups and residents, including on the good work of Birthright Canterbury Trust, and from Phillipstown Hub on the rebuild of their pizza oven, which we provided a grant towards.

• We considered a number of staff reports relating to traffic and parking issues, specifically on responding to safety issues at the Barbadoes/Bealey intersection, removing redundant loading zones on Beveridge Street at the request of a resident, improving access to the Kindercare Learning Centre on Armagh Street, and improving safety and visibility for drivers at the Warwick/Vogel intersection.

• We approved the scheme design for signalised access to the new Pak’nSave supermarket being built on Main North Road.

• We approved grants from our Discretionary Response Fund, firstly to help relevant community groups and resident associations with the cost of printing newsletters, and secondly toward creating a pathway and two walkway bridges for Papanui Bush.

• Ali Jones was sworn in as the Innes ward’s newest representative on the Waipapa Papanui-Innes-Central Community Board.

Read the minutes for our 9 March meeting for full details.

Our next meeting is on 13 April in the boardroom at the Papanui Library and Service Centre. The link to view the livestream is available on the first page of the Agenda. Search our past and future meetings here.

Tell us your vision for our Papanui, Innes and Central communities

We’re developing our draft Community Board Plans across the city and and we’d like to hear your feedback.

A Community Board Plan is a three-year plan that sets out the community board’s vision and priorities for the local community. Each plan identifies up to nine priorities, which the board will focus on during their term. The plans guide decisions on local activities, projects and facilities and help the board understand what their communities would like them to advocate for. Here's the one for Waipapa Papanui-Innes-Central.

You have until 26 March to have your say. Community feedback will help shape each community board plan, with all plans aimed to be completed by May 2023.

How do you want your rates bill to look?

Mayor Phil Mauger is encouraging Christchurch residents to have their say on a budget that aims to keep rates increases down while continuing to invest in the city’s future and deliver the basics.

The Council’s Draft Annual Plan 2023/24 has opened for public feedback. It proposes what the Council will spend on projects and day-to-day services over the next financial year and how it will pay for them – and foremost among the proposals are some changes to how the Council charges its rates.

The Draft Annual Plan proposes an average overall rates increase of 5.68%, and an average increase for households of 5.79%. Read more on Newsline.
 

Concrete pour major milestone in Court Theatre build

Construction of The Court Theatre’s new home in central Christchurch has begun.

Contractors have poured the first concrete on the Colombo St and Gloucester Street site which will see The Court Theatre return to the city in the heart of the Performing Arts Precinct.

One of the first jobs is working on the building’s foundations and we’ll be pouring concrete over a number of days for this. The next step will be the main construction of buildings, with precast concrete panels, steel and large timber elements all forming part of the building core.

Christchurch District Plan changes to get public feedback

Christchurch City Council will soon notify proposed changes to its planning rulebook for housing and business growth.

Earlier this month, councillors voted to proceed with consultation on proposed changes to the city’s District Plan – the Housing and Business Choice Plan Change (Plan Change 14) and the Heritage Plan Change (Plan Change 13).

Notification on both plan changes will open on 17 March and people will be able to give feedback on them until 3 May.

Plan Change 14 has been designed to bring the city’s District Plan in line with the Government’s National Policy Statement for Urban Development and new national standards to encourage multi-housing developments, called the Medium-Density Residential Standards (MDRS).