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National Planning Standards - submissions open

11/7/2018

Draft National Planning Standards have been formally notified by the Ministry for the Environment.

They will have a huge impact on how plans are prepared and used by our communities. Any efforts to improve and rationalise the plan-making process are likely to be welcomed by planning practitioners, developers, NGOs and community groups. But are there potential downsides?

What's the big deal about planning standards, and what have our planning experts uncovered so far?

National Planning Standards consultation document - MfE

Te Aranga Māori Cultural Landscape Principles in Planning

10/11/2017

I’ve been reflecting on how to better represent Māori Cultural Values in planning following a recent Te Tau-a-Nuku / Nga Aho Māori Cultural Landscape Hui that I attended.

The hui focused on the Te Aranga Māori Cultural Landscape Principles: Mana, Whakapapa, Mauri Tu, Taiao, Mahi Toi, Tohu and Ahi Kā. While there are many principles of Tikanga Māori that can be applied to our work, I could see a lot of our projects at Perception Planning already meeting the Te Aranga principles.

I thought that this could be a good time to discuss how Te Aranga principles are being applied to planning. What are they? What are we at Perception Planning doing? What are others doing? What opportunities are there to do more? If you are working in the space of applying Te Aranga Principles to planning work, we would love to hear more examples and get more discussion going.

View from Marae on Maori ancestral land. Source: Perception Planning

18 October is a Very Big Day

18/10/2017

It's a Big Day for the RMA as heaps of the recent RLAA changes go live today. Today's nibble from the bite sized blog series is a wee date reminder for RMA practitioners. Are you ready to roll with the new amendments?

We've blogged about a few of the changes that go live today:
Notification
Temporary and marginal infringements
Fast tracking consents

We'd love to hear about how you've added the changes into your daily work. Any tips or suggestions for fellow planners?

Photo: Lukas Blazek on Unsplash

Appeal rights and resource consents

11/10/2017

The next snippet in our series of blogs on recent RMA amendments relates to the right to appeal council decisions on resource consents. These changes to section 120 kick in on 18 October 2017.

What is an appeal?

Generally, it's like a second opinion. If a party is unhappy with a decision made by a council as the result of a hearing, they can make an appeal to the Environment Court.

Notification

4/10/2017

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Welcome to the latest instalment of our bite sized blog series about the recent changes to the RMA.

The 18th of October is just around the corner. This is when a lot of the RLAA changes will kick in, including today’s special feature: Section 95 Notification. A.k.a how councils decide whether resource consent applications are:

publicly notified (everyone gets a chance to give feedback)
limited notified (a limited number of people get to give feedback)
or non-notified (public feedback isn’t necessary).

Today’s post is fairly planner-centric (including some free resources for council planners), but if you’re a Normal Person™ interested in finding out what the changes to notification might mean for you, stick with us and we’ll help you navigate the jargon.

Photo by Mathyas Kurman on Unsplash

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My activity status is... sedentary?

26/9/2017

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Welcome back to our bite sized blog series about recent changes to the RMA and what they mean for Regular People. This is a very short vocabulary post, with a Bonus Activity Status Diagram to print out and stick on your fridge (using that magnet you got from a street market in Wellington that says "It's martini o'clock!" even though I don't need reminding).

Background:
The Resource Legislation Amendment Act 2017 (RLAA) was adopted by the New Zealand government in April 2017. It contains changes to 5 different Acts, one of which is the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA). Some of the changes to the RMA happened immediately, and others will go live in October 2017.

Next week's bite sized RMA blog post is about resource consent applications and how councils decide to notify them. So today we'll chat about what an activity status is, and how public notification of resource consents is changing.

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Temporary or marginal infringements - who dares, wins?

31/8/2017

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Welcome back to our bite sized blog series about recent changes to the RMA and what they mean for Regular People. Some of the RMA changes address resource consent issues to make them easier and cheaper for people to deal with, and today we’ll chat about “temporary or marginal infringements” (new section 87BB of the RMA, going live in October 2017).

The government has decided that the council can make a call and decide that resource consent is not needed for ‘temporary’ or ‘marginal’ infringements of rules in a District or Regional Plan, when ordinarily a consent would be required.

Huh? How does this work?

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Electronic information delivery (finally)

29/8/2017

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Welcome to our bite sized blog series about recent changes to the RMA and what they mean for Regular People. Some of the RMA changes address resource consent issues to make them easier and cheaper for people to deal with, and today’s buzzword is “Electronic Information Delivery”.

The council I (Jen) used to work at was probably a fire hazard, with paper copies of All The Things stored on site. We posted out tonnes of documents, but emailed each other (That image isn't me... I don't wear suits).

Photo Kathleen Zarubin CC BY 2.0

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Fast tracking - zoom zoom!

16/8/2017

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One of the RLAA changes kicking off on 18 October 2017 is that resource consents for controlled activities can be processed in 10 working days - rather than the 20 working days required now. Check out section 87AAC of the RLAA for the policy details if you're keen. We'll wait.

Controlled activities are ones that need to go through a resource consent process so the council can make sure they follow certain parameters (e.g. have a bit of control), but they are always granted. Depending on the district plan, examples could be things like papakāinga housing projects, or relocating a dwelling*.

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Boundary activities - the bite sized RMA series

7/8/2017

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Welcome to the first in our series of posts about recent changes to the RMA and what they mean for Regular People. Some of the RMA changes address resource consent issues to make them easier and cheaper for people to deal with: Boundary activities, marginal infringements, and temporary infringements.

Today we’ll jump into the first topic that lots of Regular People can relate to: Boundary activities (new section 87BA of RMA).

Background:
The Resource Legislation Amendment Act 2017 (RLAA) was adopted by the New Zealand government in April 2017. It contains changes to 5 different Acts, one of which is the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA). Some of the changes to the RMA happened immediately, and others will go live in October 2017.

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<<Previous

Blog

National Planning Standards - submissions open

Te Aranga Māori Cultural Landscape Principles in Planning

18 October is a Very Big Day

Appeal rights and resource consents

What is an appeal?

Notification

My activity status is... sedentary?

Temporary or marginal infringements - who dares, wins?

Electronic information delivery (finally)

Fast tracking - zoom zoom!

Boundary activities - the bite sized RMA series

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