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Blog

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? 
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National Planning Standards consultation document - MfE

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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. ​
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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).
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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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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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The latest RMA changes - in bite sized pieces

3/8/2017

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A lot has been going on in the RMA space lately.

The government recently made a bunch of changes to the RMA to make it less complicated. We'd like to chat with you about some of those changes. What are they? What do they mean on the ground? We've put together a summary document of the more significant changes if you want to dive right in:
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Some delicious RMA nibbles.

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Perception Planning's RMA Amendment Bill submission

5/8/2016

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15 March 2016
The Government is proposing some pretty fundamental changes to the Resource Management Act with its Resource Legislation Bill.  Submissions just closed on this Bill and since then there has been a bit of media, much of it pointing out how the Bill proposes to limit public participation in resource management processes and decision making.

There are concerns the Department of Conservation won’t be able to do their job of advocating for conservation - and we think this proposed amendment will limit the ability of other public good organisations, including community groups to make submissions and be involved in environmental decision making processes.

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A new view of s32: better RMA plan making

5/8/2016

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25 March 2014
​Section 32 of the Resource Management Act provides a process for the critical evaluation of planning policy and proposals. Lucy Cooper examines whether the recent changes to s32 will improve the quality of s32 evaluations and the basis upon which we develop planning policy in New Zealand:

The amendments to s32 of the Resource Management Act that were introduced recently are designed to address both procedural issues – i.e. how to do a s32 evaluation – and improve the evidential basis upon which policy development and ultimately planning decisions are made.   Accompanying the changes is the Ministry for the Environment’s (MfE) interim GUIDE TO SECTION 32 OF THE RMA, a 95-page document that provides a step-by-step manual to the s32 evaluation process, from scoping and project managing the evaluation right through to the publication of the report.

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Government irrigation company tips RMA playing field

5/8/2016

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10 July 2013
With the announcement of the formation of Crown Irrigation Investments Limited by Minister of Primary Industries Nathan Guy (‘IRRIGATION INVESTMENT COMPANY ESTABLISHED’ Beehive press release, 1 July 2013), the government has unashamedly put in place the machinery to tilt the regional planning playing field firmly in favour of economic development.

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