Latest news with #SurreyStFloodActionGroup
Otago Daily Times
08-05-2025
- Politics
- Otago Daily Times
DCC negligent: flood action group
The council has been accused of negligence and deliberate appeasement tactics over South Dunedin flood management. Speaking at hearings for the council's nine-year plan and Local Water Done Well — government reform on the future delivery of drinking water, wastewater and stormwater — Surrey St Flood Action Group convener Lynne Newell said residents had been seeking justice for years on the issue. "We counted over 30 years of fruitless submissions and millions of dollars spent commissioning engineering firms to investigate the waste and stormwater situation in South Dunedin and further afield," she said. "They designed engineering solutions to our problems that could have had us drying out by now, but they were ignored." Ms Newell said the South Dunedin Future programme was a deliberate "delaying tactic" to appease residents. The joint programme between the Dunedin City Council and the Otago Regional Council is investigating seven options to respond to climate change and flooding problems in South Dunedin, which range from boosting flood defences to large-scale relocation of homes and infrastructure. The cost of options range from $2 billion to $7.1b. "Nothing new has been learnt from this costly project as many of the people in South Dunedin know," Ms Newell said. "All they have come up with is unknowable, estimated costs, an option of mass exodus of people to God knows where and leave the best land in the city to ducks and eels." She said by diverting wastewater and stormwater from the hill suburbs to South Dunedin, the council was knowingly risking the health of residents. Justice and a public apology was needed for "decades of putting [Surrey St] residents and ultimately the whole of South Dunedin at risk of serious disease and possibly deaths". She said flooding risk across Dunedin and the Taieri was not caused by climate change — it was instead caused by land impermeability from increased housing development, population density and a decaying piping and pumping network system. "At the end of the day, the most important thing a council has to do is ensure that you've got clean drinking water, that you're taking away the sewage and that people can travel safely around the city. "That's your core business — all the other frills are nice-to-have. She also asked for the council to implement a "mana-enhancing" media policy for South Dunedin, to give residents and business owners respect and promote the area as a valuable flat land asset.
Otago Daily Times
04-05-2025
- Politics
- Otago Daily Times
Surrey St group demands DCC action
Flooding in Surrey St, in October last year. PHOTO: GREGOR RICHARDSON Residents of a South Dunedin street say they are being "continually flooded with sewage" and are demanding the city council fix the problem. The Dunedin City Council will today meet to begin a week of hearings for its nine-year plan, as well as the city's adoption of Local Water Done Well — a government reform programme focused on the future delivery of drinking water, wastewater and stormwater. Among those who submitted on the plan were representatives of the recently formed Surrey St Flood Action Group. In her submission, convener Lynne Newell said local residents had been complaining to the council for years, urgently requesting an overflow of wastewater and sewage in the street be stopped. "We are continually flooded with sewage from the diversion of the hill suburbs' wastewater. "This sewage-filled stormwater flows into surrounding streets and increases the volume of water in the streets and thus the level of damage to properties. "The health risk is appalling and is a moral duty for the council to immediately address." In her submission, Ms Newell made a range of claims, including that the council was overstating climate change and was downplaying its own culpability for the overflows. The group requested the council begin "urgent action" to reduce the risk of further wastewater overflow to zero within the next year and apologise to the people of South Dunedin, among other demands. In his submission, committee member Julian Doorey said he had "financial skin in the issue of stormwater flooding". "The discharged contaminated water, including raw sewage, creates environmental hazards and serious health risks." The council has declined to comment on individual submissions before the hearings.
