Regional and strategic leadership

Result: We have held regular hui for the ten Papatipu Rūnanga across Waitaha, including Te Rōpū Tuia and Te Paiherenga*

Result: We continue to investigate opportunities to establish co-governance and co-management arrangements with ngā Papatipu Rūnanga. For example, the Te Mōkihi programme consists of the five agencies (Environment Canterbury, Department of Conservation, Toitū Te Whenua Land Information New Zealand, Mackenzie District Council, and Waitaki District Council) with statutory responsibility for land and water management in Te Manahuna (Mackenzie Basin). The agencies and ngā Papatipu Rūnanga meet on a regular basis and remain committed to working together to improve environmental outcomes in Te Manahuna.

In 2023/24 we began investigating, in partnership with each of the ten Canterbury Papatipu Rūnanga, a reset of the governance arrangements we have in place, and which underpin the way we work in partnership.

The target for 2022/23, which was achieved, was to investigate feasibility of establishing at least one new co-governance or co-management arrangement.

Result: We have reviewed feedback from our annual community survey and from Te Kōrari, our People’s Panel, and identified four mechanisms that provide for involvement in Council decision-making that we can utilise and expand on. These are deliberative engagement processes such as citizens assemblies, panels or juries, public ‘open days’, livestreaming Council meetings, and using social media to request and analyse feedback on specific topics.

Result: A programme of Councillor engagements occurred across the region, with Councillors attending a variety of events.

Result: In an independent survey of a random sample of community members, more than one in three (37%) participants were aware that they can have a say in the work we do. This is an increase on 2023 (33%), but not statistically significant as the survey has a margin of error of +/-4.4%.

Result: Ten new schools have signed Enviroschool agreements, bringing the total supported within Canterbury to 136. In 2022/23, the target was to provide support for an additional 25 Enviroschools for the 2021 waiting list by the end of 2022/23, and was achieved. 25 additional Enviroschools signed up to the programme.

Result: Staff have worked with the Environment Canterbury Youth Rōpū to promote engagement opportunities to young people across the region. This has been achieved across multiple modes and has included training and development, gathering feedback, and participation in formal processes such as Long-Term Plan consultation. 

Result: Processes were reviewed and for 2023/24, $350,000 was available. 34 new applications were received from across the region requesting approximately $650,000. 23 groups were allocated funding; 12 were multi-year allocations made in previous years and 11 were new projects. View successful applications to the Waitaha Action to Impact fund.

Result: We provided secretariat support to the Canterbury Mayoral, Chief Executives, Corporate, Operations, Policy, Communications and Engagement and Economic Development Forums to enable their efficient and effective operations. This has included facilitating engagement with Central Government on several key matters including resource management, emergency management, infrastructure, and transport.

Result: A draft Canterbury Regional Policy Statement (RPS) and Section 32 report has been prepared. We are on track to notify a proposed RPS in December 2024.

Result: Each year our planners work with the region’s Territorial Authorities (TAs) to provide planning support on issues of regional significance, such as district plan reviews, private plan change requests, district development strategies, bylaws, and regionally significant notified resource consent applications. The majority of the work is responsive to the work programmes of the Canterbury TAs but some is led (or jointly led) by us, particularly in relation to the Greater Christchurch Partnership.

Result: For 2023/24, 1266 resource consent application grant/decline decisions were issued and 320 (26.1%) were processed in accordance with RMA statutory timeframes, down from 34.8% in 2022/23. This reduction reflects the work to focus on addressing older legacy consent applications, which have been in our system for some time.

As noted on page 64, we are implementing a Sustainable Consents Delivery Plan, focusing on addressing a buildup of applications. We expect the overall percentage timeframe compliance to continue to improve as the number of legacy consent applications reduces.

Of the 1226 consents decided, 1188 were non-notified, 26 were limited notified, and 12 were publicly notified. A further 207 applications were returned as incomplete.

Result: The overall median audit score for this year’s audit was 93.5% (‘very good’), which is slightly lower than the last audit (2021-22) median audit score (94.75%) but continues the trend of high overall median audit scores over the past three audits.

The purpose of the audit was to determine the extent to which each application had been assessed against the requirements of the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA), the policies and objectives of relevant planning documents, and the extent to which the specific effects associated with the activity were likely to be addressed by the consent conditions.

Result: We did not achieve this target with 68.3% (541) of 792 high-priority consents monitored. This compares with 72.7% (730) of 1,004 high-priority consents monitored in 2022/23. Further information is provided above.

Result: We responded to 81% (474) of 585 elevated pollution events within two days. This compares with 83.7% (691) of 826 elevated pollution events in 2022/23.

Result: Our Annual Report/Te Pūrongo ā-Tau 2022/23 was audited and presented to the Audit, Finance and Risk Committee on 4 October, adopted at the Council meeting on 25 October 2023, and published on our website in November.

Result: The Annual Plan for 2024/25 is year 1 of the Long-Term Plan 2024-34. The Long-Term Plan 2024-34 | Te Mahere Pae Tawhiti 2024-34 was adopted by Council on 26 June 2024.

Result: In May 2020, on the advice of our Treasury Advisor, Bancorp Treasury Services, we engaged Fitch Australia Pty Ltd to provide an internationally recognised credit rating and subsequent annual reviews. In July, Fitch Australia Pty Ltd completed their annual rating review and advised that Environment Canterbury have retained their AA+ Long-Term and F1+ Short-Term Issuer Default Ratings. (We have maintained these results since our initial assessment in 2020.)

Result: Work has progressed well on Environment Canterbury’s Climate Change Action Plan, which includes information on funding of climate change initiatives.

Result: Our website makes environmental monitoring data and information accessible to the public, including quick access to the frequently requested monitoring data for rainfall, river flows, water quality, air quality, and coastal wave data. Links from our website go to environmental reporting and information on the Land Air Water Aotearoa (LAWA) website – our regional State of the Environment reporting platform.

Result: We have continued to operate under our decentralised model of data governance, and changes and improvements to this model have been incorporated into the data strategy review (39.3b). In alignment with the Government’s open data guidelines, we share our Data with the public through multiple channels. Canterbury Maps and the Open Data Portal on Environment Canterbury’s website are curated data sets that have been published externally through automated standardised procedures. The data sets have been reviewed to ensure quality of data.

Result: Examples include new map-based reporting on Canterbury’s water quality limits and work underway on a model for recreational water quality that will have community benefits.

Result: A review of the data strategy has been undertaken and a draft report is with senior managers.

Result: We continue to track user statistics to help inform our work on sharing data and information.

• Canterbury Maps: In 2023/24, there were over 123,000 users*
• Environment Canterbury’s Open Data Portal (a directory of all our publicly available datasets): Around 4,085 users compared with around 4,300 in 2022/23
• Water data: The developer data portal is a data service available on our website. It provides water flow data via Application Programming Interface (API) format that enables creation of apps by developers. In 2023/24 there were 751 users compared
  with 835 in 2022/23.

Result: The content of Canterbury Maps and the Ngāi Tahu layer collection is regularly reviewed and updated. In May 2024, a report to the Water and Land Committee (PDF file, 13.98MB) provided a Mātauranga Māori update and covered work underway on developing an internal framework for Environment Canterbury that ensures mana whenua maintain rangatiratanga and Intellectual property rights over their own mātauranga.

Result: In 2023/24, partnering with EOS Ecology, we worked with 15 catchment groups across Canterbury, developing maps and collating publicly available data, as part of a programme called ‘Wai Connection’, supported by funding from the Ministry for the Environment through the Essential Freshwater Fund. One of the key components of ‘Wai Connection’ is supporting and connecting landowners, catchment groups and communities to their local freshwater environment through involvement in citizen science monitoring programmes. The data they collect will help fill knowledge gaps and complement Regional Council data.

Result: Council and Committee meeting information was made publicly available at least two days before the meeting.