Wellington housing

At the first meeting on 15 December, 2016 the Mayor’s Taskforce on Housing, chaired by Deputy Mayor Paul Eagle, the Council’s Housing Portfolio Leader, bought together experts from around the country to identify affordable, social and emergency housing as areas in need of immediate action.

Mayor Justin Lester says the Council will act swiftly to get new homes built.

“The advice from our taskforce today is that in the face of skyrocketing house prices, there is an immediate need for local government to step up and start taking action,” he says.

“I will be asking my councillors early in the New Year to approve policy changes to help us tackle these problems. These will include a $5000 rates rebate for building first homes, a new model to help deliver affordable housing, and expanding our stock of social housing.

“If we want to avoid a situation like Auckland, we need to take action.”

Councillor Eagle says the taskforce’s first meeting was significant. “It’s the first time we’ve had representatives from across the housing continuum at the same table prioritising housing issues for Wellington,” he says.

Key issues identified included a long-term housing plan tailored for Wellington, better data to improve decision-making, working with central government, learning from other successful housing initiatives and continuing to overhaul Council processes to make it easier to build more homes.

“Building more homes remains our number one priority,” says Cr Eagle. “That means focusing on developing masterplans for our neighbourhoods, getting the housing mix right with developers and creating a pipeline for long-term housing construction.”

The Housing Taskforce will meet again in the New Year with a forum planned with wider representation from the housing sector. Final recommendations will be presented in April to align with the Council’s annual plan deliberations.

Mayor’s Housing Taskforce – representatives

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A $500 million development in Shelly Bay is part of the plan to address housing affordability in the area.

Fears Shelly Bay housing will be too expensive

Photo: RNZ / Michael Cropp

A major housing development planned for Wellington is being criticised by a community housing organisation as unaffordable for people on a regular income.

The Shelly Bay site will become a Special Housing Area.

The former Air Force base at Shelly Bay will become a Special Housing Area – one of three announced yesterday.

The areas were created under the accord with the government, to fast-track some developments and improve the supply and affordability of homes.

However, promotional material showed prices of the 300 homes at Shelly Bay could range from $600,000 to $3.5 million.

Community Housing Aotearoa director Scott Figenshow said those homes would be out of reach for those on an average income.

“The Auckland accord provides for it, would’ve thought that should’ve been a feature in the Wellington accord.

“And if that was the case then having Shelly Bay as one of the Special Housing Areas, it would mean we’d know we were getting some truly affordable housing in it.”

The site and the two other other Special Housing Areas in Wellington – smaller developments in the suburbs of Newtown and Newlands – bring to 24 the number of new SHAs in Wellington.

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