Tuesday, February 07, 2006

RMA rort

Received in my letterbox yesterday was a scare-mongering letter. It asked me to picture my local environment, "in 10 years with high density housing, much less bush and fewer native birds."

A couple of Bays away a developer wants to divide a section into two lots which are apparently under the square meterage allowed in the council district plan - by about an eighth.

The owners of a neighbouring property have decided to try and enlist the support of hundreds of homes in the local vicinity by partially completing a standard submission on the application for resource consent, placing it in residential letterboxes and asking the resident to complete the form and send it to the council (or return it to them for forwarding). They have of course filled in the part requesting the council decline the consent.

This sort of thing irks me no end. The complainants are alerting all similar types (environmental zealots with no regard for property rights) for miles around. Using bold headings like, "It's your lifestyle at stake," they will elicit many submissions from people who would otherwise take no interest in this development.

This is a typical example of how the RMA is abused.

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