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Local election turnout under 30% in cities, with days to go

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 2d

A local government expert doubts this election’s final turnout can surpass previous one.

With the voting period extended a week, local body election returns in some areas have slightly improved from three years ago but turnout remains low in the main centres.

Sixes & Sevens cafe rolls the dice on larger, safer venue

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 2d

“A lot of the time, business owners are just too scared to change because everyone else isn’t changing. But they need to because right now it’s unsustainable out there."

One of Wellington’s most popular cafes has moved, citing the need for more space and and concerns over worsening safety around Courtenay Place. “You shouldn’t have to step over someone smoking P to ge...

Election countdown ... don’t stop me now

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 3d

With less than a week to go until the votes are in, candidates (and one former candidate) have been going full noise.

The heat is on ‒ and with less than a week to go before the elections, candidates are going full tilt to pull votes.

Happy 60th, Porirua — the second youngest city in Wellington is all grown up

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 4d

ICYMI: There was a celebration of your new status - a booklet full of hope and an evening ball. The Governor General, Brigadier Sir Bernard Fergusson, came out to hand over the proclamation of your birth as a city.

Sixty years ago Porirua was declared a city. Now it’s celebrating a milestone birthday — and a lifetime of stories, struggles and triumphs

Actor sidesteps grim diagnosis with humour, cricket and theatre

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The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 4d

“My lovely oncologist says she’s never had someone with a glioblastoma live so long.”

Two years after a stage 4 brain tumour diagnosis, Cohen Holloway is filming, playing cricket, and preparing his most joyful show yet — “The Māori Sidesteps”.

‘Impossible’ for iconic Wellington cafe to stay, Peter Jackson firm says, as historic building renovated

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 5d

Reps for Sir Peter Jackson's company say the ongoing Shelly Bay renovations make it “impossible for the cafe to remain open beyond January”.

The cafe, which is in a building owned by Sir Peter Jackson and Dame Fran Walsh, will shut its doors at the end of January, leaving 28 staff out of work.

Wellington mayoral candidates on bike lanes

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 5d

The last in our series asking the main mayoral candidates what they will do on key issues. Voting closes at noon on October 11.

Each week we are asking the main mayoral candidates what they will do on key issues. This week: Retain, extend or reduce Wellington's current bike lane network?

A super city, rates and water: Wellington region’s issues and election promises

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 5d

Outside the boundaries of the capital city, what are the main issues, who are their mayoral candidates and what are they promising to their voters?

Voters outside Wellington City are having to consider amalgamation, an ever-increasing rates burden and the new water entity.

Fewer leaks, more capacity, hosed off residents

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 6d

"It’s a default shift that we go into each summer, it’s the responsible thing for the region to do."

Unlike Auckland and Christchurch, water restrictions are already in place again in the capital - despite big money being thrown at leaking pipes and ageing infrastructure.

Social housing residents endure ‘unbearable’ summer heat

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 8d

“It’s a real concern for vulnerable tenants, particularly tenants who are health compromised.”

Sweltering tenants say there is little to no airflow in their rooms, with reports of temperatures reaching 40C, warped lampshades and bubbling paint.

Live: Earthquake rating system scrapped in massive overhaul

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 10d

A significant impact on Wellington, in particular.

The change will mean over around 2900 buildings stickered as earthquake prone will no longer be considered a risk by the Government. Find out what the other changes might mean for you.

Wellington mayoral candidates on keeping or removing Wellington's Māori ward

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The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 11d

Each week in the lead-up to the council elections, we are asking the main mayoral candidates to tell us, in 100 or fewer of their own words, what they will do on key issues.

A poll about the Māori ward at this election will be binding on the next two council elections. We asked mayoral candidates whether Wellington should keep or remove its Māori ward.

New Zealand sides with Israel, US on Palestine question

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The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 11d

Peters was asked what he would say to people disappointed New Zealand was not showing leadership on the issue. “Well, I don't accept that at all,” he said.

Foreign Minister Winston Peters has broken ranks with New Zealand’s oldest and closest partners, and sided with the United States and Israel, in joining just a handful of countries that are refusing t...

Behind the boring promises: the protesters trying to reshape local democracy

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The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 11d

On paper, their campaigns are about rates, potholes and safer streets, but their roots in the anti-mandate movement tell a different story.

Candidates linked to the pandemic protest movement are increasingly targeting council seats under community banners.

A tragedy, a sister’s vigil and the guilty verdict that followed

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 12d

“I still feel the anger and the sadness. He was just doing what he loved, living his life. He didn’t deserve this. None of them did.”

It was a place of last resort for some, a home by choice for others. More than two years after five lives were lost in a fire at Loafers Lodge, the man who lit the blaze has been found guilty of murde...

Rates rises: rubbish deal or a necessary evil?

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 12d

Rates. If there’s one word that looks set to define October’s local body elections it is surely that one.

The issues and costs may differ, depending on where you live, but rising rates bills seem inescapable. So what can be done?

‘Bloody hopeless’: Cricket great’s private papers left in dumped mayoral desk

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 13d

Two ex mayors and a former city councillor ‒ whose private correspondence is now public ‒ have joined the chorus of critics piling on the Wellington City Council for allowing confidential paperwork to be left in a dumped office desk.

Former Black Cap and Wellington City councillor John Morrison is among those fuming after his confidential correspondence on a highly personal matter was found among screeds of council paperwork left ...

An ‘election changing’ 55,000 votes could be barred under controversial new law

Reposted by The Post

henry cooke @henrycooke.bsky.social · 13d

The Government's controversial voting law will result in a 411% increase in the number of votes being thrown out, according to the Electoral Commission.

www.thepost.co.nz/politics/360...

The Government’s changes to voting laws will see a 400% increase in “disallowed” votes, the Electoral Commission says.

Three years on, postcode lottery still rules the scalpel

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The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 13d

"If one place is getting many more operations and the other place is getting almost none, you have to ration out the size of the pot of gold you’ve got.”

Hastings mum Michaela Wyatt has waited almost three years for a hysterectomy for bleeding and agonising pain. In another city, she might have got the op within months.

Dump customer buys discarded desk filled with confidential council papers

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 14d

Whoops...

A man hunting bargains at a landfill tip shop paid $200 for rimu desk, donated by the Wellington City Council. But what he discovered inside a locked drawer shocked him.

Articulate Episode 2: Debbie Fish

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The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 15d

What happens when art meets the ocean? Wellington's Debbie Fish took a giant sea sponge ‒ made from recycled shade cloth ‒ all the way to Chile for an international art biennial.

WATCH: In this week’s episode of Articulate, André Chumko talks to Wellington artist Debbie Fish about fragility, ecosystems and the surprising ways art and science intertwine.

Why I gave up a career in medicine to become a horticulture apprentice

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 16d

Feelgood story of the day...

River Foster was hoping to become a cardiac physiologist but realised medicine just wasn’t the right fit. He wanted to work outdoors so he swapped human biology for botany. Now he’s 2025 Young Amenity...

Suburban libraries in decline but two sites see rising patronage

The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 17d

More than two million visitors a year are forecast to visit the new Te Matapihi central library after it opens in March. But what will become our local faves?

One councillor says the results reflected how libraries are evolving to become become multi-purpose community spaces - “a third space that people can just go to gather, study, contemplate, meet friend...

thepost.co.nz

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The Post @thepost-nz.bsky.social · 17d

“People were quite happy to come and spend a few dollars for a day of playing games ... but it wasn't enough build up and sustain.”

Wellington board game shop Caffeinated Dragons to close

Its owner Rhys Kaan hoped the move to Manners St, away from the construction around Te Matapihi Library, would boost business but the shop has continued to struggle, “to the point, probably past the p...