Recently environmental advocacy group Wise Water Use HB (WWU HB) brought BayBuzz’s attention to an under-the-radar initiative at the CHB District Council to create a ‘Community Trust’ with a mission to address the district’s ‘water security’ issues.

As it turns out, CHBDC has spent several thousands on legal work to fashion a trust deed, whose real purpose appears to be facilitating efforts of the cash-poor commercial entity Water Holdings Hawke’s Bay (WHHB) to resuscitate the Ruataniwha Dam.

BayBuzz has been told by CHBDC, in effect, ‘not to worry’, the Trust would simply be a vehicle to ensure that all options for meeting CHB’s water needs, including more intensive water conservation measures, were actively discussed and explored by the community.

So far, however, the ‘community’ consulted on the Trust since February has been limited to WHHB and a few select local iwi leaders. A media release from WWU HB queries: “It has to be asked, why have Council staff been in talks with selective parties since February, with the drawing up of a Trust Deed commissioned in July, yet without any public announcement about this work which will clearly have major implications for ratepayers?” 

When BayBuzz sought more detail on the Trust, the whole proposition simply became more mysterious, with key questions unanswered, such as: 

• Would WHHB hand over to the Trust its assets (the Ruantaniwha consents) and liabilities (the science charges from HBRC for which it continues to seek relief)?

• What other water-related assets and/or liabilities might the Trust hold (e.g., municipal bores, aquifer recharge schemes, other infrastructure)?

• How would the Trust be resourced to explore a wide range of water re-allocation, aquifer recharge, small scale storage, water conservation, land use change and other options, if that were indeed its mission?

• What powers would the Trust have, or is it merely another chat forum?

• If projects the Trust were to support go belly-up, what liability would the Trust bear?

• How would the Trust be appointed to ensure wide community representation?

Such questions and many more have been put to CHBDC by the Wise Water Use group in this detailed Official Information Act request.

“This failed project has consumed over $27 million of Hawke’s Bay ratepayers’ money since its inception in 2012, and now Council are pouring more local ratepayers’ money down the bottomless pit that is the Ruataniwha dam.” said WWU spokesperson Dr Trevor Le Lievre, adding: “This project has only ever existed on paper, yet its appetite for public money is insatiable.”  

Forgive my cynicism, but at this point the proposed ‘Community Trust’ looks to be nothing more than a stalking horse for a handful of irrigators, specifically Water Holdings HB, designed to give a patina of wide support for its ambitions to resurrect the Ruataniwha Dam.

As WWU HB sees it, the ‘Trust’ is simply a fundraising vehicle to help impoverished WWHB, already fighting with the HB Regional Council over hundreds of thousands of dollars of science charges, secure funds to “revamp their business case in preparation for a Government announcement that the dam is a pre-approved project under Fast Track legislation.” WWU HB’s Le Lievre says: “[These] are first and foremost hard-nosed businessmen who will be looking to recoup costs and to realise a profit from their assets, and to minimise their future costs. This won’t be a hand-out to the community.”

The CHBDC should not be complicit in such a scheme, spending ratepayer money with no transparency. 

As for reviving Dam II, it’s worth recalling a few points:

It is a misconception that Dam I failed only because of an ‘unfortunate’ court decision. That dam was already dead because it could not attract nearly adequate funding at its 2015 cost ($300m for the dam itself and $300m more to pipe the water to irrigators). Think of what that cost would balloon to today … $1b plus.

CHB’s fundamental ‘water security’ problem is an allocation scheme that gives a preponderance of the water to a handful of dairy farmers … the worst conceivable use of the water imaginable – economically and environmentally. More than a water security problem, CHB has a land use problem sustained by a mis-allocation scheme.

The much-touted Regional Water Assessment completed by HBRC projected a water shortfall for the entire region of 25 million (by 2040) to 33 million (by 2060) cubic metres (leaving aside for now their studiously ignored scenario that projected a surplus in the same timeframe with more rigorous water conservation). That’s not a clarion call for a 100m cube dam in CHB! Whatever that ‘gap’ might actually be, massive existing investments by growers on the Heretaunga Plains guarantee that is where any investment in water storage would deliver the most bang for the buck.

Dam II is already a dead duck, even as it awaits fast tracking. It will be a fast track to an inevitable financial cliff. Keeping its ‘Rates reality’ in mind, CHBDC has better things to do than using ratepayer funds to facilitate the fantasy of a handful of irrigators.