Latest / Best of Business / Michael O'Neill: Mt Maunganui Ratepayers, Residents and Retailers Association ahead of meeting to discuss Mt Maunganui's future

Transcript

Michael O'Neill: Mt Maunganui Ratepayers, Residents and Retailers Association ahead of meeting to discuss Mt Maunganui's future · Best of Business

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  Speaker 2: Now to the Mount Mount Monganui, Todung. There is a
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  Speaker 2: big meeting in todunger tonight that will give residents a
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  Speaker 2: clearer picture on when the Mount will reopen again. The
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  Speaker 2: Mount's obviously been closed almost one hundred days since the
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  Speaker 2: deadly lan landslip. Michael O'Neill is the president of the
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  Speaker 2: Mount Mongonui Ratepayers, Residents and Retailers Association. Hi Michael, Hi,
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  Speaker 2: is this really, honestly the first community meeting that you've
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  Speaker 2: had in one hundred days?
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  Speaker 3: Well, they had, they had one just for the Business
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  Speaker 3: House Association last week. But yeah, it's the first time
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  Speaker 3: we've had any sort of real feedback from council in
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  Speaker 3: regard to reopening the mouth.
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  Speaker 2: Right, Okay, what are you expecting to hear?
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  Speaker 3: Oh, I'm not that optimistic yet, you I'm expecting to
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  Speaker 3: hear There's there's been quite a lot of Facebook feedback
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  Speaker 3: coming through. EBU related messages are basically saying that they
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  Speaker 3: think the Mount should have arrest, that it needs to
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  Speaker 3: recover wee bit to get its money back, whereas the
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  Speaker 3: regular users are saying, well, hey, this is part of
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  Speaker 3: our lifestyle, This is part of why we live in
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  Speaker 3: this area. The Mounts is the heart and soul of
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  Speaker 3: why we live here. Can we not get back to
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  Speaker 3: using our treasure? And so we've got two fields. One
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  Speaker 3: they want to see their arrest and the others that
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  Speaker 3: want to to get it back to what it's been
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  Speaker 3: and start using it again.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, And if we are talking about a rest, we
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  Speaker 2: are talking about the thing being shut down, what completely
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  Speaker 2: even to people walking up there?
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  Speaker 3: Absolutely yep, okay, would no, absolutely no, no?
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  Speaker 1: Why not done?
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  Speaker 3: Well, it's a it's a fundamental asset to the mount.
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  Speaker 3: A lot of a lot of the business houses rely
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  Speaker 3: on the patronage from those that use them mount, those
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  Speaker 3: that go up for their walk on the weekend and
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  Speaker 3: then come back into town and buy their by their
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  Speaker 3: lunches and their coffees and a sort of it. In
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  Speaker 3: the campground the same, the hot pools the same, the
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  Speaker 3: boat ramp the same. And all those things are now
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  Speaker 3: shut down and locals can't use them, so they're not
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  Speaker 3: bothering to come. So businesses are suffering, some of them extremely.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, So you are expecting to find out what an
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  Speaker 2: answer one way or the other. At this meeting are
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  Speaker 2: you're going to find out whether the thing is open
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  Speaker 2: or shut.
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  Speaker 3: No, not that optimistic, but I'm predicting that there will
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  Speaker 3: be some talk about opening up the one route to
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  Speaker 3: the top and also possibly some progress on the hot pools.
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  Speaker 3: That's the expectations I'm going on with. The last time
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  Speaker 3: this happened, the cyclone Gabriel and the base track was
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  Speaker 3: shut down due to a slip. It took counsel two
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  Speaker 3: years to come up with a plan to reopen it
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  Speaker 3: at a cost of between five and six million dollars.
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  Speaker 3: One of the members of our associations, the next engineer,
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  Speaker 3: came up with a plan that's stand out that they
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  Speaker 3: actually used putting a bridge in and he estimated would
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  Speaker 3: have cost three hundred and fifty thousand. At the end
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  Speaker 3: of the day, it cost eight hundred and fifty thousand,
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  Speaker 3: but it was a heck of a saving from what
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  Speaker 3: council were predicting what he had to spend. So local
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  Speaker 3: knowledge is actually there's some very wise people out in
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  Speaker 3: their community that are retired here and they've got an
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  Speaker 3: abundance of skills that they're happy to share with their
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  Speaker 3: community and with council, and you know, councilor should really
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  Speaker 3: take the opportunity to listen to what we want and
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  Speaker 3: engage with us, and they're not doing that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, Michael listened. Beast of luck with it, good luck.
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  Speaker 2: That's Michael O'Neil, the president of the Mountmong And we
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  Speaker 2: rate Pays Residents and Retailers Association.
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