The “P”s of Amalgamation in HB

Posted on May 15, 2015 by Andrew Frame

“Amalgamating Hawke’s Bay’s five councils into one entity WILL result in lower council rates”

This is one of the major selling Points “A Better Hawke’s Bay” / “Amalgamate Hawke’s Bay” and their Proponents would have you believe.

And you know what? They’re right – it will!

But, as always, there are catches. In this case they all begin with the letter “P”.

Just as one nasty “P”, Pseudoephedrine, has been found silently contaminating local state houses recently, another nasty “P” contaminates the minds of those who hope for and bankroll the campaign to amalgamate Hawke’s Bay.

This “P” GUARANTEES lower rates.

But when Pushed for Proof by its Proponents this “P” is seldom highlighted – it’s Practically a “silent P”.

Because it’s “Privatisation”

It’s simple, really.

If, under a new amalgamated council’s strategy, contracts to Provide the likes of rubbish collection, water supply or libraries across Hawke’s Bay are sold off to Private companies – your rates WILL be lower, because you won’t be Paying the council for them!

For a time Hawke’s Bay residents may still Pay the same total overall as they do now to get all the services we receive under the current structure – just with one Part going to the council rates and the other Part going to Private enterprise.

But then along comes the second “P” and this is one that will really catch you out!

Because, unlike local governments, Private businesses are PROFIT-driven.

Somewhere, sometime down the track you WILL be Paying more for all the services you receive now.

But, unlike now, where ratepayers can at least vote out councillors who hike rates, fail to Provide services, or go back on Promises. If a service you Pay for, like water supply for example, is controlled by a single, Private entity – you don’t get a say in the matter. Private companies’ / corporations’ loyalties are ultimately to their “bottom lines” and shareholders.

Privatising such essentials of human life as water has been done before and does continue around the world.

But when Profit Pandering overrides common and commercial sense, People Power often kicks in and it doesn’t end well for the Privateers. That should cause Pause for thought.

But while Private companies and corporations are often seen as and act like, heartless, mindless drones to Profit, our recent current civic leaders don’t appear to have shown much in the way of credibility, accountability or consideration of the finances they are using being Public money.

So there you go.

We ALL want Hawke’s Bay to do better than it has been over recent years, but Picking out its Prime assets and services for Private Profit won’t improve things – it will just Put us further down the Path to Pandemonium.

Anyone who tries to convince you otherwise is just taking the Piss.

Have Your Say on the Future of Napier!

Posted on May 12, 2015 by Andrew Frame

Napier City Council is currently taking submissions for its “Long Term Plan”

You can make your own submission HERE

It takes a mere five minutes to fill out the Council’s questionnaire and then there is a space for you to write your own submissions to the council on how you think our city should move into the future.

But you have to be quick – Submissions close TOMORROW (Wednesday 13 May at midday)

I was a bit tardy, having been busy while the submission window was open, but I managed to get my submission down and have just sent it off.

I hope you feel empowered to make your voice heard too!

Below is a copy of my submission:

“Napier is a wonderful city. It has been my home all my life and I cherish it dearly.

But Napier has been allowed to “age disgracefully” over recent years under previous administrations. It has often felt like “baby-boomers” rule and the interests of anyone under the age of 40 get ignored or have to fend for themselves.

As a result, we annually lose generations of our bright and talented youth to other parts of New Zealand and the world. A few return in later life with their families, most never do.

This creates not only a great gulf in the age bracket, earning Hawke’s Bay its sunny ‘Retirement village’ image, but also major cultural and economic holes in the region.

When it comes to looking after Napier’s younger generations needs or allocating them some form of infrastructure, N.C.C.’s solution to date has been “build a skate-park!” Ho-hum!

Skateboards and BMX’s alone do not a youth make. Where are the events, concerts, expos and exhibitions for our youth? Where are the workshops for young writers, actors, designers, technicians and entrepreneurs?

Our central city is often bereft of shoppers, while the number of empty shops grows and festers. Napier’s CBD is a favourite destination for its young people, so why not combine these two elements for mutually beneficial results?

Where is any voice or influence for Napier’s “Youth Council”? It has essentially vanished off the radar since I was a member in 1995!

How are they being guided or given a voice? I remember hearing that in the last few years they staged a shanty town in the Library forecourt for the 40-hour famine and raised money for children in Africa. What about those underprivileged children in their own city?

There is so much focus and so many millions being thrown at attracting tourists and their wallets to briefly visit Napier, but where are the initiatives and funding to keep our talented, inspired school-leavers in Napier?

This is a problem that has been nagging at me for years. I never left Hawke’s Bay for university, a career or global migration after high school. I stayed here, living and working in what I still consider one of the best places in the world. It has had its advantages, but also some major disadvantages.

Over the past decade the major drawbacks have been few career opportunities within the region and poor pay. Hawke’s Bay’s economy has suffered because of these factors and the poor economy has depressed wages and career opportunities even more.

We need to break this cycle.

I have talked to and read items written by local business people and entrepreneurs in their 30’s who, like me, never left Napier, or went away and returned. They have good ideas on keeping Hawke’s Bay youth empowered, employed and engaged in Hawke’s Bay.

There are also older, far more established business people in the region who are more than capable of being inspiring mentors to younger generations. Unfortunately their attitude to the region’s “Lost Generations” of 20-somethings is:

“It’s really hard to keep people in their 20’s in the Bay. Be great if we could, but there are easier places to focus where we swim with the tide.”
(Rod Drury, Xero founder and Hawke’s Bay resident – Quote taken from “Fruitbowl” website)

I don’t consider continuing to put this problem in the “too hard basket” and hoping Hawke’s Bay’s bright and talented young one day return to be an option any longer. Somebody needs to take a stand and do something about it.

Will you?

Rod Drury’s Xero is a successful, global company. But one thing Mr Drury fears (I read this in a special CEO lift-out in the Herald) was his company losing its “start-up feel”.

Start-ups are often skin-of-the-teeth operations. Someone starts with an idea and builds a business from it. People using their raw talent and skills – often without tertiary qualifications. I really admire people who can do that – I’m not sure I could.

The technology industry is one of the main benefactors and biggest earners of start-up thinking and business. Just look at Facebook. Typically, modern start-ups are often begun by people in their late teens and early twenties, just the segment Hawke’s Bay is missing out on!

We need to target these high-value tech companies and foster such start-ups to set up operations in Hawke’s Bay. Especially with web-based content, where work can be done from anywhere in the world, so why not Napier?

With our youth being so tech-savvy, school-leavers would be ideal employment candidates. Pay them more than the local retail of hospitality industry (it shouldn’t be too hard), provide some on the job training and “Boom!” – instant workforce and all-round benefits to Napier and Hawke’s Bay’s economy!

This isn’t asking for preferential treatment for Hawke’s Bay’s school leavers and 20-somethings. This is about giving them the opportunity to stay in their home towns if they want to and at the same time creating real, well-paying career opportunities and boosting our regions flagging economy.

Doing nothing is no longer an option. It’s time we did something about it.

Will you do it?

Anti-Social Media: Network Broadcasting in NZ

Posted on May 11, 2015 by Andrew Frame

I wish this was a new problem, but it has been going on for as long as I’ve been a curmudgeon! 😉

Broadcast media in New Zealand is struggling. Watching live, free to air television is becoming a thing of the past as the quality of content drops and viewers switch to the internet to watch the latest episodes of shows, where they want, when they want.

Similarly, despite hundreds of stations to choose from, former radio audiences now make their own playlists of downloaded songs to listen to at home, at work and on the go.

Who is to blame? While the evolution of technology and the fickleness of modern consumers certainly must play a part, I would argue the biggest contributor to audiences turning off mainstream broadcast media had been the media themselves.

The scale with which tight-fisted network simulcasting and cronyism (or “cross-promotion” as they would probably prefer to call it) has encroached across our screens and airwaves has become suffocating – Not only to its audiences, but to the broadcasters who instigated and maintain it.

Of all broadcast media, radio has always been the most “personal” – it’s just you and your radio. Indeed, one of the first things they teach in announcer training is that you aren’t talking to hundreds or thousands of people, but to just one person listening at home, or in their car etc.

The voice across the airwaves wasn’t some stranger, it was your friend. Some announcers even took on familial names – Maud Basham and Reverend Colin Scrimgeour became “Aunt Daisy” and “Uncle Scrim” in the early days of New Zealand radio.

Later on, when most cities had their own station, broadcasting became “Live and local, 24 hours a day!” If there was a fire in Hastings, you heard about it straight away. A crash blocked a road in Napier? They gave you detour directions as it was cleared. Some minor local celebrities were created, but it also kept you close. You often met announcers in the street.

Then in the 90’s profits started to take over. Individual stations were bought up, joined into national networks and local content was stripped back and in many cases away completely.

“Live” and “local” became too “costly” and “old fashioned”. The personal touch gave way to a wide, sweeping brush.

Ring up the local station (now an 0800 number) to ask about a fire in Havelock and you will be asked “Is that Havelock in Nelson, or Havelock North in Hawke’s Bay?” Similarly, just for fun, try asking what the weather is doing at the moment and you’re likely to receive an answer very different to reality.

Take NZME’s “The Hits” network for example: It has 25 “stations” / frequencies across the country. Each broadcasts five to seven different shows per day with one to two announcers hosting each show.

17 of those stations have a sole local announcer, usually on the breakfast show and three stations have two local announcers – again usually a breakfast radio duo like Hawke’s Bay’s “Martin and Sarah”.

Four stations have no local announcers at all – including Kapiti and Whanganui, whose “local” announcer is simulcast from Wellington and Palmerston North respectively.

In total the network has 31 “local” announcers, given the 8 announcers who are simulcast throughout the country from NZME Radio’s main studio in Auckland are technically “local” in Auckland.

This means around 158 announcing positions across the country are covered by the same 8 people in Auckland.

That hardly seems fair on local listeners, locally based broadcasters or those wanting to break into the industry.

The other main player on our airwaves, Mediaworks, is just as bad with just as may stations simulcasting just as many shows from their Auckland studios.

We are supposed to believe these few announcers are the cream of the broadcasting crop – at the top of their game. But they’re not.

As New Zealand’s two biggest radio networks vie for listeners – each trying so hard to be different to the other, just like teenagers searching for their individual identity, they all too often end up being almost exactly the same. Bland, networked drivel rules the airwaves.

Even when networks re-structure, there is little actual change.

NZME Radio “rearranged their deckchairs” in the last twelve months. But all it basically meant was the more seasoned announcers (two or three years on one station is a VERY long time, never mind 20!) on the youth-targeted ZM network moved to the studio next door and now voice the more “Classic” “Hits” network.

Where is the new talent? Where are the fresh, new voices?

It’s hardly surprising that the main examples of successful graduates the New Zealand Broadcasting School (long considered New Zealand’s premiere broadcast media training facility in Christchurch) uses are all now based in London!

Once again New Zealand’s biggest export proves to be its talented youth!

But it gets worse for broadcasting job-seekers.

It’s no longer good enough for networks to try and dominate one media platform – they must dominate ALL platforms!

Paul Henry and Mike Hosking are prime examples. Mediaworks have (unsuccessfully it appears) attempted to put all their eggs in one basket by dropping the individual Radio Live, 3 Breakfast News programmes and regular internet news service (at least a dozen jobs down the tubes in total there) and replaced them with “The Paul Henry Show” which broadcasts across television, radio AND the internet simultaneously.

Not to be out-done, Hosking hosts the breakfast show on NZME’s simulcast “Newstalk ZB” network, has a regular column in the NZ Herald (also owned by NZME), as well as being the headline act in TVNZ’s derided “Seven Sharp” and now has his own op-ed videos on NZ Herald’s online edition!

And it’s not just news shows.

Mediaworks seems hell-bent on dumbing down our television screens with board member’s pet “hyper-reality” shows. No matter how dire, repetitive, convoluted, or just plain crap these televisual offerings are, Mediaworks’ other brands, stations and network staff will still sing their praises.

“Hey, did you see ‘Show Z’ last night, wasn’t it great!?” they will broadcast, tweet and opine.

“Oh, look! Who just happens to be walking on to the set of “My Kitchen Garden Rebuild is New Zealand’s Top Singer” – it’s Dave and Jane from ‘Bland FM’ with the contestants’ latest challenge!”
How convenient…

Need a host for your new show? Why have auditions for someone new, when you can just shimmy a current staff member over from another of your network’s brands?

Can someone else have a turn, please?

Yes, they can!

Here is where the wonder of SOCIAL media comes in. You can say what you want, listen to who you want and share things with like-minded and located people.

Ask online about that fire in Havelock and you will be told precisely where it is, when it started, how big it is and likely get pictures and video live from the scene. Similarly, live weather tracking from nearby online friends will allow you to get the towels in just before the sky opens.

Social media does what it says on the packet – it is a SOCIAL MEDIA! It has a (world-)wide broadcast range, but it can also have the most personal of touches. It works superbly.

If traditional media’s income, reach, influence and almighty ratings are hurt by that, then they have only themselves to blame.

Palmed Off and Blocked Off on Prebensen Drive

Posted on May 8, 2015 by Andrew Frame

Prebensen Drive’s Phoenix palms – gone, but not forgotten!

They say “The road to hell is paved with good intentions”.

Well, in Napier’s case, the road to the port is paved with tree stumps and dodgy intersections.

A couple of months ago Napier City Council started a project 11 years in the making – the widening of Prebensen Drive from two lanes into four.

The intention is to ease congestion and hasten the trip of heavy vehicles to and from Napier’s Onekawa and Ahuriri industrial areas as well as the Port of Napier.

Built in 1990, Prebensen Drive (also known as “Tamatea Drive”) was created to help decongest Taradale Road and speed up the transit between central Napier and the suburb of Tamatea (hence the moniker). An extension linking it to Greenmeadows and Taradale came later on in 2005.

One of the first features added to Prebensen Drive was a line of Phoenix palm trees planted on either side of the road to give it a natural look not too dissimilar to Kennedy Road’s famous date palms and Marine Parades Norfolk Pines. From looking like tiny little pineapples, the Phoenix palms grew into big, wide, beautiful palm trees. Until earlier this year.

On a trip down the road, I noticed a few of the palms were missing, with the sawn-off remnants of other trees lying nearby. It wasn’t a good look and it even got some media attention, with international business visitors saddened by the destruction.

Napier City Council claimed they had tried to sell of, or move the palms, but there had been no takers and the palms had grown too big to economically re-plant elsewhere.

But it did raise the question – if four-laning Prebensen Drive had been in the works for at least 11 years (it’s not unreasonable to consider it was part of the larger plan upon creation of the road) could a solution, other than destruction of these majestic trees been incorporated earlier?

Despite lots of focus and advertising recently being put behind the constant creation and adjustments of council “Long Term Plans” the answer is evidently not.

But within the last few weeks the planning and traffic flow adjustments of Prebensen Drive and its’ surrounding industrial areas just got even stranger:

Some time ago, soon after Mitre 10 Mega moved onto its Prebensen Drive site, a roundabout was put outside the store on the corner with Ahuriri’s Severn Street.

For a time it appeared half the roundabout was there for the sole purpose of allowing easy access for Hawke’s Bay’s handy-men and women to the region’s largest hardware store. But other plans were afoot.

Ford Road, a minor side-street in the Onekawa industrial area was being extended over the creek that used to border it and past Mitre 10 Mega to join up with Prebensen Drive. This new extension opened only a few weeks ago.

But with the opening up of Ford Road, traffic flow into the Onekawa Industrial area via Austin Street – its main thoroughfare and entry / exit point was halted.

Where Austin Street used to have right-of-way from Taradale Road at one end all the way through to Prebensen Drive at the other, it suddenly had a stop sign planted at the Ford Road intersection, mere meters from the Taradale Road egress point.

While extensively publicised and signs on the road indicating the upcoming change for several months, it has been hard to break the traffic habit of decades and incidents at the new stop sign’s intersection have apparently been numerous.

But the news gets worse for Austin Street – From May 12th, due to the four-laning of Prebensen Drive, access into Austin Street from Prebensen Drive will cease permanently – essentially making Austin Street Napier’s biggest, busiest, most industrious cul-de-sac!

To enter the Onekawa Industrial area you will need to use the new Ford Road extension / Mitre 10 roundabout.

Once construction of the additional lanes on Prebensen Drive is complete, restoration of one-way, EXIT ONLY traffic from Austin Street onto Prebensen Drive (a tricky intersection at the best of times) is being considered.

But that doesn’t address a major issue this corner faces. Getting onto Prebensen Drive and heading towards Tamatea / Taradale at this intersection, particularly during morning and evening rush-hours accompanied with the rising / setting sun makes vision particularly difficult – especially with more heavy traffic set to thunder down the road at right-angles to merging traffic.

Ultimately the question for this whole project is:

“Is it necessary”?

“Does Prebensen Drive REALLY need to be four lanes?”

The prime focus of this expansion is to accommodate more heavy trucks and keep them off suburban roads and, of course, off Marine Parade.

But, while often busy, I must say I have never seen Prebensen Drive jam-packed with traffic (except when a particularly long train passes the level crossing at its central Napier.

We are a regional area, largely ignored by national economic development and internal immigration. So our suburban traffic along Prebensen Drive will likely never get to the levels of Auckland or Wellington rush-hour congestion.

And, to be honest, can Hawke’s Bay drivers really handle a four-laned road?

Many Hawke’s Bay auto pilots can’t even seem to fathom a two-lane roundabout without cutting across lanes, cutting other vehicles off, not indicating, or simply running into other vehicles? Is a four-lane road leading into a roundabout with four lanes just a few lanes too many?

I can’t help but think that, once again, there are bigger problems at play here which won’t be cured with the expensive, complicated projects that have been set in motion.

Napier, its road users, industries and palm trees deserve better!

It’s an Interesting Life – My 100th Post!

Posted on May 7, 2015 by Andrew Frame

A few weeks ago when I was getting my hair cut the barber said “I’ve seen you in the paper a fair bit recently. Do they give you a call whenever they are getting low on news to fill up space?”

My first reaction was to think – “Gee, what a douche-bag! Looks like I’ll be getting my hair done elsewhere from now on…”

My second reaction was to actually say “No. I just have an interesting life that occasionally involves situations that deserve publication!”

And, as this is my 100th “Napier in Frame” post, I think that’s true!

Over the past two-and-a-bit years I’ve:

Been fortunate to end up in some unique situations,

To do stuff I love,

To meet wonderful, interesting people,

The team gathers before the game…

To share trials, triumphs and tragedy,

Have some fun,

“Where are we going, Wilbur?”

Generate debate and discussion,

And, more often than not, to have a bloody good vent!

I have also been very fortunate to have you, my readers, get involved, give support and feedback and, well, read my posts! It makes the whole exercise worthwhile.

So, thank you!

Here’s to another 100+ posts and, who knows. maybe even something professional may come of it! (I’ll write for food and / or money!) 😉

Speech-bubbling the Same (Distractive) Language?

Posted on May 6, 2015 by Andrew Frame

Spot the Difference

I can’t help but notice the similarities between the recently launched campaign of John Key’s pet project – changing New Zealand’s flag and those of “Amalgamate Hawke’s Bay” – A Better Hawke’s Bay’s pro-local government amalgamation endeavors here in Hawke’s Bay.

Both have very similar styling – a speech bubble being the logo that adorns both campaigns:

The “Flag Consideration Project” campaign’s logo also resembles a flag, naturally, but the tail on it and “What Do We Stand For” script most certainly intimates a speech bubble, or encouraging your own speech or opinion.

“Amalgamate Hawke’s Bay’s” speech bubbles seem to be more akin to statements (or “facts” we are told) issued by some unidentifiable source.

Both campaigns cost those who will be ultimately affected (i.e. the public) by the respective research or results of these protagonists’ projects LOTS of money:

The flag referendum process is expected to cost New Zealand taxpayers more than $25million.

While the almost childish, tit-for-tat campaigns between pro-amalgamation Hastings mayor Lawrence Yule and his anti-amalgamation Napier counterpart, Bill Dalton, have already cost Hawke’s Bay ratepayers around $100,000 (The ratepayers footing the bill never actually got a say in the money being used, by the way)

Ultimately, both campaigns try to convince us one minor detail (putting all Hawke’s Bay under the control of one council / changing the design of the nation’s flag) will somehow cure all our ills.

It won’t.

Changing New Zealand’s flag will not make houses more affordable, or completely rebuild Christchurch, or send the massive levels of inequality New Zealand currently suffers back to the Dark Ages where they belong.

Similarly, compressing Hawke’s Bay’s five councils into one will not end poverty, high unemployment, poor health, or low paying jobs in the region. Would one big, completely inefficient building consent office really be better than two or three mildly inefficient ones?

Those Hawke’s Bay central and local government politicians who claim amalgamation will help pull our region out of the societal doldrums we have resided in for the last decade also seem to have conveniently forgotten that they are the ones who have been in the central and local government positions most likely to affect the required change for that same length of time!

Can you say “Hypocritical”?

There are massive, critical issues facing our region and nation that need addressing and fixing RIGHT NOW – WAY before any of these frivolous, distractive, expensive jaunts should even be considered.

Ignoring one rotten apple as it’s put into the bag doesn’t turn that apple good – it merely spreads the rot.

Hawke’s Bay and New Zealand deserve better!

It’s Not WHAT You Know…

Posted on May 1, 2015 by Andrew Frame

“Napier Life” – promoting Napier to people who already live here…

It looks like Napier City Council’s new CEO, Wayne Jack and his staff have been having a good old clean-out at the NCC offices.

Closets are being emptied and a few skeletons have been evicted.

While at least one skeleton came back to haunt the council, causing a bit of a poltergeist-like mess and costing the council a fair bit of cash, other skeletons have been evicted a bit more quietly than they should have been.

In late February THIS little doozy appeared in the Dominion Post and on Stuff, but didn’t seem to get much airtime here in Hawke’s Bay, where I would have expected it to deservedly cause a bit of a stir.

“Napier Life” magazine was a bold, glossy, ratepayer-funded publication intended to attract people from around New Zealand and the world to come and live in Napier.

It was first produced in 1997 – 90’s television presenter Lana Cockcroft and the Marineland dolphins featured on the cover. The magazine had a pretty impressive 16 year run until 2013, where the last issue’s back cover was an advertisement promoting the debacle that was to be the Art Deco Buses.

In retrospect it’s kind of ironic how those two Napier tourism attractions – without doubt the most hotly-debated ventures of recent times – literally and figuratively book-ended the existence of what should also become a thoroughly debated, or at least PUBLICLY examined, venture.

Because most of the 31,000 copies produced in 2013 were delivered to Napier letterboxes and local businesses – mainly motels, hotels, cafes and the like.

Yup, around 30,000 glossy, ratepayer-funded magazines meant to attract people to Napier went to around 30,000 ratepayers already living in Napier – Now there’s some marketing genius for you!

And there was nothing in the Dominion Post’s article to indicate that any of the 15 previous editions were any different – making that total potentially closer to Half a Million Copies!

“Napier Life” was the baby of former Economic Development Manager Ron Massey (one of the aforementioned evicted “skeletons”) and a company called “3Sixty5 HB” which is owned by Napier advertising executive Rick Hopkinson and his wife Judith. Hopkinson edited the publication and his wife wrote articles for it.

Last year Napier City Council commissioned an audit of Massey’s Economic Development Unit focusing, in particular, on its operational spending.

The audit found $555,441 – 35 percent of operational expenditure – between January 2012 and February2013 (EDU’s total expenditure was OVER $1.5Mill PER YEAR?!) went to one company – the Hopkinsons’ 3Sixty5 HB”!

And here I was thinking “Napier Life” was financially self-sufficient from selling advertising space and glossy, multiple page “advertorials” like most regular magazines.

The auditors stated they were “not provided with evidence of the approval of this expenditure before it was incurred” – Never mind a regular review, tendering process, or due diligence…

“To comply with council policies”, the Dominion Post reported, “Massey should have had the spending approved by former council chief executive Neil Taylor.”

“The audit recommended the council look closely at the sum being spent with one supplier when spread over several projects under the control of one manager. This would “set a ceiling on the amount able to be spent with one supplier before CEO approval is required”.

Napier City Council had since ceased publication of “Napier Life” and was moving its focus to more effective and cheaper methods of promoting Napier, such as social media.

Napier City Council’s previous administration certainly didn’t seem to do many people many favours. But for the select few it did favour….. Good grief!

Addendum:

Since writing this on Friday, something has been gnawing away at me- annoying me:

No-one knew about what was going on with “Napier Life”?

REALLY??!!

I can’t believe that while the auditors may not have “been provided with evidence” of prior approval, that this sort of spending or contracting out of work went un-noticed or unknown once, let alone SIXTEEN TIMES!

Half a million dollars per year is a significant amount of money – especially when it is ratepayer’s money. There are checks and balances in place to monitor its usage, right?

Neither the Tourism and Economic Development Committee, or the Finance Committee asked about any of the spending or practises employed in making “Napier Life”?

And while there may have been no evidence NCC’s previous CEO Neil Taylor gave prior approval for the spending or deal with 3Sixty5 HB, Napier City Councillors were certainly at least aware of the publication’s production.

Previous mayor, Barbara Arnott, wrote an opening piece / welcoming letter in each issue and councillor John Cocking (who was apparently renowned for his accounting nous) appeared in the publication on multiple occasions as his “Art Deco Ambassador” alter-ego of “Bertie”. I’m pretty sure I remember seeing other councillors featured in “Napier Life” at different stages, in different / prior capacities, too.

During that time none of those elected or employed council people featured bothered to ask or check how much “Napier Life” cost, how many people it reached, where it went, or how the project was tendered out? As a glossy promotional job for the council – a good, solid, well-paying client – it would have been a dream job, so other parties must have been some interest in getting in on the deal themselves.

But nobody did and here we are again.

Napier deserves better!

Scarface Claw Part Two – On the Road

Posted on April 23, 2015 by Andrew Frame

The first rule about Fight Club is “You do not blog about Fight Club!”

Two weeks ago I had some more Basal Cell Carcinomas removed from my face.

But, instead of having it done privately here in Hawke’s Bay, I had them removed at Lower Hutt Hospital (apparently it’s cheaper or easier for NZ’s health system to pay for my travel to and accommodation in Lower Hutt than it is to send a surgeon up here).

It’s a trip I have made on three occasions over recent years – taking Mum down for similar surgery, the last time being two years ago.

Dad didn’t feel comfortable making the long drives there and back so I would take them down and take Mum to her appointments while Dad and I would mooch around Lower Hutt and occasionally go into central Wellington.

While Mum always seemed extra-stressed by the imminence of surgery, it meant I could spend some time with her and Dad – something you don’t get much chance to do as you get older. Dad and I, by comparison, always managed to have a good time while in Lower Hutt and I have very fond memories of our trips down there.

Those memories were made even more precious by my appointment being set for just over a year since Dad died. So I decided to make this trip for my surgery a bit of a homage to him.

I left Napier at ‘zero-dark-thirty’ on Monday morning, catching a beautiful sunrise over the Takapau Plains. The weather forecast for the Tararua region had not been too positive for the trip down and sure enough, the moment I left the Takapau Plains (Hawke’s Bay), climbed that first little hill, dropped down into the Butcher’s Creek valley and crossed the bridge into the Tararua district, the heavens opened and the wind roared.

I took a break for breakfast and sat out of the worst of the weather at McDonalds in Dannevirke (a regular stop on previous trips), followed by a stop in Masterton to visit some friends, then over the Rimutaka Ranges, into the Hutt Valley and to my hotel just before midday.

With some time to kill before my appointment and comfort food to stockpile, I walked across the road to Lower Hutt’s Queensgate Mall to get lunch and other necessary provisions (i.e.: donuts, chocolate etc.), before catching a bus to Hutt Hospital and going under the knife.

My surgeon on this occasion was a young Irish lady and removing five of the little BCC buggers took just under two hours.

Feeling a little tender and resembling Marv from Sin City, I took the bus back to Queensgate, before deciding to go for a wander around Lower Hutt’s CBD – Wellington’s notorious, snow-chilled southerly wind providing an uncharacteristically welcome relief on my sore face.

Queensgate had been a “base of operations” for Dad and I on previous visits, particularly our first trip some years ago, when Mum was an inpatient at the hospital for a week and we had a lot of time to kill. As a result I know the place back-to-front – especially where the food is!

Dinner came from a Chinese buffet in one of the mall’s two big food courts, followed by yet another wander around and one of two food homages to Dad.

On that first week-long trip down, Dad and I would have dinner in the food court each night before going back to our hotel. On the walk back through the mall, we would pass a Wendy’s Ice Cream and Hot Dog kiosk. Now I have a reasonably bottomless stomach and Dad would normally complain at how full dinner had made him, but whenever we went past this kiosk, he would ask if I fancied a “Shake ‘n Dog” (milkshake and hot dog combo) with him. How could I refuse? We sat on a nearby couch, ate, drank and watched the mall’s world go by.

Getting a Shake ‘n Dog became our “thing” each night after dinner that week and carried on to subsequent trips, so that was a stop I could not miss.

The next morning was cold and blustery, so I was keen to get on the road and home, but I had one more food stop to make.

Dinner and breakfast – “For Dad”

Across the road from Hutt Hospital is a café that, due to its location, surely does a roaring trade. They also do a wonderful all-day breakfast of toast, eggs, bacon and chips that Dad and I discovered on our second trip down – this time Mum had an appointment like mine – travel down, in and out of out-patients, stay the night and then home. So, while she had her procedure, Dad and I would enjoy a nice cooked lunch together. It was so nice it became another of our “things”. As usual, it was lovely and I raised my coffee cup in his memory.

To break up the trip on the way home I stopped at the summit of the Rimutaka Ranges road, something I have never done before, for a wander and a nosey. The road really is a wonderful piece of engineering, clinging to the side of cliffs in a gorgeously rugged piece of natural New Zealand.

The Rough and Rugged Rimutakas

My next stop was another essential, but just for my wife and I whenever we pass through the region, at Schoc Chocolates in Greytown, followed by a pause for remembrance in Carterton and a visit to a business in Masterton I have dealt with through work for ten years, but never actually met in person until now were my last Wairarapa stops.

Another tradition Mrs In Frame and I have – a milkshake from “Tinkerbell Dairy” in Dannevirke was my last stop of the trip before skirting a hailstorm just north of the Danish-founded town, which provided the most entertainment of the last stage home to my wife and Baby in Frame.

A No visit to “Dannevegas”is complete without a milkshake from Tinkerbell Dairy! 😉

Due to the nature of Basal Cell Carcinomas, I doubt this will be the last trip I make to Lower Hutt. But at least I now have some traditions to follow on the trip and fond memories to keep me company while I am away. 🙂

Lest We Forget

Posted on April 23, 2015 by Andrew Frame

Last week I had to travel down to Lower Hutt. On the drive there and back I went through Wairarapa. It’s become one of my favourite areas and drives on the way to Wellington and it was looking particularly pretty after recent rain across the region and a dusting of snow on the Tararua Ranges.

Maybe it’s just because of the focus on this year’s ANZAC Day being the 100th anniversary of the battle that would forge two countries’ identities, but while driving through Wairarapa’s smaller towns, like Carterton, Greytown and Featherston, I couldn’t help but notice just how prominent war memorials were in these towns. I dare say they had all been given an attention-seekingly timely spruce-up, but they seemed more prominent than usual.

On the drive home I stopped and had a look at Carterton’s memorial, noting the memorial’s broken main column. I don’t know if this was an actual structural break, but from an artistic point of view it would quite subtly and beautifully represent lives cut short, broken promises, or unachieved aspirations.

I also noted on the “Roll of Honour” where the same surnames appeared grouped together on a couple of occasions and couldn’t help but feel for the Wairarapa families who lost multiple members – fathers, sons, brothers, cousins in places literally and geographically as far away from their Wairarapa homes as you could get and how devastating that must have been for those they left behind.

Whether it’s the hundred year old architecture of the region that has been lovingly preserved, or the smaller, closer-knit communities that these Wairarapa towns seem to have, but you can easily get a feel for life there a century ago when so many of their menfolk went off on a “great adventure” “to fight for King and country” and “do their duty“, from which many did not return.

In August last year young men, around the same age as those who went off to war a century ago, re-enacted the march from Masterton’s town hall to the railway station and off to war that their ancestors took. It looked like quite a remarkable and emotional recreation.

Hindsight can be a wonderful and terrible thing.

We look back now on “The War to End All Wars” with mixed emotions – pride at how our forces performed and how the ANZAC identity was forged. Love and admiration for those who returned; Sorrow for those who didn’t and Futility at the sheer number of lives lost, the level of destruction and the repetitiveness with which subsequent conflicts have arisen.

With modern communication and attitudes evolving, war is seen very differently nowadays. I would hope we never see scenes like those of 100 years ago being repeated again.

But memories are short.

War, like so many other things, has become a business and there are profits to be made, land and resources to acquire. Jingoism, intolerance and evil still abound.

Perhaps the best weapon we have to defend ourselves against these elements are these memorials across the country and our memories.

Lest we forget.

I Don’t Rate New Zealand’s Ratings System

Posted on April 22, 2015 by Andrew Frame

To figure out how popular televisions shows are 600 “Peoplemeters” sit atop televisions in as many selected households and monitor what the occupants of those homes (around 1500 people, allegedly) watch each day, with those results updated via internet each night.

That might seem like a reasonable good system. But, give or take, NZ has a population of 4 million people and quite amazingly 2 million televisions. Meaning those 600 meters equate to 0.03 percent of the nation’s televisions and 0.015 percent of New Zealand’s population.

Through the divine scriptures known as “Ratings” that this miniscule sample sized monitoring system puts forth, the deities of New Zealand’s television industry are told / tell us what is popular and what is not.

Last month they told us that TV3’s current affairs show, “Campbell Live” was not being watched by practically anyone and so was “under review”.

There was a “tink” noise as a thread holding the sword of Damocles (or should that be Demographics?) snapped above what is considered by many to be the last remaining bastion of televisual journalism in New Zealand.

The sword wobbled and Campbell Live was a strand nearer to “getting the chop”

According to the “Ratings System”, Campbell Live averages 250,000 viewers per night. Its direct opponent, TVNZ’s Seven Sharp has 400,000 and Shortland Street, somehow, tops them all with 450,000 – 500,000 viewers per night.

Given that 1500 people are supposedly watching what their Peoplemeter is watching, that means:

A mere 300 people still watch Shortland Street in the hope the acting and storylines might finally get better, equating to its “450,000 viewers”.

267 disciples of “The Gospel According to Hosking” (A.K.A. TVNZ’s “Seven Sharp”) miraculously become “400,000 viewers”

and

Campbell Live’s “250,000 viewers per night” are derived from a miniscule 167 actual people

The figures would seem rather foreboding – if you believed them.

I don’t.

Because somehow Campbell Live’s 167 / “250,000” viewers last year helped raise over $800,000 for KidsCan (a charity set up to help support underprivileged children and earlier this year, when Cyclone Pam hit Vanuatu, Campbell Live helped raise around $200,000 for aid to the stricken islands.

And when the news broke that Campbell Live was “Under Review” over 77,000 people put their signatures to online petitions to save the show.

Going by the maths and logic New Zealand’s ratings system uses that equates to 115,500,000 “viewers”, by the way. Just saying.

I know which numbers I’d take more seriously and they aren’t the ratings.

What ratings don’t take into account, AT ALL, is content.

Seven Sharp has been widely derided by public and media alike as “Fluff”. And let’s be honest, Shortland Street hasn’t been any good since “Muffin Man” Lionel Skeggins fell off a cliff in the late 90’s (His body was never found, by the way, so with the show re-hashing so many characters, there’s a pretty good chance he may yet resurface in his hometown Dannevirke after 20 years of amnesia..) .

Campbell Live HELPS people – like those in Vanuatu and organisations like KidsCan and their wards.

It gives a voice to those who have been done wrong, robbed, dismissed, cast aside, “suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” and more often than not the show, along with its “167 viewers” helps those people get out of those situations. It rights wrongs.

I often hear people moaning that the show has done another item on the Christchurch earthquake and those still awaiting insurance pay-outs, repairs to their homes and getting some form of normality returned to their lives.

That doesn’t show Campbell Live losing touch and deserving cancelation – It shows how utterly ABYSMALLY the likes of EQC and insurance companies have treated their own residents and customers that these issues have still not been resolved four years after the quakes!

Without the likes of Campbell live highlighting and fighting for these issues like these, who would?

Sure as hell it won’t be the ratings system.

Napier In Frame

Author Archives: Andrew Frame