Posts by Craig Ranapia
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Hard News: The uncooling of the inner West, in reply to llew40,
I agree with intensification. Simply no other way to accommodate growth, avoid economic cost of sprawl, as well as get a bit more big-city vibrancy.
I think it’s also a response to the tiresome demographic realities. As I said upthread, David is retiring next year and we’re looking very seriously at quitting Auckland entirely. But wherever we go, a very serious question is going to be reasonable access to health and social services, and with a serious drop in income (and the fact I can’t drive at night) being close in or close to reliable public transport matters.
Not everyone requires or desires some suburban McMansion with a giant lawn, no matter how much the usual (and far from disinterested) suspects would like you to believe otherwise.
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Hard News: The uncooling of the inner West, in reply to Jim Cathcart,
Oh, so housing as a speculative asset didn’t exist under a Labor government?
And Labour doesn't believe home ownership was, is and ever shall be a social good? I'm sure the current candidates for the Labour leadership would be very surprised to hear that.
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Hard News: The uncooling of the inner West, in reply to Nick Russell,
Every time I think property prices in Wellington are out of whack, I can always cheer myself up by thinking about Auckland.
Why? My partner's retiring next year, and we're seriously mulling over moving back to Wellington after almost thirteen years away. Even with what we've got reasonably good odds of realizing for this place (unless the market pancakes dramatically), not a hope in hell of moving back to Newtown or the Park-end of Karori. But I guess it's the reality check of what you'd like against what you really need that keeps things interesting.
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Hard News: The uncooling of the inner West, in reply to Russell Brown,
I’m lamenting a potential loss of diversity and hoping for policies that will bring in more young adults to live in my neighbourhood. Clearly, just like UKIP.
And if you want to go there, I don't think you need to be a raving UKIPper to note London has some housing affordability issues that would strain even The Herald's capability for hyperbolic hysteria.
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Hard News: TVNZ: Emptied out, in reply to TracyMac,
Back to my original point, is there any govt that anyone can think of that doesn’t control a TV network and/or a radio network? Even the US has the PBS.
Sorry for being that guy, Tracy, but PBS and NPR are not owned or controlled by the US Government. (NPR in particularly has to spend way too much time trying, and pretty much failing, to refute the right-wing public tit-sucker myth.)
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Speaker: David Fisher: The OIA arms race, in reply to Carol Stewart,
I totally get your point that OIAs are an important tool for making governments more transparent. It just wasn’t a lot of fun to be on the receiving end of, as a parent volunteer.
No it's not -- but I'm on the committee of a body that receives a fair amount of financial support from the ASB Community Trust and the Auckland City Council. They (quite properly) have pretty detailed audit requirements that are only fun for masochists with a paperwork fetish but that's the pro quo for the quids.
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Hard News: Media Take: The creeping…, in reply to Russell Brown,
One more thing worth noting from Fish’s speech: the malign effect of the “no surprises” policy, which sees nearly every released funnelled through a ministerial office and, effectively, be subject to ministerial sign-off.
The other side of the equation, and one that shouldn't be neglected, is local government and district health boards. You think the Press Gallery has some awful OIA stories try talking to the poor suckers on the council and health rounds.
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Hard News: Media Take: The creeping…, in reply to nzlemming,
Sadly, the Auditor-General doesn’t see it as part of their role to police whether agencies are living up to their legislative requirements.
The Auditor-General's mandate and responsibilities are determined by the Public Audit Act 2001. I'm sure someone will promptly correct me if I'm wrong, but that doesn't include OIA/LGOIMA compliance.
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I realise that there is another side to this: the sheer weight of requests, often themselves highly political, or near-vexatious, that suck up resources.
I’m not sympathetic. If that’s a genuine problem (and I’m not saying it isn’t) then the solution is to appropriately amend the legislation in a manner that happens without undue trauma dozens of times every year. Until then, it should be a baseline expectation that everyone should be properly resourced to comply with the law as it now stands – and that doesn’t include giving civil servants and political hacks the right to ignore OIA requests they deem overly “political” or “vexatious.”
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Hard News: Friday Music: There have been…, in reply to bob daktari,
at the Waiata Maori Music Awards their Iconic awards are presented first which gives those artists the respect they so rightly deserve and sets the evening up brilliantly to celebrate the music and the music makers.
That's far too simple and elegant a solution, Bob. Stop it. :)