Contact Your Councillor

This election has so far been the most digital and social on many levels. 

You can engage with me on Facebook, Twitter, I have my own Blog, I am listed on websites as representatives for constituents and sectors, and you can even Google my name. 

But you can still always get hold of me the old fashioned way.

It doesn't matter what medium we use, as long as we have a conversation.

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Whangarei District Council      

     

Cell Phone   0272 288 882

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Tourism Industry Association Board 

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Why am I standing for Council?

Why am I standing for Council?

We have challenges and many opportunities.

We need people that recognise opportunities and will act, instead of forever dithering around.

We do not have the luxury to waste opportunities like “Hundertwasser” and subsequent Hotel development and the “Cruise ship” opportunity. If we dither we lose. (remember the Kelly Tarlton proposal for the Bay ?) We need action, create jobs and built our economy.

We need to do more with less, sharpen our pencils, improve our services, encourage sustainable development, look after small communities, grow the pie and be more “enabling”

Develop and look after our infrastructure and environment to create a District where everyone can prosper. We’ve done lots, we need to do more.  All about balance.

I have a passion, understanding and energy  for this process, experience with the system,  a significant network, commitment and a track record of achievement.

To achieve better outcomes I need your vote for positive progress!

Response to Letter to the Editor - September 2013

Letter to the Editor - September 2013

Just to clarify, I’m not myopic but need to respond to the folly assertion of Tricia Cuthford.

Who can travel on $58 per day as an international visitor, or $37/ a day as a domestic visitor?

Not everyone is a couch surfer…

More realistic figures come from Infometics (June 2013) re daily spend, the UK visitor median spend is $90 a day, the Chinese median spend $500 a day, the average about $220 a day.

That out of the way, the recent 8 week Andy Warhol exhibition in Wellington attracted over 50,000 people at $17,50 each. People like art.

Another interesting bit of information, the changes in international visitors markets now have China as our second largest market with 200,000 visitors.

Chinese outbound market is currently 83 million. Their premier has decreed that this should rise 5 fold to 200 million in 4 years.

Extrapolate this to NZ, we could be seeing over 1 million Chinese visitors into NZ, and the market has shifted from guided tours to longer staying FIT’s (free independent travellers)

Taking that opportunity, plus the potential cruise ship market and Hotel development plus the self generating Hundertwasser visitors, multiply these millions of possible generated funds spend in our city over a 10 year LTP period (from which I quoted the 0.6% investment of WDC) than the hundreds of millions may just have a more realistic sound. Sorry I hadn’t clarified this enough.

It is a real potential that will only be generated if we actually decide to do something.

If we don’t , well, it won’t.   

We can wait for hand outs, or enable hand up’s.

I prefer to do the hard work and get some results. 

Letter to the Editor response - September 2013

Response Letter to the Editor September 2013 - Northern Advocate

With interest I read Tricia’s Cutforth’s stance on the proposed Hundertwasser Art centre, that is, her pre election promise.

With more information we should be able to change our minds.

I’m pleased Tricia has read the Deloittes reports which focuses on the economics of the internal opportunities that arise from building the Center.

An analyses done by Dr Christoph Schumacher (Massey University) on the economic impact of a significant attraction such as the Hundertwasser centre to our city shows even more exciting figures.

He looked at the traffic on SH1, the tourist trips as a % of this traffic, and the analyses if just 10% of these visitors decided to drive into our town as a result of the Hundertwasser building.

He halved the average spend of visitors per day and only calculated for 200 days in the year, so pretty conservative.

The direct output resulted in nearly $7 million a year, taking into account the value added factors and “Leontief” factor (something Tricia will be familiar with), we are looking at (conservatively) an $11 million impact to our local economy per annum!

That has to be good news, and regardless of how well we liked the process that WDC went through, it would be irresponsible to dismiss this project.

Being in Council is all about balance, currently over 85% OF OUR Capex budget is on hard infrastructure, 15% on sporting facilities, parks and other community facilities.

As mentioned before, the cost of Hundertwasser is 0.6% of our LTP budget. That is not a radical expenditure, particularly taking into account the economic benefits resulting from this.

Only once other cost contributions have been confirmed will Council be able to confirm if it is going ahead.

Considering the positive opportunities for jobs, businesses and community you may well reconsider your stance prior to the election Trish as I know you too want to move the community forward!

Jeroen Jongejans

WDC Hikurangi/Coastal Ward Councillor

Can we afford not to?

Letter to the Editor - Northern Advocate 06.09.13

Can we afford not to?

Another way of looking at the Hundertwasser Centre is to ask, what can it do for our city?

It will deliver a highly recognisable and marketable brand to Whangarei, with a significant Maori Art Gallery. 

It will attract a notable amount of visitors to the CBD, resulting in millions being added to our GDP.

It will be a catalyst for a 4 star Hotel, one we desperately need. Last week Whangarei  lost 2 major conferences  due to a lack of suitable accommodation available. We lost over $1 million of revenue to our district.

It will be the main catalyst to attract Cruise ships to our Port. Cruise NZ has identified that the Hundertwasser Centre would be a great incentive for them to market our district successfully.

It will be our “unique point of difference”, supporting a wide range of other products that we can deliver to this Cruise market.

If we do it right, we could match ship visits to Tauranga, which is worth $36 million per annum.

The cost of the Hundertwasser over our LTP expenditure is 0.6%. The potential upside of economic activity in Whangarei is in the hundreds of millions of dollars if we manage our opportunities well.

Let’s face it, we have a significant number of social issues, we have empty shops and businesses suffering.

We have to deal to those challenges. We can - we just need to be positively positive!

So, can we afford not to do it?

Jeroen Jongejans

WDC Hikurangi/Coastal Ward Councillor

Wall Street Journal blog

Hundertwasser Art Centre Whangarei