Monte Cecilia Park spend-up to reach $50 million

Today the Finance & Strategy Committee of the Auckland City Council - meeting behind closed doors - approved further purchases of land to expand Monte Cecilia Park in Mt Roskill.

However, before the purchases were made the committee publicly acknowledged the running total for buying up land for the park had already reached $32.4 million.

Committee member Councillor Cathy Casey said that this total does not include the $15 million earmarked for the purchase and re-siting of Monte Cecilia School.

“The cost to ratepayers for this park is about to reach $50 million. There are no spending restraints being placed on this council in its final months. Nor does it seem as if watchdogs such as the Ombudsman, the Auditor-General or the Auckland Transition Agency (ATA) have any power to limit this council’s profligate spending on Monte Cecilia Park.”

“With this big spend, it is the Monte Cecilia School and community that are the big losers.

Cr Richard Northey, another member of the committee, said,

“There is an outrageous contrast between this gold-plated open space monument in the Deputy Mayor, David Hay’s, bailiwick of Mt Roskill being bequeathed to the new Auckland Council. At the same time, David Hay and his Citizen & Ratepayers councillor mates have allowed our treasured volcanic cones like Owairaka-Mt Albert and Maungarei-Mt Wellington and even our much loved Tepid Baths to go to rack and ruin.”

“Low income, high population growth areas - like Otahuhu, which has been denied their long-promised swimming pool and Glen Innes, which is crying out for a music and arts centre for its young people - have had their projects canned by John Banks and his C&R council so that pet projects like the expansion of Monte Cecilia Park can be finalised in the dying days of this council.”

ENDS

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