Community involvement

Regional Bylaws

Community involvement - Orari

Members of the community are actively encouraged to participate in discussions during the Planning process.

The Orari Integrated Catchment Management (ICM) Group has prepared a Catchment Management Strategy and the review of environmental flows is clearly identified in the strategy as an action point.

Read the strategy (pdf 993 kB)

As part of the process of developing a flow and allocation regime for the catchment of the Orari River and its tributaries, Environment Canterbury with the support of the ICM group promoted the formation of a Community Advisory Group (CAG) by local residents in 2008. There have been eight CAG meetings so far and four meetings of the Orari Steerring Committee.

Bird surveys were undertaken on the Orari River on 24 October 2010 and on 9 November 2011. Environment Canterbury staff, the ICM group and the Orari Protection Group Inc are working together to ensure the survey is successful. This survey, together with those conducted in previous years is important to enable the protection of river birds’ habitat.

Previous meetings

A meeting of the Community Advisory Group and all consent holders was held on the 16th December 2010. The purpose of the meeting was to report back to the community on the research that had taken place over the preceding year.

Lee Burbery (Hydrogeologist - Lincoln Ventures) summarised what we know about the hydrogeology of the catchment. Specifically he described what earlier and more recent hydrological investigations tell us about the surface water groundwater relationships, water balances and catchment boundaries. Some options for water resource management were discussed.

Jen Ritson (Surface Water Scientist - Environment Canterbury) summarised the current understanding of surface water hydrology in the catchment. She described the development of a model to assess the impact of abstractions on the extent of dry reaches at SH1 and SH72 under different abstraction scenarios. The effect of different minimum flow scenarios on the number of days abstractors are restricted was also modelled.

Dr Greg Burrell (Golder Associates) presented an analysis of field work undertaken combined with historical information and conversations with people in the catchment. The purpose of the presentation was to provide the community with information on the ecological values and their flow needs to inform decisions on minimum flows and allocation. The impact of different abstraction scenarios on fish, birds and invertebrate habitat was modelled.

Working paper 1 provided members of the Community Advisory Group with a recap on the process that has been followed to date, and an indication of the process that will be followed to develop an Environmental Flow and Allocation Plan for the Orari River.

Following the meeting in December 2010, there were three separate workshops to foster discussions about minimum flows and to assist participants formulate an opinion on the likely effects of various minimum flow options. These were held for the Upper Coopers / Upper Orari consent holders, Ohapi consent holders, and Instream / conservation interests. The results of each of these workshops were reported at meeting on 1 February the last meeting (see minutes). A further workshop was held after the February meeting for the Lower Orari / Lower Coopers consent holders.

The seventh Community Advisory Group meeting took place at Milford Hall near Temuka, on 1 February 2011. The purpose of this meeting was to provide the CAG with information regarding tangata whenua values and groundwater/surface water interconnections. Gail Tipa and Mandy Home talked about tangata whenua values and explained the methodology used in the assessments. Runanga is undertaking the field work at three sites over the next month or so. Lee Burbery provided a recap on groundwater and surface water interactions and gave an update on the water balance he prepared for the Orari River catchment.

Leading up to the meeting, Working Paper Two was prepared to provide members of the Community Advisory Group with an up-to-date account of the process that has been followed to date, and an indication of the process that will be followed to develop an Environmental Flow and Allocation Plan for the Orari River.

Working Paper 1 (pdf 112 kB)
Working Paper 2 (pdf 466 kB)

The eighth meeting on 25 May 2011 discussed tradable permits and the planning framework including allocation, efficiency, restrictions and augmentation and there was also some discussion about the TDC stock water take and the B allocation block. The group also agreed that it would be best if a steering group was formed to take the flow and allocation regime further.

Orari Flows Steering Committee

Following on from the Community Advisory Group Meetings, a Steering Committee has now been formed. This Steering Committee is a smaller group of 15 and contains representatives from the different stakeholder groups in the Orari Catchment. The Steering group is meeting once or twice monthly to discuss in depth issues regarding the Orari flow and allocation regime. The Steering Committee will report back to the Wider Community Advisory Group early in 2012.

The first Steering Committee Meeting was held on 23 November 2011 in Geraldine. At this meeting the group was provided with a recap of previous meetings held and discussed economic and ecological issues with Simon Harris and Greg Burrell. There was also discussion around the hydrology of the Orari Catchment. This led to a further technical meeting around hydrology involving ECan staff and some Committee members.

The second Steering Committee Meeting was held on 20 December 2011 in Temuka and was a workshop which ran from 9am-12.30pm. Working Paper 3 was provided to the group before the workshop. Ian Morten presented to the Committee on the Rangitata South Irrigation Scheme and Judy Blakemore presented on the Timaru District Council Stock water takes and future plans. The Committee also discussed the technical hydrological meeting outcomes and the different management options for stream depleting groundwater takes, either a river zone concept or the NRRP policy. The group then focussed on the different flow options and chose to reduce the options to be investigated. The flow options to be modelled and the percentage figure to be used for irrigation usage within these options were agreed upon.

Working paper 3, December 2011 (102 kB)

The third steering committee meeting was held on 23 February 2012. At this meeting the group discussed the conjunctive use zone (Working paper #4) for stream depleting groundwater takes up to 30m depth. Jen Ritson (ECan hydrologist), also presented the modelling from the flow scenarios that the group suggested. From this the group decided on two variable flow options to look into in more detail. Further reliability modelling was carried out on these two scenarios.

The fourth and most recent Steering Committee meeting was held on 22 March 2012. The main purpose of this meeting was to discuss the policy provisions to go into the sub regional chapter of the Land and Water Plan. Working paper #5 (on website) formed the basis for discussions on possible policy options. At the workshop, the Committee came up with provisions regarding: water efficiency, water metering, water allocation, transfer of permits, augmentation, water use restrictions, stream depletion, damming, water yield, water quality and Coopers Creek.

All flow scenarios will soon be modelled and passed to Simon Harris (economist) and Duncan Gray (ecologist) to undertake their assessments. Philip Grove will also provide an analysis on birds and Mandy Home will provide a cultural review of the Orari Catchment by the end of April.

Working paper 4, February 2012 (506 kB)
Working paper 5, March 2012 (560 kB)

Three more Steering Committee meetings occured in May to discuss the final provisions of the sub-regional chapter and a final one in June ( the minutes fo the June meeting are yet to beconfirmed). A Community Advisory Group meeting was also held in June.