New mayor, Max Brough, is a man with a plan.
His belief is that the New Plymouth District Council needs to be rebuilt from the ground up.
And he wants to do that in just three years.
Max has made no secret of his desire to be a “one and done” mayor.
He wants to be the new broom that sweeps clean, bring costs back to an affordable level and have the dog wagging the tail rather than the other way round.
“When I leave here we’re going to have a really good platform for the people of New Plymouth and whoever comes in on the next council.”
Balancing the books is Max Brough’s number one goal and he’s not looking to bring any more new ambitions to the table.
“But the projects we will be doing will be done really well. We need to slow down a bit and consolidate. That’s why it’s only a three year job.”
Transparency and communication are also key — fitting for a man who embodies the maxim “What you see is what you get.”
They are two things council has been lacking, he says and he is determined to change that.
It’s one of the reasons he wanted to have three Deputy Mayors, serving concurrently however legality prevented that and now they are on a rotational basis, changing every six months.
“There’s too much to do for one person … and it’s giving a wider pool of people direct access to the mayoralty. Each of the Deputy Mayors has different contacts and circles of people they can access,” he says of Gordon Brown, Moira George and Murray Chong (who is first up in the role).
“Everybody wants a piece of you as the mayor and you don’t have enough pieces.
“No matter how quickly you try and get back to people, it’s never quick enough. People expect an instant response. Having three deputies was about dealing with things quickly and spreading the load. Basically I’m a lazy person — I’m trying to cut down from 16 hours a day to 12,” he asides, with his acknowledged irreverent sense of humour.
Married for over 30 years the Brough’s have three adult kids— “two daughters and a transitioning son” (male to female), a process that started early this year.
“There’s been some adapting of thought processes within our family,” he wryly grins.
He’s been in the roofing business all his life and makes a roofing product that is used by roofing manufacturers all around New Zealand.
“Our product goes into the ridging of every house in New Zealand — it pushes down into all the corrugations to seal them off.”
He hired a manager to run his business in anticipation of either his new job, or retirement, depending on the election outcome.
It turned out retirement was never an option.
He romped into the mayoralty with almost 14,000 votes and 46% of the vote, with the second placegetter at just over 6,000.
After one term as a councillor he wanted to be the one who set the direction for the district.
“I felt the trajectory we were on, whilst admirable, was financially unsustainable.”
Rates levels are set for the current financial year (ends 30 June 2026) and in the new year the focus will be on slashing budget items to bring down the projected 9.9% increase for the 2026/27 year.
The NPDC is already in a deficit position for next year’s budget after it was realised an error was made in the average rateable property value. Consequently rates were set lower than they should have been.
As things stand, the $3.1m error (which equates to just over 2% of rates) has been credited to properties already, means this council has to find that amount of savings before it even starts on decreasing the projected rate increase for next year.
“The new target I have asked the staff to achieve is CPI +1%. The next part of the process will be the ‘how’. We wont get to the level of detail around those decisions until early next year at Annual Plan process time.”
He’s not looking to necessarily cancel projects, just maybe apply the brakes a little.
“There’s a difference between pause and stop.”
THE NEW COUNCIL
There’s one more council meeting before Christmas (Dec 18th) and the agenda will include formalising the new committees, the pay structures, and a paper with options for a certain variety of biscuits,” Max chuckles, in reference to Tim Tam Alley (the cycle lanes and road changes along Devon St West).
“I’ve put in a request for a report on what we can do and that will be coming through at the Dec 18th Meeting. The concept was good but the execution was poor … I’ve said that all the way along.”
He’s also asked for the proposed new precinct on Queen Street, in front of the Govett Brewster Art Gallery, to be looked at.
Voted for by the last council at their final meeting, the $3 million plus price-tag caused outrage.
“It will still go ahead in some form but my express desire is that it’s not in a three and a half million dollar form.”
The council is still bonding but Max is confident it will happen.
The new committee structure (see side-bar) is expected to halve the time it takes to get through the council process, from around 50 days to somewhere in the 20s.
NEW STANDING COMMITTEES
The three rotating Deputy Mayors will each chair a standing committee too.
Te Huinga Taumatua is the iwi liaison committee, that provides strategic guidance and advice on matters important to Māori and helps improve Māori participation in decision-making. Gordon Brown will co-chair with an iwi representative yet to be determined.
Pubic Engagement will be a portal for people that want to have some input or want something looked at, this will be the starting point. So if that committee believes someone has raised a great idea, this committee will ask staff to write a report in time for the next committee meeting, which can then be elevated to a full council meeting for a decision.
“So rather than coming from council to the community, we’ll bring ideas and concerns from the community into the council. We’re going to flip that perception people have that council dictates to the community — of the tail wagging the dog.” Murray Chong will chair this committee.
Going for Growth will be chaired by Moira George and will focus on aspects of economic development, infrastructure, and land supply to accommodate the district’s growth. The first focus of this committee will be job growth and employment — critical for the district.
“The Finance, Audit and Risk chair I’ve always felt should be a professional person so we’ve gone through a process to find one of those people … and have a couple that have been short-listed and hopefully we’ll have an appointment impending.”
CONSULTATION
In his first few weeks Max worked with councillors to help determine who would be best suited to the various committees NPDC has.
He has also been active on social media with weekly video updates from the “mayor’s office” to keep the community informed. The platform also provides a direct conduit for people to ask questions. Max doesn’t always man the live feeds personally, but if it’s not him it will be one of the deputy mayors or councillors.
Next year he is looking to develop a more independent overview style NPDC social media channel that is less formal and more organic.
“I think people want to see a social media channel that reports on council with some objectivity.”
The idea would be to talk to council about what they are working on and trying to achieve, but also get comment from people who maybe think something’s not such a great idea and why not.
“We’re looking at how we can establish that — and it’s not behind a paywall. That’s actually problematic for a lot of people.”
He’d also like to change the current way of doing “consultations”.
“Sometimes in previous council surveys and ‘consultations’ it feels like the questions are loaded towards the council’s desired outcome,” he says.
“NZTA run a similar model with the ‘surveys’ they send out to stakeholders,” he says of the planned road closures to the north of the district in January.
“The way questions are framed, there is no opportunity for the industry groups or survey respondents to say ‘actually, we don’t want a road closure’. There’s no room for debate or dissent or out-of-the-box thinking that may actually lead to a better outcome.”
Pre-election Max warned community groups that demands for funding from council were often seen as a right and his plan was to put a stop to some of that type of mindset. It’s something he is still intent on doing.
“I don’t want to cripple community groups but the current system of groups applying to a range of funders is possibly not the most efficient way of doing things. I’ve been toying with the idea of having a single point of community funding.
“I’m going to have a chat with staff and maybe the TOI Foundation about how we can maybe pool the money and have a single distribution point.
“Another thing I’ve noticed is that we have various community groups turn up and they’re all trying to do the similar things. Maybe there is a way of getting them all talking to each other so that there’s no duplication of efforts and resources.”
WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE
“It’s been noted that I wasn’t comfortable with how that came about,” Max said of Neil Holdom’s appointment as CEO of the new Water Services Council Controlled Organisation (WSCCO) that will be responsible for the future delivery of the district’s water services.
Before Holdom left his job as Mayor, a board was appointed for the new WSCCO — the day before the election. Holdom was confirmed as the CEO by the new board.
“I looked at that from a legal perspective, personally, and though it was something I would not have done, it wasn’t illegal.
“I’ve now had a bit of time to think about it and the reality is, someone had to do the job. If I take away the process of how Neil was appointed and am objective about it, Neil can do the job.
“I never got to see the list of candidates so I have no opinion if he was the best person for the job but I know he is qualified to do the job and I’m going to let him get on with doing it. He has a working knowledge of council and at the end of the day, I have the final say. We have ten months to set it up … let’s get on with it.”
Similarly, Max is looking forward to working with NPDC Chief Executive Gareth Green, though at the time of this interview (a month post-election) Green was still on holiday.
“I suspect when that annual leave was booked the expectation was that post-election it would be ‘business as usual’. My guess would be that my election was somewhat unexpected,” Max grins.
“I didn’t want to get in the way of his holiday — it’s been a tough year for everyone — and we came to a mutual understanding that we would get on with things in the meantime. We’ve been in touch via email … I feel for him a little bit when he’s trying to relax.
“But next year it’s all go … we’re just getting all the deck chairs lined up.”
An unfortunate simile in that it conjures up images of the Titanic.
But for the man wanting to rebuild how things are done at New Plymouth District Council and reduce rate increases to affordable levels, his mission is indeed, titanic.
“I’m going to deliver what I stood for, or die trying.”