Kapiti Coast District Council has adopted the concept of sustainable development as a basic building block of the Community Plan, known as Kapiti Coast: Choosing Futures.
Click here to read the Community Plan.
Taking this approach is a response to the community’s clear interest in managing the District in a more sustainable way, and to the requirements of the Local Government Act.
Sustainable development is about the way things are done, as well as a vision for what the future might be like. It is a way of ensuring the social, cultural, economic and environmental wellbeing of the community, and sets a framework for making decisions.
Kapiti Coast District Council has adopted fourteen sustainable development principles which will guide decision-making.
Click here to view the principles (6 pages, 1.76mb).
These principles are drawn from the Local Government Act 2002 (click here), from the Central Government’s Sustainable Development for New Zealand Programme of Action (click here) and from a review of what other communities are doing.
The Council is working to ensure that its projects and programmes are consistent with these principles, because sustainable development is not just about environmental issues (although action in this area is very important).
Key relevant projects are:
- town centres
- transport
- community consultation processes
- coastal strategy work
- economic development
- the Wellington Regional Strategy process
- climate change (click here)
- energy use (click here)
- responsible water use (click here)
- Community Plan (click here)
- funding and rating review (click here)
- community design processes.
Kapiti Coast District Council is also participating in the development of a Wellington Regional Strategy; a two year project of the six councils in the region. It also has a sustainable development focus, which will be finalised through debate and consultation with the community.