- The role of Councilkeyboard_arrow_down
- Executive management
- Our elected memberskeyboard_arrow_down
- Meetingskeyboard_arrow_down
- Our vision and direction
- Delivering for Kāpitikeyboard_arrow_up
- Documentskeyboard_arrow_down
- Planningkeyboard_arrow_down
- Projectskeyboard_arrow_down
- Job vacancieskeyboard_arrow_down
- Partnerskeyboard_arrow_down
- Supplier portal
- Local electionskeyboard_arrow_down
- Our awards for environmental care
- Official Information Requests
- Central government reforms
Year one
In year one of our Long-term Plan 2021–41, the ever-changing impacts of COVID-19 on both our community and Council. We’ve played a leadership role, advocating for our community’s best interests as major government changes unfolded in water reform, resource management, housing intensification, and more. Despite these challenges we’ve stuck to our plan and invested for resilience and growth.
Our performance
You can get a picture of what we did in 2021/22, including our financial performance, in our Performance Reports and Annual Report 2021/22. We’ve highlighted some activities below.

Water services
- Improving the safety and resilience of our drinking water supply.
- Progressing upgrades to our wastewater treatment plants in Waikanae and Ōtaki.
- Progressing 32 major stormwater priority projects.
- Ten stormwater asset renewals and upgrades in construction phase, two in procurement stage, and 20 in design and consenting phase.
- We’ve cleaned 17.3 kilometres of open drains, and completed districtwide stormwater asset investigations.
- Completed a 1.5-kilometre trunk water main upgrade to boost supply to the Ōtaki central business district.
- Installed a new bore head and raw water pipeline in Hautere–Te Horo to improve drinking water safety.
Read more at Waters.

Access and transport
- Paraparaumu Transport Hub design completed and preparation works commenced.
- We’ve sealed 12.2 kilometres of local roads, and built 1.7 kilometres of footpaths.

Parks and open spaces
We have 49 playgrounds in neighbourhoods across Kāpiti, building community connectedness and keeping our tamariki (children) active. Each year we renew and upgrade a selection of these from across the district. In 2021/22 we completed the renewal of the Mazengarb Reserve hockey turf. We also consulted on, designed and planned:
- Lorna Irene playground replacement
- Shotover Grove playground replacement
- Milne Drive playground replacement.
Construction of these playgrounds will begin in the 2022/23 financial year. Read more at Open spaces.

Recreation and leisure
Our pools and libraries are popular places to be! In 2021/22 we had a total of 223,110 pool visits across our three pools, broken down as follows:
- Coastlands Aquatics Centre – 146,006
- Ōtaki Pool – 37,439
- Waikanae Pool – 39,665.
Our libraries issued 500,138 library books, including 29,100 ebooks.

Community facilities
In 2021/22 we continued to invest for our community in our district’s growth and resilience. This included:
- beginning the Mahara Gallery rebuild project
- exploring options for a permanent Waikanae Library and Service Centre replacement
- opening new public toilets in Waikanae.

Tangata whenua
Council agreed to appoint one representative from each of our three iwi mana whenua partners to our Strategy and Operations Committee, Appeals Hearing Committee, and the Grants Allocation Subcommittee, with full voting rights from 1 July 2022. This will support a mutually mana-enhancing partnership that honours the Crown’s Treaty obligations.
Read more about our partnership at Tangata whenua.

Governance
We completed our representation review, resulting in new arrangements from October 2022 that include additional councillors for the Waikanae and Paraparaumu wards, a change in the ratio of ward to districtwide councillors from 5:5 to 7:3, and another community board.

Economic development
Our Major Events Fund supported the following events to help attract visitors, stimulate tourism, and support our local economy and social wellbeing.
- Kāpiti Women's Triathlon
- Kāpiti Half Marathon
- Xterra Wellington
- Kāpiti Food Fair
- Ōtaki Kite Festival
- Māoriland Film Festival
- Matariki Ramaroa Lights Arts Festival.
We also delivered the Kāpiti Arts Trail, and adopted our:
- Destination Management Plan
- Workforce Plan.
Read more about these at Supporting economic development.

Growth
To help address our district’s need for more than 15,000 extra dwellings to house 32,000 new residents, and the infrastructure and environmental protection needed to support this growth over the next 30 years, we adopted these strategies in 2021/22:
- Growth Strategy – Te Tupu Pai
- Open Space Strategy – Toitū Kāpiti
- Housing Strategy
- Sustainable Transport Strategy.
You can find out more about these at Council strategies.

Consultation
We received 19,429 email and website submissions on:
- your building consent experience
- traffic bylaw
- your resource consent experience
- local alcohol policy
- Our Growth Strategy – Te Tupu Pai
- growing and enhancing our open spaces
- District Plan Change 2: Intensification
- open space zoning of Council-owned sites
- modification of indigenous vegetation
- reclassification of Arawhata Rd, Tutanekai St and Ventor Dr
- Maclean Park refresh
- Stormwater Management Framework
- affordable housing and our Housing Strategy
- coastal hazards
- Representation Review
- Annual Plan 2022/23.

Regulatory
Our regulatory team:
- processed 1,185 building consents for building work with an estimated value of $243 million
- issued 1,193 building consents
- received 390 applications and issued 268 decisions.
- responded to a total of 3,240 requests for service, the most related to wandering dogs (535), dog noise complaints (386), and dogs found (332)
- processed 46 new Food Act registrations, and renewed 223
- issued alcohol license applications for 63 premises, and 101 special licenses
- carried out 63 health inspections and 205 trade waste inspections.

Customer service
Despite a challenging year with COVID-19 and significant weather events, in 2021/22 our Council team kept our essential services operating and responded to:
- 21,078 service requests
- 25,897 front counter customers
- 47,445 customer calls.

Residents' opinion surveys
Residents who took part in our residents’ opinion surveys said they were satisfied with the quality of our:
- drinking water
- libraries
- pools
- access to beaches
- public toilets
We know more work is needed on roading, street lighting, and emergency management preparedness.

Responding to a changing climate
- Adopted our Climate Emergency Action Framework.
- Advanced work to explore climate adaption options through our Takutai Kāpiti project.
- Progressed design work for seawall projects in Raumati and Paekākāriki.
Read more about our work around Climate change.

Reducing our carbon emissions
- Invested in electric vehicles.
- Transitioned most streetlights to energy-efficient LED lights.
- Supported Energise Ōtaki’s solar farm to help provide power and resilience to the town’s wastewater treatment plant.
Read more about our Emissions reduction work.

Responding to emergency management events
In 2021/22 we responded to more emergency management events than in any other year. We fully activated and staffed our Emergency Operations Centre, which forms part of the local civil defence response, for:
- COVID-19 August 2021
- Flood event 6–7 December 2021
- Waikanae tornado 9 June 2022 (partial activation)
- Rising Waikanae River levels and tornadoes 12 June 2022
- Reikorangi Road closure 13–14 June 2022.
As well as the 126 hours spent on these events, our staff also undertook 245 hours in training, to make sure we're always prepared for event activations.
Read more about Civil defence and emergency management and the Emergency Operations Centre (EOC).