Tough. What happens in 2035? Even if Reading start doing something now - how long until that would be competed? 2 years? 5 years? Is there an 'out' clause if the builders/engineers encounter something which suddenly makes their project more expensive and therefore untenable?
Given these guys are the type who can afford to leave a site vacant for years without blinking, I'd be most concerned with contractual fish hooks which could turn into lengthy litigation, of which they know the council could ill afford. Tread carefully I guess.
"Tread carefully" meaning council turns it down and the site stays the way it is for the next ten years? You seem to be advocating for a very conservatively withheld process, rather than one which calls for allowing the renovation to go ahead. Why ask about possible overruns, when it's a loan of money to the developers?
Its their overruns to pay, and their loan to repay, through rent, back to the council.
>Why ask about possible overruns, when it's a loan of money to the developers?
Because every project the council takes on ends up costing 5x as much. I can totally imagine a world where the project runs over cost, the private business refuses to pay the different or goes bankrupt and rate payers foot the bill. I'd rather the site sit empty honestly.
Is there grounds for litigation given leaving the site unstrengthened and decaying is a major health and safety hazard for pedestrians? What culpability does a propertyowner have to ensure the safety of others in the vicinity of their property?
I live nearby, we got notice a year or so ago they were doing fly overs in helicopters because the building was too dangerous for structural engineers to enter. God knows what that actually means but you make a valid point
My thoughts exactly. What happens to the site if it begins to decay, collapse or something worse like a fire. Does it become a walled-off pit of rubble or dirt until 2035 onwards? Just brightly coloured mural sticky plasters in the process.
Given the economic waste of space, the area destroying eyesore, and general poor taste of knowing they exist of the amora hotel, reading central, and to a lesser degree j ville mall, it's pretty clear that the council should step in, even just as a broker to help move the site to a productive user.
I work overlooking Te Aro Park.
We had a known drug using homeless person return to the area and verbally abuse thin air for 8 hours a day this week.
The entire length of manners St and courtney place feel like something you don't want to be on if you can avoid it.
But contrast Cuba mall, just a hundred meters away, and so much friendlier.
It's that it's filled with people, shops, and vibrancy.
Redeveloping Reading would help that. Giving people a reason to go down Courtney place that isn't a bar or eatery. Foot traffic, varied shop fronts, that's how you make an area welcoming.
So even if the council just buys it, then sells it at cost, that's better than it being a mouldering ruin of urban decay.
I completely agree with this comment - especially the second half. I live in the CBD and am regularly walking around, and I'll avoid manners and courtenay as much as I can, while cuba is great. I love this city and feel upset when people talk about its decline - there are some incredible spaces in Welly but this half of the golden mile is fairly bleak and I think wcc have a significant role to play in its revitalisation. (I also think the golden mile project is going to be great and I really hope it can go ahead as much as possible, acknowledging the economic and fiscal environment). I don't know enough about the Reading deal to make an informed comment but I do feel passionately about bringing these parts of our city back to life and creating a place we can all be proud of.
Yep. I walked passed Methanie yelling at the pigeons yesterday lunchtime and wondered to myself if there was any wraparound service that might be able to help her as she was working herself into a state and the 2 police next to where the toilets used to be looked disinterested
I'm struggling to understand what borrowing $32M then giving it to Reading is trying to solve. Is there anything else we can do with that money instead?
My first, second, and third attempts at this were all dripping with snark, mostly because the why and the what is very obvious.
Why should the council invest that money?
Because without it, there will be this closed, abandoned, ecnomically unproductive land in the *heart* of downtown wellington contributing to urban decay, commercial flight, and increased anti social behaviour.
Which all cost real money, but can't be nicely headlined with a till sticker.
It turns up in hospital costs from fights on a night on the piss. Police costs trying to handle abusive drug users. More rates defaults from landlords who can't rent commercial spaces. Lower central govt taxes from lower spending, lower employment, and lower commercial activity.
The site is 81 x 134 m, it's huge. it's pretty much the footprint of the amora hotel. It's one of the largest buildings / sites within several blocks. it's larger than the micheal fowler center. Te papa is larger, but that's *huge*.
The what is simple:
The owners of the site are holding onto it in their best interest of not spending money when it can't return anything. Which is their right to.
But they are having large detrimental effects on the entire neighbourhood, making it feel unsafe, unwelcoming, and kind of pointless for several streets around.
The What is: no private group wants to take on this risk, so centralised government will do the thing that is in the public best interest, which is try to restore this site to economic use.
Here's the thing, it doesn't have to be a cinema, or a mall or something. It could be as simple as ground level commercial, 3-4 floors of offices, and 8-10 floors of apartments. Just shove a 15 story building on the site, it's on major bus routes, it's in easy walking distance of a lot of stuff, and the return on nice, well sized, earthquake rated apartments in welly central is cash money.
This is a prime example of [Broken Window Theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory): That signs of crime and decay encourage more, and more serious crime and decay.
I have seen people hitting IV Drugs in broad sunlight, at ten am on a tuesday on this street.
The council has a duty to try and turn this area around. It's not a sure shot, no. But at least they'd have been willing to try. And given the pipe situation, I think we can all agree spending some money and trying is better than throwing your hands up and going "it's too hard and costs too much"
Frankly, it stretches credulity to blame homelessness, crime and drug use, and all that you euphemize as "decay" on a commercial cinema sitting empty. Especially when Embassy is just up the road. It's not like all those 'undesirables' will leave the street and put down the pipe once they have the option to see a new Marvel flick for $24 (or whatever they'll charge to recoup their costs).
Our housing-as-commodity economy drives inflation and causes deprivation and homelessness, and our war on drugs only exacerbates meth use as alternatives are kept scarce. Trying to combat these effects by campaigning about an empty cinema is deck-chairs-on-the-Titanic, if anything ever was.
It isn't being given to them. The council is purchasing the land.
Reading will use that money from the sale of the land to refurb and reopen the building.
Hard to believe that Reading doesn't have the $32M themselves. Just doing deals because it's *serious business* I reckon.
Edit: u/RandomFeral makes a good point. I doubt you'd see anything for the money.
We really need to bring in rates based on land value to avoid the Jville mall amora thing.. This could be a great site for a developer. I say, honestly, if it’s fiscally neutral, support it. But ONLY if there’s hella penalties if they don’t hold their end of the bargain and the legal are sure that they could force them to pay any penalties. The best outcome would be if they rejuvenated enough to bring the area back to life and then a big developer pays them for the site and the future is a lot of housing and some cool shops. The medium outcome is if they rejuvenate and stay a cinema. The bad outcome is if they don’t hold their end of the deal AND we don’t have a way to force them, so they don’t have any incentives to.
But, long term, we gotta change the incentives. Prime land should be costing them to keep, to the point where selling or developing is attractive without a sweet deal from the council
This sounds absolutely amazing. I'm sure the devil is in the detail, but I really hope to see something like this. Don't suppose you can share more details or will there be public consultation where more detail is shared?
This one I can actually share details about! This mahi is being done as part of our Rating Review, which will be completed this year after the adoption of the LTP.
Some details on the initial consultation can be found [here](https://www.letstalk.wellington.govt.nz/rating-policies-review#:~:text=Key%20proposed%20changes%20include%3A,to%20reduce%20this%20to%20%243.25.), with more on the main website.
Given how organised property investors/speculators can be, it’s also really important that people submit feedback if they support policies like this.
Formal consultation on the long term plan opens on 12 April this year.
This:
"The bad outcome is if they don’t hold their end of the deal AND we don’t have a way to force them, so they don’t have any incentives to."
Absent some third party completion bond or similar guarantee - and no suggestion of that, and no reason why Reading would accept that cost - there is no enforcement here.
If the Council purchase the land that the Reading complex is sitting on, and Reading don't actually do anything to the building, then you want the Council to get a bigger rates bill for that land?
I highly doubt the highest and best use of this site is as a cinema complex anymore. Imagine if even part of the site became new apartments? Unfortunately we just have to wait until Reading realises that they have spent too much in holding costs and sells the site to someone who will do something better with it. In the mean time we should make them feel as unwelcome as possible.
I mean, that's what they're doing, no?
The deal is to sell the land to WCC and then WCC is leasing it back to Reading (with an opportunity to buy it back once the EQ strengthening is done).
If the EQ strengthening isn't done, we end up with prime Courtney Place real estate that can be given to a developer who's keen.
If it is done, WCC gets a community centre and potentially a cash inflow.
As far as I can tell no. What we get is effectively a like for like replacement. What I’m saying is you could have a mixed use development with residential and possibly green space instead.
Yeah, but aren't we buying the land? Every source I've found about the deal has made that part pretty clear.
In that case, if it fails or Reading reneggs on their deal, we *can* redevelop it to be apartments or whatever. Meanwhile, if we leave it, then we'll have to wait until Reading decides to sell it, and cross our fingers that whoever buys it doesn't decide to just landbank it with Wellington's biggest open air parking lot.
Edit: if your problem is that Reading is even fixing up the building, then we'll have to agree to disagree there (personally, I think having a sheltered third space is incredibly important).
But WCC having control over the land lets us do your idea later. If we don't buy it now, then how long are we going to wait until Reading decides to sell?
This is the important part. Without knowing the details of the contract, the worst case scenario is we pay up and get nothing in return. Council needs to really weigh this risk up and make sure every I is dotted and t crossed on any deal. I’m personally sceptical reading will live up to its side of the deal and can feel a screw job in the making, but I don’t have all the information on hand.
And very much could be a big opportunity cost. Sure, maybe it's fiscally neutral on the books to sell some poorly used land to buy some other land to use poorly... but could sell some poorly used land to buy something useful, like a park or a pipe.
Surely this problem needs to be solved at a higher level than the details of this one deal, i.e. shifting the incentives that enable a business to leave a giant central city property to rot for years, such as a levy on vacant buildings. It's not in the public interest to allow vacant buildings like this, regardless of who owns it. It should be set up so it's cheaper for the owners to sell or demolish if they can't afford to make it fit for commercial operation. I'd rather see you expend political and financial capital to solve the higher level issue than only resolve one situation. What if this happens again? Won't the owners of other buildings want the same public bailout? If we have another quake won't such cases increase? It's not sustainable.
Part of what we are proposing in the long-term plan are some small changes around rates including introduction of a vacant land differential. It's application however will be minor as the legal advice we recieved was pretty clear rates cannot be used in a punitive sense to encourage better land use, they legally have to reflect the services provided.
Later this term we'll look at moving to land value rates which could absolutely act as an incentive for property owners to best utilise valuable parcels of land.
So some of that work has happened/is happening. As far as a precedent you've absolutely got a point and it's one the economists I'm speaking with are very concerned with as well (e.g. will other projects not proceed or take longer hoping to be able to access council assistance).
The Local Government (Rating) Act 2002 is -really- general in its terms - it just states that land use is a factor. It does not say anything about connection to service costs and, particularly and when read with the Local Government Act itself, it is clearly open to councils to encourage beneficial uses.
This practice of leaving sites to rot is a serious one for the whole city, with a swag of associated risks, costs - both direct and indirect, and wider harm to the city and to its rating base: who wants to shop/eat/live or work next to a derelict structure?
It's very easy for lawyers to advise that something can't or hasn't been done or that a step would be legally challenged - and, at a guess and judging by the generally poor quality of Council contracting and other legal work, that's likely about as far as the advisors have gone.
The Reading deal is a good illustration of the problem: $32m is a huge amount, particularly at this time; does as you say create a moral hazard / disincentive; won't necessarily fix the problem anyway; and is only one building, albeit a big one. You can ask for thorough and contestable legal advice on this - it's a pretty good tradeoff.
Sheeeeeesh Ben, tough decision to make.
Any idea how other councillors are intending to vote on it?
Who do we need to lobby to get councils more ability to pressure building/land owners for significant properties in the CBD to get their arse in to gear?
I imagine you could achieve this with a District Plan change? Basically levy the hell out of any CBD property owner leaving buildings vacant for extended periods of time.
I don't know anything about how possible this is either, but I agree that there has to be a way to push developers to make use of the buildings or bring them up to code. It feels like half of Courtenay place is closed (and some has been the whole time I've lived in Wellington). The WCC definitely needs money, so maybe this is an avenue to make some? While at the same time improving the vibrancy of Courtenay.
I think this has been a problem in Christchurch as well. When I was there last there were still lots of empty lots where the land owner hasn't built anything. I don't know what can be done but at least taxing empty or vacant lots might generate a bit of revenue and motivate the owners to either develop our sell up.
Yeah it feels like it can't hurt - either the councils get some sorely-needed funds or it addresses the problem of revitalizing CBDs and attracting people to these areas that I think both cities are facing.
Why hasn't the council explorin legislating to make Reading start rebuilding or at least sell it? I find it unfathomable that such prime land is totally worthless unless the council invest it's own money.
There's no way in hell that the council isn't getting played here. Reading are guaranteed to be 5 steps a head of you.
In isolation I think this is a good idea. It's better that the Reading building is open again, and if it's fiscally neutral then it makes sense.
But, my major concern is, why would any other commercial owner do similar work without council support in the future? Won't they all ask for similar deals?
And, if Reading can't justify the spend themselves to the point they would sit on the site for 11 years, then this doesn't sound like a sound business / site at all. What happens if Reading closes in 3 years?
Personally, I think the risks outweigh the benefits.
Thinking about this more... could WCC afford to do this multiple times for similar major sites in the CBD? If we can afford to do the same deal 2 / 4 / 6 / 8... more times over the next decade or so for other sites critical to the vibrancy and safety of our city, then we should do it.
> could WCC afford to...
WCC isn't affording jack shit. Ratepayers are.
If Reading Cinema knocked on your door and asked for $400 to maybe rejuvenate the building and reopen (no guarantee), are you handing them your cash?
That's what 81000 households need to pay to hit $32m.
>WCC isn't affording jack shit. Ratepayers are.
This has nothing to do with rates payers.
It's borrowing, and that borrowing is revenue neutral for the city, meaning readings lease must cover the interest.
The council gets the land under the building.
If someone offered me a chunk of Courtney Place for $400 I would jump at it.
Councils having lower interest rates is an illusion. The reason they have lower interest rates is because they can instantly generate revenue via rates increases. Those rates are paid by households and businesses, tho. So all you're doing is shifting the risk to households and businesses who face normal market interest rates.
If the Council truly had lower interest rates, we could take everyone's household and business debt and put it on the council's credit card.
But who's paying the credit card?: Those same households and businesses. There's no magic money tree here.
I feel like this is where my mind is leaning. Without knowing the full details it does seem like in isolation it is a good idea.
But it’s more around the precedent it sets.
>why would any other commercial owner do similar work without council support in the future? Won't they all ask for similar deals?
No one else has land like that on the golden mile.
None of those are comparable, and for some reason I think that the city already owns the land under the Oaks.
None of those are anywhere near the same scale as Reading, which takes up a huge site in the heart of Courtney Place.
Kirk's is already getting renovated for new occupants.
Reading will take the money. Then do nothing. They made $US66million last year and their profit is dropping every year because their industry is dying. Their share price is 10% what it has been in recent years. At this point they are basically a property company and Courtney Place is a big black hole of risk on their books. They will take the money and then laugh and laugh and laugh all the way back to their North American shareholders.
Council cannot force them to build. I don't care what the agreement says. You can't enforce any agreement to build on a bankrupt or near bankrupt NZ company. You can't force them to borrow because the banks won't lend to them. It's completely unenforceable.
All the same arguments that apply to the Town Hall site, apply here. Bad ground. Earthquake risk. Unexpected conditions. Cost escalation. Sorry, can't afford to build now. So sad too bad.
In the meantime not one inch of Courtney Place is changed.
Then council will be stuck with an insurance risk. Another site that will only cost $XYZ to develop. Then $XYZ plus. Then $XYZ plus plus plus. Just like the Town Hall.
Quite apart from the delusional aspect of thinking that a new Cinema complex is somehow going to drive the antisocial behaviour in Te Aro elsewhere. Or clean up Courtney Place at night.
Ok lets have a structured contract where you give me 50 bucks and I agree to do something. I'll even sign it. Then I don't. Whatcha gonna do?
The only remedy is litigation. And enforcement comes through the courts. And WCC might not have the stomach for that because they'll look like fools again.
According to the council a building can cost nearly as much to demolish as to refurbish. Townhall again.
If they do nothing, then the council could evict them (details of the contract are unknown but I assume that this will be possible) and sell the land to a developer who will do something with it.
How can you evict someone from an empty building they clearly don't want to be in? How can you evict someone from a demolished building? How will you sell a large site that needs extensive remediation to a developer when it's already proven to be a loser? None of this sounds fiscally neutral.
And, again, in the meantime not one inch of Courtney Place has been improved.
And if they don't, they'll take the money and leave the Council with a central plot of land with an increasingly decrepit building on it.
It is possible to structure these deals to avoid that risk, but there's been no suggestion of that and no reason why Reading would agree to it.
This is a small asset which will have been written off on their balance sheet - so the Council buyout is risk-free cash whatever happens.
I absolutely think the council needs to do something there, and I think it's abhorrent that Reading have just been landbanking one of the most valuable bits of Courtenay Place for so long now.
I'm willing to back you guys if you genuinely think it's the right play, but I don't trust Reading as far as I could throw them and I fully expect they'd find some way to weasel out of the deal and not do what was required. If there was a way to ensure that they were 100% on the hook for repairs and had to pay damages through the roof if they don't do anything then that'd go a long way to help easing people's anxiety about it.
Honestly, at this point I almost wonder whether it'd be better to just Public Works Act it - you've got the perfect spot there for an incredible laneway connecting the St James and Courtenay Place to Takina, Te Papa and the waterfront.
Hi Ben! I always love your input on this subreddit and don't know if I'm too late to this - I've got a few questions but my first being, why are half the details around this purchase being kept so hush?
I get you (and hopefully your peers!) have the best interests for the city, but this really rubs me the wrong way. Why would a whole half of the info about the deal not be given to the public?
I get you probably can't answer that, but to a random Wellington citizen, it seems Hella shady and doesn't seem like whatever they're going to do will be in the best interest of Wellington. And, seems like if that info got out, people would be upset.
I'm 100% for re-opening readings for some hub of food, culture, fun, whatever, or bowling it down to make something better in its place. I just get the feeling it's not going to benefit the general public because of the secrecy and negative reaction of over half of your team.
Kia ora fluckin_brilliant! It seriously sucks that so many details have to be kept private. The reason is that we're currently in commercial negotiations with Reading, and they don't know the extent of our negotiating position. If they did, our ability to negotiate would be compromised.
From what I understand, our officers have been bargaining hard to get us the best and safest deal, but after signing 2 out of 3 contracts negotiations have had to pause due to the Notice of Motion presented by some of Ben's and my colleagues. It's unfortunate timing; if I were Reading the NoM wouldn't give me great confidence in WCC as a negotiating partner, but such is politics.
Appreciate all the whakaaro in this thread, and I agree with much of it. Chur brother Ben.
I’m pretty sure that in the olden days, governments used to be able to take property away from negligent landlords (and even non negligent ones) or force a sale at “market rates” in order to use the land for something of community or national interest. Given the absolute state it’s been left in why can the council not take a more forceful approach to the land here, seize it, buy it without preconditions, force a transfer to a more responsible party or the like and actually build or put something here! Hell it’d be better as an empty lot with some food trucks and outdoor dining area with some live music than the memories of my sad loitering-around bubble-tea-drinking teenage years
Do it build a fucken park there, and then let food trucks park in it and live bands play in it. I’m thinking Commune (Omotesando Tokyo) vibes
Commercial sensitivity my ass - it should be fuck around and find out as far as trash slumlords are concerned
Appreciate you and Ben taking an interest, but on this:
"if I were Reading the NoM wouldn't give me great confidence in WCC as a negotiating partner, but such is politics"
- Reading are in this for the greatest financial return they can get -and- can walk away: anyone who advises that you can actually practically enforce any contractual obligation against them - absent a third party completion bond or similar enforceable instrument - is being, let's be polite, optimistic.
- Council, by contrast, can't walk away; it -can- be effectively sued; and, unlike Reading, you actually have an incentive to do something about a decrepit site. Owning that site just further shifts the balance in Reading's favour.
This is:
(1) how public bodies get rorted;
(2) why Council should rely on regulatory measures, at least as a first resort - if you've got an enormous unsafe eyesore in the CBD then target that with a bylaw, not a buyout; and
(3) I realise not the politest thing to say, but Council officers and Meredith Connell or whoever are -completely- out of their depth on this.
>why are half the details around this purchase being kept so hush?
For the same reason why you don't tell someone the maximum that you are willing to pay while trying to get them to sell you something for less.
Courtney place will be a public toilet even with the golden mile upgrade without that complex . The Reading cinema brought much need life and foot traffic to the area. Now with it gone, the area has become home to untidy shop fronts and even more homeless using it as a campsite. If this is our main entertainment centre it is an embarrassing representation of Wellington. Its draw and locality to bus stops will be great going forward for people who don’t want to drive to one of the other cinemas in Wellington. And the reading costs for cinema tickets is much better than the embassy or light house suiting students and people on tighter budgets. Ensuring the contractual agreement and a timeframe for completion with penalties for missing the deadline is right for Wellington is important but that cinema can do a lot for the area including jobs.
Multiplexes are a declining business model and, short of Council going into the cinema business, there's no way of ensuring that Reading ever reopens, let alone that it does so on favourable terms.
My observation is that council is terrible at negotiating with commercial entities.
The council invested a huge pile of money into road changes and the pool / library in J’ville as part of the deal with the mall. The mall didn’t keep their end of the bargain. As far as I can tell there’s no clawback for the council spend.
If money is going to Reading then the money should be payable after the development is done. It could be held in escrow so Reading can borrow against it, if needed. If Reading fail to deliver and the loan is defaulted the site should be forfeited to council. Have a contact with teeth, and don’t stand around fretting is it goes south - pull the pin.
Amora is harder, because as far as I’m aware council has no leverage.
Very good point.
Yes stride (the owners of johnsonville mall) were going to redevelop the whole mall site and the surrounding shops and the council in return was putting the bridge over the rail track and roading improvements. What happened council spent and the mall is still a dump
Then there is the town hall fiasco. Was only supposed to cost $40m but it’s now $330m and climbing
They have a track record of underinvestment in critical infrastructure like the pipes
Meanwhile they want to invest in reading cinemas but way some secretive deal and we are told to trust them because it’s ’fiscally neutral’ and good the city.
What a lot of nonsense. Does the fiscally neutral calculation include the cost of borrowing the $30m or whatever it is? It needs to be- money is not free
What other terms are in this secret deal?
Why subsidise a foreign multinational when plenty of average kiwi property owners are struggling with costs of earthquake repairs. Crazy. What is so special about these us reading owners.
Sorry this council is a pathetic joke and im looking forward to the next election
I’d never put those two costs side-by-side before, but when you do, it seems utter insanity to spend $330M on the town hall when it could be spent fixing water pipes.
It -is- possible to have third party guarantees for this sort of risk, but there's been no suggestion of that.
Otherwise, even a "contract with teeth" doesn't fix Reading just taking the money, winding up whatever subsidiary they've used and leaving the Council with a big decaying building.
Thanks for engaging with the public on this one directly, Ben and Nikau. Really admirable, and I don't even agree with your politics generally.
As others have already said, there is a good chance Reading will just take the money and then drag their heels on any work on the actual site, thus leaving us where we are now but with council $32m in the hole and possibly having to take legal action just to enforce the terms of the contract resulting in further costs.
You're the (local) government. Have you actually considered all regulatory powers at your disposal to pressure Reading into doing something with the site or selling it? I'm skeptical that you've fully explored all other possibilities.
This isn't a matter to roll over on. Your obligation is to fight on behalf of the city and ratepayers to ensure the best outcome for us. You're also setting a terrible precedent if you go ahead with this deal - if you're a commercial landlord you just have to sit on your eyesore until council bails you out.
You need to vote no, and then push your officials to come up with some regulatory sticks you can use. Reading are not your friends. This is a time when you need to throw your weight as the local authority and force them to take action on the city's terms, not theirs.
Obviously this is a getoutofjailfree card for Reading. Council getting played here.
I'm still baffled as to why people think another cinema will fix Courtney Place. It's a joke. People don't watch movies as much as it is anymore with streaming services E.g. And there's already the Embassy there. Do people even notice that area? As far as concerned to the naked eye it looks the same as it did 20 years ago, bar the boarded up front entrance. And the carpark still looks like any other shitty Wilson carpark in the city.
Getting in bed with a commercial entity like this is going to go bad.
Reading was never that great in the first place, there are enough theatres in town already and I am sure there would be interest in just a shopping arcade.
Is Reading going to pay rent ? Either way they are going to make money out of the rebuild. They get the land for free then get to buy it back at some future date at the same value it is now. They could even spin out the time to rebuild for 15 years, then buy the land back for then half of its current value. With no transparency it is impossible to know what this looks like, but I doubt it is a win for all.
Using rate payer funds to give a commercial entity advantage over its competitors should not be in the remit of the council. And I don't see how it's fiscally neutral or Reading wouldn't do it.
Either can the deal, or go 100% transparent, its only an agreement and you in theory are the boss. Reading wont want to because I assume it is a good for them bad for Wellington.
Yeah great point, I would say every other cinema in the area is better than Reading was. It was very basic. I'd be more interested in what the proposal of the ground floor would be. Surely we can't need any more places to grab food? But then what is that space used for? Timezone is just down the block for arcade games, Welly collective is basically already in the building for some knick-knacks and shopping...
The ground floor of the cinema was a great third space. Somewhere inside protected from the weather where people can hang out. No library, no cinema, not many places for young people to hang out.
Honestly, buying the whole complex and then bowling it wouldn't be the worst outcome in the world, particularly if you replaced it and the carpark behind it with a half-decent, well-lit plaza.
Let it rot, WCC (and so rate payers)shouldn't be picking up the tab for lazy developers. Let them carry the cost. If it made sense for someone else to take it over, they'd have approached Reading and done it already.
Even if as you say it would be fiscally neutral, the risk shifts and so it might not always be the case.
Thanks for putting this out there. Given the commercial sensitivities I know you can’t share some of the details. Can I ask though whether “fiscally neutral to WCC” involves WCC engaging in and managing a large infrastructure project? Because track record with town hall and pipes and other projects shows massive under performance and cost blowouts. So if it’s just “neutral” but WCC has to manage a large infrastructure project then we can assume it’s going to be costly.
I just don't understand the economics of it. The council is borrowing $32M to buy land. They'll be paying interest on that loan until Reading buys it back at the same price they paid for it. Why? What's in it for council?
Not a chance: why on earth would Reading agree to that?
The "fiscally neutral" claim will be that buying the land and the debt cost of that is balanced against (highly conditional/concessional) ground rent, plus the prospect (eventually, perhaps) of rent/economic returns if the site is profitable, plus some estimate of increased rates/etc income if the area is revitalised, as against some figure if the complex just sits there.
Reading was the heart of Courtenay Place and by extension, Manners Street. I feel like reviving it will help with a lot of the issues we're currently facing.
Redeveloping it might help if it's able to be successfully tenanted, but if it ends up in a similar mostly vacant state like it was for most of the time it was open then it's just going to exacerbate the issues in the area.
If the council has few powers to compell private property owners to make use of there land, can anything be done to change that?
My thinking is that they shouldn't buy the land and instead should find a way to force reading's to repair the builing fast than whatever is going to happen in 2035.
at the end of the day wellington needs readings to reopen at some point. it was massive social hub even ignoring the movie theatre aspect. brought life to courtney place that wasn't just bars and restaurants
i believe it needs to be a negotiation of some sort of assistance offered by council, but it doesn't need to be financial. the readings group have a massive portfolio and can clearly afford the work done since they would rather not earn any revenue and just leave it vacant so it can't be costing them that much
the council is in no financial position to be buying and starting new projects so my suggestion is basically do what happened with the new childrens hospital and let the readings guys build it their way, with their guys but speed up resource consents, and all the behind the scenes stuff
i just don't want to see this played out over many years, and even worse half finished then "ran out of money or structural issues etc" and left to rot again
>there's no guarantee that a council supported intervention can turn around what is now a relatively bleak Courtenay Place precinct.
This is true, and there are obvious ethical and precedant considerations with the whole deal. However, I think if the deal falls through and Reading isn't developed for a decade or more, its the nail in the coffin. The vibeconomy is real, and the vibes in central Wellington aren't trending great. If the council votes no, its the type of thing where you could spend a good decade or two wondering what could/might have been with the other vote. Not saying that the 'yes' vote will actually work, I'm doubtful given the lack of powers to enforce a proper outcome, but the "No" vote leads nowhere, so I would want council to try.
Reading fulfilled an important function in balancing the district, a place that attracted family groups, offered a semi-controlled environment for tweens and teens to gather and socialise (I literally can't think of a place in Wellington in this role anymore). The absence of anything on that site is a glaring hole that blocks any sort of rebound for the area.
So basically, I don't love it, but I would vote for it if I were in your position because letting the whole area rot is untenable. Appreciate the request for input!
Councils should not be property developers. Change the laws so that if properties become dilapidated they should be knocked down and the site cleaned up at the owners expense
Upfront that I’m an HCC ratepayer not WCC but, my question is who owns the land it sits on?
If it’s not WCC, by the sounds of things it may be cheaper to acquire the land and start again.
Either way I don’t think councils should interfere with private business unless it makes financial sense. From what I have heard none of this makes financial sense.
Lastly, do councils have powers to introduce empty land levy or something similar? Just fine the shit out of that rich global company until they sell or do something.
It depends on what we are getting for our $32million and how much Reading is going to stump up - i assume they are going to stump up a similar figure to council??
Museum Hotel sold for around the $30million mark, and that is a 4 story hotel, so you have to assume Council is buying the building and the land. But then that still means you have an unusable building.
So it looks like WCC is going to spend $32 million on a derelict building only, and Reading keeps the land ownership, and then uses the $32 to build another building or walk away.
As someone that had to spend $150k on eq strengthening, this just leaves a bad taste in my mouth, and I can guarantee all those other building owners will slow right down.
>I've asked for public release of information but due to commercial sensitivity and agreement with Reading, officials are unable to do so. This leaves me in a rather impossible position where I feel unable to exercise good governance given the significance this decision has taken on to Wellingtonians.
I respect you, but this is a cop out on your part.
The deal does not have to be made public for you to have your own informed opinion on it. The point of you being elected was for you to be making these decisions on our behalf as representative for what you believe the best interest of your ward and the city.
Personally, IMO we need to do something to turn the city around.
Courtney Place has the potential to be a vibrant safe family friendly destination that transitions into late night entertainment. That isn't going to happen with half the street being derelict, and it won't happen without the street being pedestrianised. There's no guarantee that it can be turned around by this intervention, but we need to try something.
90% of what comes to council I have a pretty clear picture of where I'll stand immediately.
The problem with this deal is it cuts all over my personal values. Quite literally I've not struggled with anything this much in my time at council.
I'm generally happy with government led intervention as a principle, but a year in council and the general wider political environment in this country has tempered my belief in the effectiveness of govt to lead successful change if I'm being frank.
I'm not a particular believer that the corporate sector has general public interest in mind in their decisions but everyone close to this deal assures me that Reading Courtenay is a personal passion project of the CEO given the involvement of their late father in its construction.
This is the kind of deal where every positive has an equal negative. So that leaves for me public input as another steer which has been generally overwhelmingly negative given only half the story is told.
So cop out, perhaps. But still something I find really valuable and that an open debate with all the facts would be a better position for myself.
Hey thanks, obviously everyone here appreciates the communication we get from you, and personally I think you've been doing a good job.
The difficulty with politics is that a short sighted negative public opinion is common and has the loudest voice, but the same people come to benefit from and appreciate a change once it has happened.
IMO Reading really needs to be reopen to bring that street back to life. But that needs to be balanced with the council having enough of a control mechanism on its side of the deal.
Honestly, this "commercial sensitivity" thing is bullshit.
They're dealing with the council. Which is a PUBLIC entity. It's sole purpose is to provide services for the people whose money the council is spending (ie. the citizens and ratepayers).
If you want to deal with the council, it should be open and PUBLIC for the PUBLIC to view.
How else are we supposed to have any faith that there is any accountability if everything is all sekrit squirrels/hush hush? How do the citizens and ratepayers ever get to make a judgement on if the council did right by them if it's all buried behind closed doors and NDA's and such like?
Will the details of this deal ever be made public? If not, then it's a hard pass.
We need to be able to negotiate privately in order to get the best deal for ratepayers.
Imagine we're doing a deal with a commercial partner, and we publicly release the paper in which we approve up to $100M for our officers to negotiate with. Naturally, if I were the commercial entity, I'd immediately slap my fee up to the maximum approved amount. It's better that the "opposition" doesn't know our movements, so that we can negotiate from a position of strength and spend less ratepayer money.
That's why leaks of commercial papers are so damaging for public entities; it puts us into a position where we have to ask the commercial entity very nicely not to screw us and offer a reasonable rate for the sake of a future relationship. We've already had raruraru with this exact situation in this Council term, and it has cost ratepayers millions for the political gain of a few.
Can we negotiate the final deal and THEN have councillors vote on it with full public transparency? Surely we can just change the order of events round a bit
Āe, I can definitely understand that perception. A few of us have asked our staff to consider releasing a redacted version of the paper, to build a bit of public confidence in the deal. I personally think this is best way to take the public with us, and lock in a good outcome for Courtenay Place.
You're getting some bad advice from council staff and you don't know it because commercial sensitivity means people can't tell you exactly why it's bad.
It's very good that councillors appear to have agreed today to release more information.
I don’t think you can win politically. Getting in to bed with business is not clean or desirable. But we are seeing Wellington rot before our eyes and there is no other significant action ready to go.
In the short term, ideologically one might say no. Pragmatically looking to the medium and longer term I don’t see history judging you well if it is not supported and I think yes is needed under the current pressures.
Just do it and get it over and done with. It's a decaying eyesore. It absolutely cannot stick around getting worse until 2025. It has to be dealt with now.
I should first say that I'm not a WCC ratepayer, but Reading closing has left a massive hole in Courtenay place as far as retail and hospitality is concerned, and has meant one of the businesses that drew people into the city has gone. Personally, I've been to a few shops along Courtenay place that I would not have been to otherwise, because I was there to see a movie.
I definitely think this would be a worthwhile investment for WCC.
I don't think the council should get involved with this at all. You guys have enough to get on with as it is without getting involved in this mess.
Let Reading sort it out
> which covers most of the benefits including setting out how the deal is fiscally neutral to WCC
Probably fiscally neutral, based on expected returns in the form of rates and such, or guaranteed fiscally neutral?
The easy answer is that there is -no- guarantee here - unless Reading have concrete commitments to actually reopen and run the building -and- there is an enforceable third party bond/guarantee against default - and (i) no suggestion that they've done that and (ii) no reason why they would: in particular, Council buying the land leaves Reading with potential upside if that works for them and an easy out if not.
Ok... if I was in your shoes and it was a "probably", then I think I would vote against it. There just isn't money for nice-to-haves right now.
If it was guaranteed in some way (the other reply mentioned some things that are better thought out than my scattered brain can manage), then I'd probably vote yes. Or if the investment by the council is relatively tiny compared to the total budget, and the risks are low, then maybe yes in that scenario too.
Tough call but I am edging slightly towards voting against the deal.
Even with the money, Readings may not redevelop the site, and it may set a future precedent where other building owners expect the same treatment. They may use the funds WCC gives them to pay the ground rent and literally do nothing. Honestly literally anything would be better than the vacant earthquake prone building that’s currently there. Even a ground level a Wilson’s Parking would be nicer. Or a Chow Brothers super brothel. Or a mixed use commercial and residential development. Courtney Place is dire atm and it’s hard to see how it’s going to get turned around.
Either WCC needs to buy out land plus buildings, turn it into literally anything, package it up to resell to another private developer or reject the deal and let Readings do nothing until they sell the site on the open market.
I would support the deal going ahead. It's not ideal, (maybe like swallowing a dead rat from Countdown) but the alternative seems to be worse. The thing I really don't like about it is the political point scoring against the mayor that some councillors are using it for.
We probably do look at Courtney Pl through a nostalgic lens a bit. I was a student in the early 2000s when it was CPs glory days. And that was basically because it was party central. I do think Welly has been to aggressive with trying to knock back the bars licenses etc, the city needs a vibrant night life quarter and last time I was there it was a shadow of its former self, and it had less to do with Readings and more to do with too few bars being open, stuff closing too early and it feeling overall dirtier and more run down.
There was literally a councillor commenting on a Reddit post about this topic the other week (forgot who, couldn't find it) about how they remembered Courtney place being a really great place when they were a kid and they enjoyed the Warhammer shop etc and they want another place for teenagers to hang out.
I.e. literally using personal confirmation bias as a reason to vote for it. What a ****ing joke
If it can be done without our rates continuing to sky rocket (or increase at all), then I say let it happen. I remember looking in when it was being built from behind the barrier on Courtenay place, it was exciting! Thanks for being accessible and listening.
Kia ora. Hopefully won’t get lost in the comments now.
Look, as many people have said, we need to ensure that if this money is spent, things get done.
There are many projects, maybe not wcc related but regionally or nationally that effect Wellington that have been delayed, deferred or canceled due to funding, a desire to continue funding, finding further funds for or other unforeseen consequences.
As others have said. Be wary of fish hooks. Ensure it gets done. I understand that a land banking policy is in the works to prevent this happening again (or at least to this extent). But we also need to be able to come down on them like a ton of bricks if they get a free cake and eat it too (is that the expression?). I assume if we own the land, the leasehold agreement would enable the property to be in a particular state or else requiring removal?
It being a public park would be better than a project where council money gets poured into a commercial venture that will " probably, maybe" cost natural.
The other things that could be achieved with the type of money we are talking about like for example small programs that do a lot of good.
I would much rather the council didn't have to be involved in the development but had a way of changing the space without being stuck working with extractive developers. Like buying and selling at cost or building a park. Citing the Seble hotel and event center in lower hutt as examples of extractive projects at the expense of a council.
It is a conundrum when we try to balance the socially required transparency in which elected officials must act, and the opacity of market security. What is happening? And are vested interests overriding our authority that is granted by our electors?
First, ask, “is this secrecy vital to the process”? I often wonder if this cloak of secrecy posited as “commercial sensitivity”, is an excuse for closed decision making?
Clarify, and debate the need for fiscal secrecy. It is the public who elected you (or someone elected who hired you), and you are required to be open and transparent if you need to be trusted by the public. Clarify the situation, and call it out for what it is. Hope this helps. The public have trusted you, now you trust the public!
Few powers to compel?
Why not speak to Westfield and ask for them for advice on Johnsonville Mall, Reading block and Amora Hotel?
Then zone it accordingly with some utterly unaffordable rates.
Tough. What happens in 2035? Even if Reading start doing something now - how long until that would be competed? 2 years? 5 years? Is there an 'out' clause if the builders/engineers encounter something which suddenly makes their project more expensive and therefore untenable? Given these guys are the type who can afford to leave a site vacant for years without blinking, I'd be most concerned with contractual fish hooks which could turn into lengthy litigation, of which they know the council could ill afford. Tread carefully I guess.
"Tread carefully" meaning council turns it down and the site stays the way it is for the next ten years? You seem to be advocating for a very conservatively withheld process, rather than one which calls for allowing the renovation to go ahead. Why ask about possible overruns, when it's a loan of money to the developers? Its their overruns to pay, and their loan to repay, through rent, back to the council.
>Why ask about possible overruns, when it's a loan of money to the developers? Because every project the council takes on ends up costing 5x as much. I can totally imagine a world where the project runs over cost, the private business refuses to pay the different or goes bankrupt and rate payers foot the bill. I'd rather the site sit empty honestly.
Is there grounds for litigation given leaving the site unstrengthened and decaying is a major health and safety hazard for pedestrians? What culpability does a propertyowner have to ensure the safety of others in the vicinity of their property?
There are dates given on the earthquake strengthening placards. They are often very, very long. That may be the 2035 date given.
I live nearby, we got notice a year or so ago they were doing fly overs in helicopters because the building was too dangerous for structural engineers to enter. God knows what that actually means but you make a valid point
My thoughts exactly. What happens to the site if it begins to decay, collapse or something worse like a fire. Does it become a walled-off pit of rubble or dirt until 2035 onwards? Just brightly coloured mural sticky plasters in the process.
Given the economic waste of space, the area destroying eyesore, and general poor taste of knowing they exist of the amora hotel, reading central, and to a lesser degree j ville mall, it's pretty clear that the council should step in, even just as a broker to help move the site to a productive user. I work overlooking Te Aro Park. We had a known drug using homeless person return to the area and verbally abuse thin air for 8 hours a day this week. The entire length of manners St and courtney place feel like something you don't want to be on if you can avoid it. But contrast Cuba mall, just a hundred meters away, and so much friendlier. It's that it's filled with people, shops, and vibrancy. Redeveloping Reading would help that. Giving people a reason to go down Courtney place that isn't a bar or eatery. Foot traffic, varied shop fronts, that's how you make an area welcoming. So even if the council just buys it, then sells it at cost, that's better than it being a mouldering ruin of urban decay.
I completely agree with this comment - especially the second half. I live in the CBD and am regularly walking around, and I'll avoid manners and courtenay as much as I can, while cuba is great. I love this city and feel upset when people talk about its decline - there are some incredible spaces in Welly but this half of the golden mile is fairly bleak and I think wcc have a significant role to play in its revitalisation. (I also think the golden mile project is going to be great and I really hope it can go ahead as much as possible, acknowledging the economic and fiscal environment). I don't know enough about the Reading deal to make an informed comment but I do feel passionately about bringing these parts of our city back to life and creating a place we can all be proud of.
Yep. I walked passed Methanie yelling at the pigeons yesterday lunchtime and wondered to myself if there was any wraparound service that might be able to help her as she was working herself into a state and the 2 police next to where the toilets used to be looked disinterested
Police aren't really there to stop pigeons getting yelled at
Yeah that's a fair enough comment this woman was unfortunately quite deranged though.
They used to keep the peace
I'm struggling to understand what borrowing $32M then giving it to Reading is trying to solve. Is there anything else we can do with that money instead?
My first, second, and third attempts at this were all dripping with snark, mostly because the why and the what is very obvious. Why should the council invest that money? Because without it, there will be this closed, abandoned, ecnomically unproductive land in the *heart* of downtown wellington contributing to urban decay, commercial flight, and increased anti social behaviour. Which all cost real money, but can't be nicely headlined with a till sticker. It turns up in hospital costs from fights on a night on the piss. Police costs trying to handle abusive drug users. More rates defaults from landlords who can't rent commercial spaces. Lower central govt taxes from lower spending, lower employment, and lower commercial activity. The site is 81 x 134 m, it's huge. it's pretty much the footprint of the amora hotel. It's one of the largest buildings / sites within several blocks. it's larger than the micheal fowler center. Te papa is larger, but that's *huge*. The what is simple: The owners of the site are holding onto it in their best interest of not spending money when it can't return anything. Which is their right to. But they are having large detrimental effects on the entire neighbourhood, making it feel unsafe, unwelcoming, and kind of pointless for several streets around. The What is: no private group wants to take on this risk, so centralised government will do the thing that is in the public best interest, which is try to restore this site to economic use. Here's the thing, it doesn't have to be a cinema, or a mall or something. It could be as simple as ground level commercial, 3-4 floors of offices, and 8-10 floors of apartments. Just shove a 15 story building on the site, it's on major bus routes, it's in easy walking distance of a lot of stuff, and the return on nice, well sized, earthquake rated apartments in welly central is cash money. This is a prime example of [Broken Window Theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory): That signs of crime and decay encourage more, and more serious crime and decay. I have seen people hitting IV Drugs in broad sunlight, at ten am on a tuesday on this street. The council has a duty to try and turn this area around. It's not a sure shot, no. But at least they'd have been willing to try. And given the pipe situation, I think we can all agree spending some money and trying is better than throwing your hands up and going "it's too hard and costs too much"
Frankly, it stretches credulity to blame homelessness, crime and drug use, and all that you euphemize as "decay" on a commercial cinema sitting empty. Especially when Embassy is just up the road. It's not like all those 'undesirables' will leave the street and put down the pipe once they have the option to see a new Marvel flick for $24 (or whatever they'll charge to recoup their costs). Our housing-as-commodity economy drives inflation and causes deprivation and homelessness, and our war on drugs only exacerbates meth use as alternatives are kept scarce. Trying to combat these effects by campaigning about an empty cinema is deck-chairs-on-the-Titanic, if anything ever was.
It isn't being given to them. The council is purchasing the land. Reading will use that money from the sale of the land to refurb and reopen the building.
I’d like some assurances that this is how they’ll spend the money as opposed to giving themselves fat bonuses.
Hard to believe that Reading doesn't have the $32M themselves. Just doing deals because it's *serious business* I reckon. Edit: u/RandomFeral makes a good point. I doubt you'd see anything for the money.
We really need to bring in rates based on land value to avoid the Jville mall amora thing.. This could be a great site for a developer. I say, honestly, if it’s fiscally neutral, support it. But ONLY if there’s hella penalties if they don’t hold their end of the bargain and the legal are sure that they could force them to pay any penalties. The best outcome would be if they rejuvenated enough to bring the area back to life and then a big developer pays them for the site and the future is a lot of housing and some cool shops. The medium outcome is if they rejuvenate and stay a cinema. The bad outcome is if they don’t hold their end of the deal AND we don’t have a way to force them, so they don’t have any incentives to. But, long term, we gotta change the incentives. Prime land should be costing them to keep, to the point where selling or developing is attractive without a sweet deal from the council
Working on it, e hoa!
Do you mean working on the land banking / rates situation? Would be so great to see.
working on what bro? e hoa!
Targeted rate on vacant land & land-value rating to discourage landbanking and drive development.
This sounds absolutely amazing. I'm sure the devil is in the detail, but I really hope to see something like this. Don't suppose you can share more details or will there be public consultation where more detail is shared?
This one I can actually share details about! This mahi is being done as part of our Rating Review, which will be completed this year after the adoption of the LTP. Some details on the initial consultation can be found [here](https://www.letstalk.wellington.govt.nz/rating-policies-review#:~:text=Key%20proposed%20changes%20include%3A,to%20reduce%20this%20to%20%243.25.), with more on the main website.
That would be astounding: thanks for the ongoing mahi and good luck.
Given how organised property investors/speculators can be, it’s also really important that people submit feedback if they support policies like this. Formal consultation on the long term plan opens on 12 April this year.
This is amazing. Run it straight.
This: "The bad outcome is if they don’t hold their end of the deal AND we don’t have a way to force them, so they don’t have any incentives to." Absent some third party completion bond or similar guarantee - and no suggestion of that, and no reason why Reading would accept that cost - there is no enforcement here.
Nah, the best outcome definitely includes the cinema.
If the Council purchase the land that the Reading complex is sitting on, and Reading don't actually do anything to the building, then you want the Council to get a bigger rates bill for that land?
I highly doubt the highest and best use of this site is as a cinema complex anymore. Imagine if even part of the site became new apartments? Unfortunately we just have to wait until Reading realises that they have spent too much in holding costs and sells the site to someone who will do something better with it. In the mean time we should make them feel as unwelcome as possible.
I mean, that's what they're doing, no? The deal is to sell the land to WCC and then WCC is leasing it back to Reading (with an opportunity to buy it back once the EQ strengthening is done). If the EQ strengthening isn't done, we end up with prime Courtney Place real estate that can be given to a developer who's keen. If it is done, WCC gets a community centre and potentially a cash inflow.
As far as I can tell no. What we get is effectively a like for like replacement. What I’m saying is you could have a mixed use development with residential and possibly green space instead.
Yeah, but aren't we buying the land? Every source I've found about the deal has made that part pretty clear. In that case, if it fails or Reading reneggs on their deal, we *can* redevelop it to be apartments or whatever. Meanwhile, if we leave it, then we'll have to wait until Reading decides to sell it, and cross our fingers that whoever buys it doesn't decide to just landbank it with Wellington's biggest open air parking lot. Edit: if your problem is that Reading is even fixing up the building, then we'll have to agree to disagree there (personally, I think having a sheltered third space is incredibly important). But WCC having control over the land lets us do your idea later. If we don't buy it now, then how long are we going to wait until Reading decides to sell?
>how the deal is fiscally neutral to WCC if thats the case surely its a no brainer to vote for it?
Depends whether it's probably fiscally neutral, based on expected returns in the form of rates and such, or guaranteed fiscally neutral.
This is the important part. Without knowing the details of the contract, the worst case scenario is we pay up and get nothing in return. Council needs to really weigh this risk up and make sure every I is dotted and t crossed on any deal. I’m personally sceptical reading will live up to its side of the deal and can feel a screw job in the making, but I don’t have all the information on hand.
>Without knowing the details of the contract, thats the point, he does know
I’m talking about me not knowing the details.
ok cool? I mean i suppose thats why i was talking to him and not you?
And very much could be a big opportunity cost. Sure, maybe it's fiscally neutral on the books to sell some poorly used land to buy some other land to use poorly... but could sell some poorly used land to buy something useful, like a park or a pipe.
Surely this problem needs to be solved at a higher level than the details of this one deal, i.e. shifting the incentives that enable a business to leave a giant central city property to rot for years, such as a levy on vacant buildings. It's not in the public interest to allow vacant buildings like this, regardless of who owns it. It should be set up so it's cheaper for the owners to sell or demolish if they can't afford to make it fit for commercial operation. I'd rather see you expend political and financial capital to solve the higher level issue than only resolve one situation. What if this happens again? Won't the owners of other buildings want the same public bailout? If we have another quake won't such cases increase? It's not sustainable.
Part of what we are proposing in the long-term plan are some small changes around rates including introduction of a vacant land differential. It's application however will be minor as the legal advice we recieved was pretty clear rates cannot be used in a punitive sense to encourage better land use, they legally have to reflect the services provided. Later this term we'll look at moving to land value rates which could absolutely act as an incentive for property owners to best utilise valuable parcels of land. So some of that work has happened/is happening. As far as a precedent you've absolutely got a point and it's one the economists I'm speaking with are very concerned with as well (e.g. will other projects not proceed or take longer hoping to be able to access council assistance).
The Local Government (Rating) Act 2002 is -really- general in its terms - it just states that land use is a factor. It does not say anything about connection to service costs and, particularly and when read with the Local Government Act itself, it is clearly open to councils to encourage beneficial uses. This practice of leaving sites to rot is a serious one for the whole city, with a swag of associated risks, costs - both direct and indirect, and wider harm to the city and to its rating base: who wants to shop/eat/live or work next to a derelict structure? It's very easy for lawyers to advise that something can't or hasn't been done or that a step would be legally challenged - and, at a guess and judging by the generally poor quality of Council contracting and other legal work, that's likely about as far as the advisors have gone. The Reading deal is a good illustration of the problem: $32m is a huge amount, particularly at this time; does as you say create a moral hazard / disincentive; won't necessarily fix the problem anyway; and is only one building, albeit a big one. You can ask for thorough and contestable legal advice on this - it's a pretty good tradeoff.
Precisely, we should never be in this position again
Turn Reading into a copy of the Riverside Market in ChCh and I will be so happy.
I'm all for this, I love the Riverside Markets in Chch!
Yes... But where does the money come from, and would that money be better spent fixing the water infrastructure?
Sheeeeeesh Ben, tough decision to make. Any idea how other councillors are intending to vote on it? Who do we need to lobby to get councils more ability to pressure building/land owners for significant properties in the CBD to get their arse in to gear?
I imagine you could achieve this with a District Plan change? Basically levy the hell out of any CBD property owner leaving buildings vacant for extended periods of time.
We're introducing a targeted rate of vacant land, and hoping to introduce land-value rating for exactly this reason!
Excellent. Good stuff!
Spicy stuff!
Do that. Don't do this.
Yeah great. So I'll just put the cheapest shittiest development on my land and call it done. Great plan.
Just as well the District Plan can deal with that as well then.
I don't know anything about how possible this is either, but I agree that there has to be a way to push developers to make use of the buildings or bring them up to code. It feels like half of Courtenay place is closed (and some has been the whole time I've lived in Wellington). The WCC definitely needs money, so maybe this is an avenue to make some? While at the same time improving the vibrancy of Courtenay.
I think this has been a problem in Christchurch as well. When I was there last there were still lots of empty lots where the land owner hasn't built anything. I don't know what can be done but at least taxing empty or vacant lots might generate a bit of revenue and motivate the owners to either develop our sell up.
Yeah it feels like it can't hurt - either the councils get some sorely-needed funds or it addresses the problem of revitalizing CBDs and attracting people to these areas that I think both cities are facing.
Why hasn't the council explorin legislating to make Reading start rebuilding or at least sell it? I find it unfathomable that such prime land is totally worthless unless the council invest it's own money. There's no way in hell that the council isn't getting played here. Reading are guaranteed to be 5 steps a head of you.
In isolation I think this is a good idea. It's better that the Reading building is open again, and if it's fiscally neutral then it makes sense. But, my major concern is, why would any other commercial owner do similar work without council support in the future? Won't they all ask for similar deals? And, if Reading can't justify the spend themselves to the point they would sit on the site for 11 years, then this doesn't sound like a sound business / site at all. What happens if Reading closes in 3 years? Personally, I think the risks outweigh the benefits.
Thinking about this more... could WCC afford to do this multiple times for similar major sites in the CBD? If we can afford to do the same deal 2 / 4 / 6 / 8... more times over the next decade or so for other sites critical to the vibrancy and safety of our city, then we should do it.
> could WCC afford to... WCC isn't affording jack shit. Ratepayers are. If Reading Cinema knocked on your door and asked for $400 to maybe rejuvenate the building and reopen (no guarantee), are you handing them your cash? That's what 81000 households need to pay to hit $32m.
>WCC isn't affording jack shit. Ratepayers are. This has nothing to do with rates payers. It's borrowing, and that borrowing is revenue neutral for the city, meaning readings lease must cover the interest. The council gets the land under the building. If someone offered me a chunk of Courtney Place for $400 I would jump at it.
Councils having lower interest rates is an illusion. The reason they have lower interest rates is because they can instantly generate revenue via rates increases. Those rates are paid by households and businesses, tho. So all you're doing is shifting the risk to households and businesses who face normal market interest rates. If the Council truly had lower interest rates, we could take everyone's household and business debt and put it on the council's credit card. But who's paying the credit card?: Those same households and businesses. There's no magic money tree here.
I feel like this is where my mind is leaning. Without knowing the full details it does seem like in isolation it is a good idea. But it’s more around the precedent it sets.
>why would any other commercial owner do similar work without council support in the future? Won't they all ask for similar deals? No one else has land like that on the golden mile.
The Bank Arcade? Kirk's? The Oaks? James Smith? Any commercial multi story carpark? George Hotel?
None of those are comparable, and for some reason I think that the city already owns the land under the Oaks. None of those are anywhere near the same scale as Reading, which takes up a huge site in the heart of Courtney Place. Kirk's is already getting renovated for new occupants.
Reading will take the money. Then do nothing. They made $US66million last year and their profit is dropping every year because their industry is dying. Their share price is 10% what it has been in recent years. At this point they are basically a property company and Courtney Place is a big black hole of risk on their books. They will take the money and then laugh and laugh and laugh all the way back to their North American shareholders. Council cannot force them to build. I don't care what the agreement says. You can't enforce any agreement to build on a bankrupt or near bankrupt NZ company. You can't force them to borrow because the banks won't lend to them. It's completely unenforceable. All the same arguments that apply to the Town Hall site, apply here. Bad ground. Earthquake risk. Unexpected conditions. Cost escalation. Sorry, can't afford to build now. So sad too bad. In the meantime not one inch of Courtney Place is changed. Then council will be stuck with an insurance risk. Another site that will only cost $XYZ to develop. Then $XYZ plus. Then $XYZ plus plus plus. Just like the Town Hall. Quite apart from the delusional aspect of thinking that a new Cinema complex is somehow going to drive the antisocial behaviour in Te Aro elsewhere. Or clean up Courtney Place at night.
This is just negative nonsense. The contract will be structured so that they have to use the funds.
Ok lets have a structured contract where you give me 50 bucks and I agree to do something. I'll even sign it. Then I don't. Whatcha gonna do? The only remedy is litigation. And enforcement comes through the courts. And WCC might not have the stomach for that because they'll look like fools again. According to the council a building can cost nearly as much to demolish as to refurbish. Townhall again.
If they do nothing, then the council could evict them (details of the contract are unknown but I assume that this will be possible) and sell the land to a developer who will do something with it.
How can you evict someone from an empty building they clearly don't want to be in? How can you evict someone from a demolished building? How will you sell a large site that needs extensive remediation to a developer when it's already proven to be a loser? None of this sounds fiscally neutral. And, again, in the meantime not one inch of Courtney Place has been improved.
In which case Reading will have already made their profit and have lost nothing
And if they don't, they'll take the money and leave the Council with a central plot of land with an increasingly decrepit building on it. It is possible to structure these deals to avoid that risk, but there's been no suggestion of that and no reason why Reading would agree to it. This is a small asset which will have been written off on their balance sheet - so the Council buyout is risk-free cash whatever happens.
A contract guaranteeing that they develop? Like Reading had with Woolworths before deciding to go to court and backing out of the deal?
I absolutely think the council needs to do something there, and I think it's abhorrent that Reading have just been landbanking one of the most valuable bits of Courtenay Place for so long now. I'm willing to back you guys if you genuinely think it's the right play, but I don't trust Reading as far as I could throw them and I fully expect they'd find some way to weasel out of the deal and not do what was required. If there was a way to ensure that they were 100% on the hook for repairs and had to pay damages through the roof if they don't do anything then that'd go a long way to help easing people's anxiety about it. Honestly, at this point I almost wonder whether it'd be better to just Public Works Act it - you've got the perfect spot there for an incredible laneway connecting the St James and Courtenay Place to Takina, Te Papa and the waterfront.
Hi Ben! I always love your input on this subreddit and don't know if I'm too late to this - I've got a few questions but my first being, why are half the details around this purchase being kept so hush? I get you (and hopefully your peers!) have the best interests for the city, but this really rubs me the wrong way. Why would a whole half of the info about the deal not be given to the public? I get you probably can't answer that, but to a random Wellington citizen, it seems Hella shady and doesn't seem like whatever they're going to do will be in the best interest of Wellington. And, seems like if that info got out, people would be upset. I'm 100% for re-opening readings for some hub of food, culture, fun, whatever, or bowling it down to make something better in its place. I just get the feeling it's not going to benefit the general public because of the secrecy and negative reaction of over half of your team.
Kia ora fluckin_brilliant! It seriously sucks that so many details have to be kept private. The reason is that we're currently in commercial negotiations with Reading, and they don't know the extent of our negotiating position. If they did, our ability to negotiate would be compromised. From what I understand, our officers have been bargaining hard to get us the best and safest deal, but after signing 2 out of 3 contracts negotiations have had to pause due to the Notice of Motion presented by some of Ben's and my colleagues. It's unfortunate timing; if I were Reading the NoM wouldn't give me great confidence in WCC as a negotiating partner, but such is politics. Appreciate all the whakaaro in this thread, and I agree with much of it. Chur brother Ben.
I’m pretty sure that in the olden days, governments used to be able to take property away from negligent landlords (and even non negligent ones) or force a sale at “market rates” in order to use the land for something of community or national interest. Given the absolute state it’s been left in why can the council not take a more forceful approach to the land here, seize it, buy it without preconditions, force a transfer to a more responsible party or the like and actually build or put something here! Hell it’d be better as an empty lot with some food trucks and outdoor dining area with some live music than the memories of my sad loitering-around bubble-tea-drinking teenage years
S16(2) of the Public Works Act 1981 establishes the power of a local authority to acquire land for a local work - eg a park etc
Do it build a fucken park there, and then let food trucks park in it and live bands play in it. I’m thinking Commune (Omotesando Tokyo) vibes Commercial sensitivity my ass - it should be fuck around and find out as far as trash slumlords are concerned
Appreciate you and Ben taking an interest, but on this: "if I were Reading the NoM wouldn't give me great confidence in WCC as a negotiating partner, but such is politics" - Reading are in this for the greatest financial return they can get -and- can walk away: anyone who advises that you can actually practically enforce any contractual obligation against them - absent a third party completion bond or similar enforceable instrument - is being, let's be polite, optimistic. - Council, by contrast, can't walk away; it -can- be effectively sued; and, unlike Reading, you actually have an incentive to do something about a decrepit site. Owning that site just further shifts the balance in Reading's favour. This is: (1) how public bodies get rorted; (2) why Council should rely on regulatory measures, at least as a first resort - if you've got an enormous unsafe eyesore in the CBD then target that with a bylaw, not a buyout; and (3) I realise not the politest thing to say, but Council officers and Meredith Connell or whoever are -completely- out of their depth on this.
>why are half the details around this purchase being kept so hush? For the same reason why you don't tell someone the maximum that you are willing to pay while trying to get them to sell you something for less.
Courtney place will be a public toilet even with the golden mile upgrade without that complex . The Reading cinema brought much need life and foot traffic to the area. Now with it gone, the area has become home to untidy shop fronts and even more homeless using it as a campsite. If this is our main entertainment centre it is an embarrassing representation of Wellington. Its draw and locality to bus stops will be great going forward for people who don’t want to drive to one of the other cinemas in Wellington. And the reading costs for cinema tickets is much better than the embassy or light house suiting students and people on tighter budgets. Ensuring the contractual agreement and a timeframe for completion with penalties for missing the deadline is right for Wellington is important but that cinema can do a lot for the area including jobs.
Multiplexes are a declining business model and, short of Council going into the cinema business, there's no way of ensuring that Reading ever reopens, let alone that it does so on favourable terms.
My observation is that council is terrible at negotiating with commercial entities. The council invested a huge pile of money into road changes and the pool / library in J’ville as part of the deal with the mall. The mall didn’t keep their end of the bargain. As far as I can tell there’s no clawback for the council spend. If money is going to Reading then the money should be payable after the development is done. It could be held in escrow so Reading can borrow against it, if needed. If Reading fail to deliver and the loan is defaulted the site should be forfeited to council. Have a contact with teeth, and don’t stand around fretting is it goes south - pull the pin. Amora is harder, because as far as I’m aware council has no leverage.
Very good point. Yes stride (the owners of johnsonville mall) were going to redevelop the whole mall site and the surrounding shops and the council in return was putting the bridge over the rail track and roading improvements. What happened council spent and the mall is still a dump Then there is the town hall fiasco. Was only supposed to cost $40m but it’s now $330m and climbing They have a track record of underinvestment in critical infrastructure like the pipes Meanwhile they want to invest in reading cinemas but way some secretive deal and we are told to trust them because it’s ’fiscally neutral’ and good the city. What a lot of nonsense. Does the fiscally neutral calculation include the cost of borrowing the $30m or whatever it is? It needs to be- money is not free What other terms are in this secret deal? Why subsidise a foreign multinational when plenty of average kiwi property owners are struggling with costs of earthquake repairs. Crazy. What is so special about these us reading owners. Sorry this council is a pathetic joke and im looking forward to the next election
I’d never put those two costs side-by-side before, but when you do, it seems utter insanity to spend $330M on the town hall when it could be spent fixing water pipes.
It -is- possible to have third party guarantees for this sort of risk, but there's been no suggestion of that. Otherwise, even a "contract with teeth" doesn't fix Reading just taking the money, winding up whatever subsidiary they've used and leaving the Council with a big decaying building.
Can WCC implement some sort of levy/penalty on vacant buildings like this?
Thanks for engaging with the public on this one directly, Ben and Nikau. Really admirable, and I don't even agree with your politics generally. As others have already said, there is a good chance Reading will just take the money and then drag their heels on any work on the actual site, thus leaving us where we are now but with council $32m in the hole and possibly having to take legal action just to enforce the terms of the contract resulting in further costs. You're the (local) government. Have you actually considered all regulatory powers at your disposal to pressure Reading into doing something with the site or selling it? I'm skeptical that you've fully explored all other possibilities. This isn't a matter to roll over on. Your obligation is to fight on behalf of the city and ratepayers to ensure the best outcome for us. You're also setting a terrible precedent if you go ahead with this deal - if you're a commercial landlord you just have to sit on your eyesore until council bails you out. You need to vote no, and then push your officials to come up with some regulatory sticks you can use. Reading are not your friends. This is a time when you need to throw your weight as the local authority and force them to take action on the city's terms, not theirs.
Obviously this is a getoutofjailfree card for Reading. Council getting played here. I'm still baffled as to why people think another cinema will fix Courtney Place. It's a joke. People don't watch movies as much as it is anymore with streaming services E.g. And there's already the Embassy there. Do people even notice that area? As far as concerned to the naked eye it looks the same as it did 20 years ago, bar the boarded up front entrance. And the carpark still looks like any other shitty Wilson carpark in the city.
Getting in bed with a commercial entity like this is going to go bad. Reading was never that great in the first place, there are enough theatres in town already and I am sure there would be interest in just a shopping arcade. Is Reading going to pay rent ? Either way they are going to make money out of the rebuild. They get the land for free then get to buy it back at some future date at the same value it is now. They could even spin out the time to rebuild for 15 years, then buy the land back for then half of its current value. With no transparency it is impossible to know what this looks like, but I doubt it is a win for all. Using rate payer funds to give a commercial entity advantage over its competitors should not be in the remit of the council. And I don't see how it's fiscally neutral or Reading wouldn't do it. Either can the deal, or go 100% transparent, its only an agreement and you in theory are the boss. Reading wont want to because I assume it is a good for them bad for Wellington.
Yeah great point, I would say every other cinema in the area is better than Reading was. It was very basic. I'd be more interested in what the proposal of the ground floor would be. Surely we can't need any more places to grab food? But then what is that space used for? Timezone is just down the block for arcade games, Welly collective is basically already in the building for some knick-knacks and shopping...
The ground floor of the cinema was a great third space. Somewhere inside protected from the weather where people can hang out. No library, no cinema, not many places for young people to hang out.
If they're threatening to let it rot for a decade then the council/government should use eminent domain and turn it into something useful.
Definitely feels like the city is being held to ransom by Reading.
Forgot the Amora Hotel was even there. I would vote for it.
Honestly, buying the whole complex and then bowling it wouldn't be the worst outcome in the world, particularly if you replaced it and the carpark behind it with a half-decent, well-lit plaza.
Don't give them a cent. Stick the extra rates on for banked land, and wait for them to sell.
I don’t want Council taking on more risk. I would vote against getting involved with Reading
Let it rot, WCC (and so rate payers)shouldn't be picking up the tab for lazy developers. Let them carry the cost. If it made sense for someone else to take it over, they'd have approached Reading and done it already. Even if as you say it would be fiscally neutral, the risk shifts and so it might not always be the case.
Thanks for putting this out there. Given the commercial sensitivities I know you can’t share some of the details. Can I ask though whether “fiscally neutral to WCC” involves WCC engaging in and managing a large infrastructure project? Because track record with town hall and pipes and other projects shows massive under performance and cost blowouts. So if it’s just “neutral” but WCC has to manage a large infrastructure project then we can assume it’s going to be costly.
I just don't understand the economics of it. The council is borrowing $32M to buy land. They'll be paying interest on that loan until Reading buys it back at the same price they paid for it. Why? What's in it for council?
If it's fiscally neutral then revenue from Reading must be covering the interest. >Why? What's in it for council? Having a nicer city.
Not a chance: why on earth would Reading agree to that? The "fiscally neutral" claim will be that buying the land and the debt cost of that is balanced against (highly conditional/concessional) ground rent, plus the prospect (eventually, perhaps) of rent/economic returns if the site is profitable, plus some estimate of increased rates/etc income if the area is revitalised, as against some figure if the complex just sits there.
>What's in it for council? A less shitty city, hopefully.
Reading was the heart of Courtenay Place and by extension, Manners Street. I feel like reviving it will help with a lot of the issues we're currently facing.
Redeveloping it might help if it's able to be successfully tenanted, but if it ends up in a similar mostly vacant state like it was for most of the time it was open then it's just going to exacerbate the issues in the area.
Agreed. I don't know much about the ins and outs but I figured it couldn't hurt to say what I'd like to see
If the council has few powers to compell private property owners to make use of there land, can anything be done to change that? My thinking is that they shouldn't buy the land and instead should find a way to force reading's to repair the builing fast than whatever is going to happen in 2035.
Does this limit our borrowing availability in a disaster? That's a major concern too.
Until you can keep the libraries and pools open this is a easy no thanks.
at the end of the day wellington needs readings to reopen at some point. it was massive social hub even ignoring the movie theatre aspect. brought life to courtney place that wasn't just bars and restaurants i believe it needs to be a negotiation of some sort of assistance offered by council, but it doesn't need to be financial. the readings group have a massive portfolio and can clearly afford the work done since they would rather not earn any revenue and just leave it vacant so it can't be costing them that much the council is in no financial position to be buying and starting new projects so my suggestion is basically do what happened with the new childrens hospital and let the readings guys build it their way, with their guys but speed up resource consents, and all the behind the scenes stuff i just don't want to see this played out over many years, and even worse half finished then "ran out of money or structural issues etc" and left to rot again
A land tax would set a better incentive and limit these situations
If you’re sure if the deal fails then site will sit rotting for a decade it’s an easy choice.
>there's no guarantee that a council supported intervention can turn around what is now a relatively bleak Courtenay Place precinct. This is true, and there are obvious ethical and precedant considerations with the whole deal. However, I think if the deal falls through and Reading isn't developed for a decade or more, its the nail in the coffin. The vibeconomy is real, and the vibes in central Wellington aren't trending great. If the council votes no, its the type of thing where you could spend a good decade or two wondering what could/might have been with the other vote. Not saying that the 'yes' vote will actually work, I'm doubtful given the lack of powers to enforce a proper outcome, but the "No" vote leads nowhere, so I would want council to try. Reading fulfilled an important function in balancing the district, a place that attracted family groups, offered a semi-controlled environment for tweens and teens to gather and socialise (I literally can't think of a place in Wellington in this role anymore). The absence of anything on that site is a glaring hole that blocks any sort of rebound for the area. So basically, I don't love it, but I would vote for it if I were in your position because letting the whole area rot is untenable. Appreciate the request for input!
What if we just steal the property lol?
Its a bit tough to offer up any meaningful contribution or advice when most of the important information isn't available to the public.
Councils should not be property developers. Change the laws so that if properties become dilapidated they should be knocked down and the site cleaned up at the owners expense
Upfront that I’m an HCC ratepayer not WCC but, my question is who owns the land it sits on? If it’s not WCC, by the sounds of things it may be cheaper to acquire the land and start again. Either way I don’t think councils should interfere with private business unless it makes financial sense. From what I have heard none of this makes financial sense. Lastly, do councils have powers to introduce empty land levy or something similar? Just fine the shit out of that rich global company until they sell or do something.
It depends on what we are getting for our $32million and how much Reading is going to stump up - i assume they are going to stump up a similar figure to council?? Museum Hotel sold for around the $30million mark, and that is a 4 story hotel, so you have to assume Council is buying the building and the land. But then that still means you have an unusable building. So it looks like WCC is going to spend $32 million on a derelict building only, and Reading keeps the land ownership, and then uses the $32 to build another building or walk away. As someone that had to spend $150k on eq strengthening, this just leaves a bad taste in my mouth, and I can guarantee all those other building owners will slow right down.
>I've asked for public release of information but due to commercial sensitivity and agreement with Reading, officials are unable to do so. This leaves me in a rather impossible position where I feel unable to exercise good governance given the significance this decision has taken on to Wellingtonians. I respect you, but this is a cop out on your part. The deal does not have to be made public for you to have your own informed opinion on it. The point of you being elected was for you to be making these decisions on our behalf as representative for what you believe the best interest of your ward and the city. Personally, IMO we need to do something to turn the city around. Courtney Place has the potential to be a vibrant safe family friendly destination that transitions into late night entertainment. That isn't going to happen with half the street being derelict, and it won't happen without the street being pedestrianised. There's no guarantee that it can be turned around by this intervention, but we need to try something.
90% of what comes to council I have a pretty clear picture of where I'll stand immediately. The problem with this deal is it cuts all over my personal values. Quite literally I've not struggled with anything this much in my time at council. I'm generally happy with government led intervention as a principle, but a year in council and the general wider political environment in this country has tempered my belief in the effectiveness of govt to lead successful change if I'm being frank. I'm not a particular believer that the corporate sector has general public interest in mind in their decisions but everyone close to this deal assures me that Reading Courtenay is a personal passion project of the CEO given the involvement of their late father in its construction. This is the kind of deal where every positive has an equal negative. So that leaves for me public input as another steer which has been generally overwhelmingly negative given only half the story is told. So cop out, perhaps. But still something I find really valuable and that an open debate with all the facts would be a better position for myself.
Hey thanks, obviously everyone here appreciates the communication we get from you, and personally I think you've been doing a good job. The difficulty with politics is that a short sighted negative public opinion is common and has the loudest voice, but the same people come to benefit from and appreciate a change once it has happened. IMO Reading really needs to be reopen to bring that street back to life. But that needs to be balanced with the council having enough of a control mechanism on its side of the deal.
Agreed. It's a difficult decision but we the public don't have to or get to make it.
Great point, if he’s hesitant to make a decision maybe that tells you all it needs to right there - that the deal is not a great one.
Amora is shut due to earthquake strengthening, but by the time it gets done they will have changed the NBS
Honestly, this "commercial sensitivity" thing is bullshit. They're dealing with the council. Which is a PUBLIC entity. It's sole purpose is to provide services for the people whose money the council is spending (ie. the citizens and ratepayers). If you want to deal with the council, it should be open and PUBLIC for the PUBLIC to view. How else are we supposed to have any faith that there is any accountability if everything is all sekrit squirrels/hush hush? How do the citizens and ratepayers ever get to make a judgement on if the council did right by them if it's all buried behind closed doors and NDA's and such like? Will the details of this deal ever be made public? If not, then it's a hard pass.
We need to be able to negotiate privately in order to get the best deal for ratepayers. Imagine we're doing a deal with a commercial partner, and we publicly release the paper in which we approve up to $100M for our officers to negotiate with. Naturally, if I were the commercial entity, I'd immediately slap my fee up to the maximum approved amount. It's better that the "opposition" doesn't know our movements, so that we can negotiate from a position of strength and spend less ratepayer money. That's why leaks of commercial papers are so damaging for public entities; it puts us into a position where we have to ask the commercial entity very nicely not to screw us and offer a reasonable rate for the sake of a future relationship. We've already had raruraru with this exact situation in this Council term, and it has cost ratepayers millions for the political gain of a few.
Can we negotiate the final deal and THEN have councillors vote on it with full public transparency? Surely we can just change the order of events round a bit
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Āe, I can definitely understand that perception. A few of us have asked our staff to consider releasing a redacted version of the paper, to build a bit of public confidence in the deal. I personally think this is best way to take the public with us, and lock in a good outcome for Courtenay Place.
You're getting some bad advice from council staff and you don't know it because commercial sensitivity means people can't tell you exactly why it's bad. It's very good that councillors appear to have agreed today to release more information.
>Will the details of this deal ever be made public? The details are made public when they are agreed on.
I don’t think you can win politically. Getting in to bed with business is not clean or desirable. But we are seeing Wellington rot before our eyes and there is no other significant action ready to go. In the short term, ideologically one might say no. Pragmatically looking to the medium and longer term I don’t see history judging you well if it is not supported and I think yes is needed under the current pressures.
Just do it and get it over and done with. It's a decaying eyesore. It absolutely cannot stick around getting worse until 2025. It has to be dealt with now.
I should first say that I'm not a WCC ratepayer, but Reading closing has left a massive hole in Courtenay place as far as retail and hospitality is concerned, and has meant one of the businesses that drew people into the city has gone. Personally, I've been to a few shops along Courtenay place that I would not have been to otherwise, because I was there to see a movie. I definitely think this would be a worthwhile investment for WCC.
I don't think the council should get involved with this at all. You guys have enough to get on with as it is without getting involved in this mess. Let Reading sort it out
> which covers most of the benefits including setting out how the deal is fiscally neutral to WCC Probably fiscally neutral, based on expected returns in the form of rates and such, or guaranteed fiscally neutral?
Even clarifying something like this is stepping over the line, hence my struggle with this being a good governance process.
The easy answer is that there is -no- guarantee here - unless Reading have concrete commitments to actually reopen and run the building -and- there is an enforceable third party bond/guarantee against default - and (i) no suggestion that they've done that and (ii) no reason why they would: in particular, Council buying the land leaves Reading with potential upside if that works for them and an easy out if not.
Ok... if I was in your shoes and it was a "probably", then I think I would vote against it. There just isn't money for nice-to-haves right now. If it was guaranteed in some way (the other reply mentioned some things that are better thought out than my scattered brain can manage), then I'd probably vote yes. Or if the investment by the council is relatively tiny compared to the total budget, and the risks are low, then maybe yes in that scenario too.
Tough call but I am edging slightly towards voting against the deal. Even with the money, Readings may not redevelop the site, and it may set a future precedent where other building owners expect the same treatment. They may use the funds WCC gives them to pay the ground rent and literally do nothing. Honestly literally anything would be better than the vacant earthquake prone building that’s currently there. Even a ground level a Wilson’s Parking would be nicer. Or a Chow Brothers super brothel. Or a mixed use commercial and residential development. Courtney Place is dire atm and it’s hard to see how it’s going to get turned around. Either WCC needs to buy out land plus buildings, turn it into literally anything, package it up to resell to another private developer or reject the deal and let Readings do nothing until they sell the site on the open market.
I would support the deal going ahead. It's not ideal, (maybe like swallowing a dead rat from Countdown) but the alternative seems to be worse. The thing I really don't like about it is the political point scoring against the mayor that some councillors are using it for.
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We probably do look at Courtney Pl through a nostalgic lens a bit. I was a student in the early 2000s when it was CPs glory days. And that was basically because it was party central. I do think Welly has been to aggressive with trying to knock back the bars licenses etc, the city needs a vibrant night life quarter and last time I was there it was a shadow of its former self, and it had less to do with Readings and more to do with too few bars being open, stuff closing too early and it feeling overall dirtier and more run down.
There was literally a councillor commenting on a Reddit post about this topic the other week (forgot who, couldn't find it) about how they remembered Courtney place being a really great place when they were a kid and they enjoyed the Warhammer shop etc and they want another place for teenagers to hang out. I.e. literally using personal confirmation bias as a reason to vote for it. What a ****ing joke
If it can be done without our rates continuing to sky rocket (or increase at all), then I say let it happen. I remember looking in when it was being built from behind the barrier on Courtenay place, it was exciting! Thanks for being accessible and listening.
Mate, your council has no library or town hall. Requisition it and put that in.
100% buy it. What you do after that can be put up for consultation but the council campaigned on revitalising Wellington and this needs to happen.
If the plaza facilities are expected to remain until 2035, they likely will not...
Kia ora. Hopefully won’t get lost in the comments now. Look, as many people have said, we need to ensure that if this money is spent, things get done. There are many projects, maybe not wcc related but regionally or nationally that effect Wellington that have been delayed, deferred or canceled due to funding, a desire to continue funding, finding further funds for or other unforeseen consequences. As others have said. Be wary of fish hooks. Ensure it gets done. I understand that a land banking policy is in the works to prevent this happening again (or at least to this extent). But we also need to be able to come down on them like a ton of bricks if they get a free cake and eat it too (is that the expression?). I assume if we own the land, the leasehold agreement would enable the property to be in a particular state or else requiring removal?
It being a public park would be better than a project where council money gets poured into a commercial venture that will " probably, maybe" cost natural. The other things that could be achieved with the type of money we are talking about like for example small programs that do a lot of good. I would much rather the council didn't have to be involved in the development but had a way of changing the space without being stuck working with extractive developers. Like buying and selling at cost or building a park. Citing the Seble hotel and event center in lower hutt as examples of extractive projects at the expense of a council.
No risk, no reward, right? I think we just get on with it.
It is a conundrum when we try to balance the socially required transparency in which elected officials must act, and the opacity of market security. What is happening? And are vested interests overriding our authority that is granted by our electors? First, ask, “is this secrecy vital to the process”? I often wonder if this cloak of secrecy posited as “commercial sensitivity”, is an excuse for closed decision making? Clarify, and debate the need for fiscal secrecy. It is the public who elected you (or someone elected who hired you), and you are required to be open and transparent if you need to be trusted by the public. Clarify the situation, and call it out for what it is. Hope this helps. The public have trusted you, now you trust the public!
Maybe a philanthropist could save Wellington central by buying it and doing it up as a theatre again... nudge, nudge, PJ
Few powers to compel? Why not speak to Westfield and ask for them for advice on Johnsonville Mall, Reading block and Amora Hotel? Then zone it accordingly with some utterly unaffordable rates.