A few years back when the District Plan was last reviewed, Raglanders proposed to the Waikato District Council that they wanted the ‘look’ of the Bow Street area to remain as it was then. The Council agreed and wrote a Raglan Design Guide. This went through the normal lengthy process of community meetings, submissions, etc before it eventually became part of the District Plan compliance code.
When people complained to me about the bright orange that has appeared at 35 Bow Street for the new Thirsty Liquor chain’s Raglan store, I asked the Council to check if the colour scheme complied with the code.
After all, the code seemed quite clear:
“timeless neutral light colours applied to the main mass of the building with brighter primary and nautical colours to smaller building elements for contrast.”.
Over the last 10 years new buildings constructed by developers in the Bow Street area have followed the code. Businesses have painted buildings in keeping with the code. It has now become apparent that the colour aspects of the code are unenforceable.
The response from the Council to my enquiry was:
Our Monitoring Team have investigated the matter you outlined below and in short there is no rule to prohibit 35 Bow Street painting their premise orange, therefore no Land Use Consent was required.
Here is more detail:
Appendix D of the Waikato District Plan contains the Design Guide for the Raglan town centre, and of particular interest in this situation is section D1.11 Colours. The Design Guide specifies the preferred colours of buildings in the main street of Raglan (Bow Street).
However for the Design Guide to take effect, rule 23.62 of the Plan must be triggered.
This rule only applies when a building is being constructed or altered. In the case of 35 Bow Street the building is only being painted, not ‘constructed’ or ‘altered’. Therefore the rule does not apply in this situation. This means that there is no breach of the Waikato District Plan or the Design Guide in this case.
Major work requiring an expensive resource consent was completed on 35 Bow Street a few years back. This ‘triggered’ the colour clause so when Organic Burger restructured the building they were required to repaint it in “timeless neutral light colours applied to the main mass of the building with brighter primary and nautical colours to smaller building elements for contrast”. But one day after the code compliance certificate was issued, it could have repainted in any colour they wanted.
This is an example of bad law making by Waikato District Council. They need to fix it fast.
There may be some good news about the colour as the Council spokesperson went on to say, “Nevertheless, we understand your concerns and discussions are being had with the tenant of 35 Bow Street about the matter. They have been advised it would be in their best interest to alter the colour to something more in keeping with the precinct. I am happy to say the tenant has no desire to upset the community and are working with the Council to get the best outcome for all concerned.”
Raglan Ward Councillor, Clint Baddeley said, “I have had a number of people raise the same issue. It’s exposed the style guides lack of been enforceable. Now is the time to identify these issues as part of the review process. Sounds like staff talking to them about it so I will follow up.”