Snails’ pace for Cobden seawall stop-gap

Nicole Mathewson Reporter from The Press

From local democracy reporter Brendon McMahon:

A stop-gap suggestion by the West Coast Regional Council five months ago to donate stockpiled rock to plug the Domett Esplanade seawall at Cobden is moving at a snail's pace.

With the storm season looming, plugging low points in the seawall, built in 1969, has lagged since a storm last June 13 sent seawater through several homes.

Residents had to flee and some are still fixing the damage.

"It's been a difficult hard year for us," one of the affected residents, Vern Goodall, said.

After the storm damage, fingers were pointed about how the seawall had been compromised, including criticism of the salvage operation of the fishing boat Kutare, which sank off Cobden beach in 2017.

Goodall noted 10 to 15 low spots or flattened areas currently on the wall.

"Some of it is caused by four-wheel drives going on to the beach."

Regional councillor Peter Ewen suggested rock be made available from the closed Cobden quarry to plug gaps until a permanent solution.

But he said it needed to be addressed urgently in light of the risk.

"The ball's in (Grey District Council's) court if they want to pick up the rock."

This followed a field visit by both councils in September immediately after a joint meeting between them stalled before it even got started.

By then the district council was emphatic the regional council should fix the problem, and address future protection options in the area.

Regional council acting chairman Peter Haddock now says they are prepared to find a solution together with the district council.

While it would be "embarrassing" if another storm event hit meantime, the solution was not clear-cut.

Haddock, who retired from the district council to stand for the regional council, pointed to informal assurances to fix a problem in Cobden in 2018 had been based on "a wink and a nod".

He cited the assurance to the district council that the Government would help fund protection of the old Cobden dump, buried just above the foreshore, after tonnes of rubbish was washed out to sea during Cyclone Fehi.

"The problem is, we've got to be so careful undertaking work on a promise or a wink and a nod, as the Grey District Council found when mayor Tony (Kokshoorn) got a bit of verbal approval on the (rubbish dump) wall at Cobden, that the Government would fund it -- then it didn't," Haddock said.

As a result, the district council had to empty almost its entire $2.2 million infrastructure contingency fund to subsidise the new rockwall in front of the old rubbish dump.

After 15 months of negotiation the Government only chipped in $235,934.

Haddock said that meant he was now wary of funding "promises".

"All these projects need co-funding or funding from rating districts. What we've got to firstly identify is whose problem it really is - and both councils believe it's the other council's problem - and it's not as if the regional council has a big pot of money."

Current Greymouth mayor Tania Gibson said her council's position was clear: "We are still pretty much of the view that it is their delegation".

"We don't rate for it... That's why we pushed the issue in the first place and asked for the meeting."

It rankled that the stalled 'urgent' meeting of the Greymouth Floodwall Committee from last September had still not been reconvened, she said.

"It was (the regional council's) turn to host the meeting and it was adjourned - and we've been asking since the last meeting: it needs to be reconvened and discussed," Gibson said.

The joint meeting stalled when the Grey District Council members arrived without having received the relevant papers.

Regional council chief executive Heather Mabin said reconvening that meeting was on the "to do list" as well as clarifying an arrangement for the rock.

"We want to make it formal and official... we really need to have an agreement about what rock and who does what."

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