Everything you need to know about our local body elections coverage
It’s fantastic that we’re getting so many answers to the questions we sent out to candidates, but we were flooding our homepage with them, so we’re now tidying responses away underneath the Elections 2013 category. You can also check out responses by area, assuming the candidates actually mentioned where they were running, AND there’s a full list below in reverse chronological order. Please note: It’s getting pretty close to voting time, so we are no longer accepting answers.
- Candidates: Malcolm Aitken in Onslow Western Ward
- Candidates: John Woolf for ?
- Candidates: David Lee for?
- Candidates: Simon Woolf for Onslow Western Ward
- Candidates: Iona Pannett for Greens in Lambton Ward
- Candidates: Malcolm Sparrow for Northern Ward
- Candidates: Celia Wade Brown for Mayor
- Candidates: Milton Hollard, Lambton Ward
- Candidates: Mark Peck for Labour in Lambton Ward
- Candidates: Steve Preston, Independent for Lambton Ward
- Candidates: Peter Kennedy for Eastern Ward
- Candidates: Jack Yan for mayor
- Candidates: Jo Coughlan for ?
- Candidates: Rob Goulden for Mayor and Eastern Ward
- Candidates: Martin Wilson for ?
- Candidates: Nigel Wilson for Capital and Coast DHB and Regional Council Kapiti seat
- Candidates: Simon Marsh, Eastern Ward
- Candidates: Jackie Elliott Mayoral candidate for Kapiti
- Candidates: Karunanidhi Muthu for Mayor and Eastern Ward
- Candidates: Jacob Toner, Independent for Northern Ward
- Candidates: Judith Aiken Wellington Regional Council and the Capital and Coast District Health Board
- Candidate: Sarah Free, Eastern Ward
- Candidate: Arie Ketel, Onslow-Western Ward
- Candidates: Peter Gilberd, Independent candidate for the Northern Ward
- Candidates: Sridhar Ekambaram for Onslow Western Ward
- Candidates: Ginette McDonald for Southern Ward
- Candidates: Helene Ritchie for Northern Ward & DHB
- Candidates: Nicola Young for Mayor & Lambton Ward
- Candidates: Rex Nicholls for Lambton Ward
- Candidates: Brent Pierson for WCC Southern Ward
- Candidates: Don McDonald for Southern Ward
- Candidates: Hayley Robinson for Onslow Western Ward
- Candidates: Justin Lester for Northern Ward
Update: By now though you’re probably wondering: what Ward do I live in? There’s detailed maps at the Council website but on the right you can get an idea of the boundaries.
And for convenience, here’s the Candidate responses grouped by Ward plus those for the Mayoralty:
Voting papers get sent out three weeks before the official election date 12 October, so expect your postal ballot papers in the mail from about 23 September onwards.
You can mail these back anytime, but just make sure they’ll get back before the 12th. The official details around all this are on the Council website too.
There is in fact lots of dry but useful information on the Council’s election website, including candidate profiles and a list of upcoming “Meet the Candidates” meetings. There’s also the semi-official looking vote.co.nz website which contains a list of many of the candidates’ top five issues.
And finally, we’d be remiss if we didn’t also mention the great coverage on the WCC Watch website. Tireless, those guys.
Thanks Jo, great work you’re doing here. It’s interesting: as an inner-city apartment dweller, I get to see no billboards, and receive no flyers – they can’t get through the junk mail ban on the door. So, I have absolutely no info on which to base my vote. So far just one candidate for Lambton has replied here – i want more! I can probably guess what the other candidates are like, but they’re going to need to get off their arses and do some legwork – and respond here or they won’t be getting any votes from the urbanites.
But the real anti-democratic crunch point for me comes with regard to the Regional Council and the District Health Board – we are meant to vote for them? And yet we know nothing about any of them! Jude Aitken has responded – good on her – but who are these others faceless people who get in, run our DHB and how do I know they aren’t going to cock it up?
Great to see Wellingtonista, StrathmorePark & WCC Watch providing ongoing information about the local election around Wellington. I’m in Upper Hutt where there are 27 candidates for 10 spots. There is barely any information about most of them – it’s mostly just hordes of hoardings saying vote for me, without any real information about what they want to contribute to the City, or what vision they have for the future. Keep up the good coverage – it’s much needed for the voting public.
Thanks to Jo and all the Wellingtonista. I may not agree with what you say sometimes, but this right here is a particularly fine piece of work.
Extremely well done!