1. What should the council’s role be in cre­at­ing afford­able hous­ing?

Stream­line con­sent­ing pro­cess. Open up new land with avail­able pub­lic trans­port links. Sup­port public/private part­ner­ships for new devel­op­ment. Sup­port social hous­ing

2. What one pro­ject for Wel­ling­ton have you been most act­ive on so far?

I brought my loc­al com­munity togeth­er in 2015 so that their voice was heard on medi­um dens­ity hous­ing. Almost 500 sub­mis­sions were made

3. What pro­ject do you plan to cham­pi­on most if you win this pos­i­tion?

I will get the Coun­cil to work bet­ter with loc­al com­munit­ies so their voice is heard much earli­er on.

4. What’s your opin­ion on the pro­posed new bus routes?

We need much more engage­ment by GWRC with impacted com­munit­ies. WCC also needs to be more act­ively involved to ensure the best pos­sible out­comes.

5. What’s your opin­ion on cycle­ways?

Con­tin­ue to devel­op them as part of an integ­rated trans­port sys­tem (sup­port­ing fur­ther recre­ation­al use) and include loc­al com­munit­ies in the design pro­cess.

6. What’s your opin­ion on the air­port exten­sion?

Not the right time until it can be proven to be safe, eco­nom­ic­ally viable, eco­lo­gic­ally friendly and % con­tri­bu­tion matches own­er­ship.

7. Who is the biggest donat­or to your cam­paign?

The Calvert/Owens fam­ily

8. Which NZ politi­cian do you most admire?

Paula Ben­nett for call­ing it was it is- a hous­ing “crisis” (not a chal­lenge) and con­sist­ently com­pet­ent. Pos­sible PM one day?

9. What do you think needs to hap­pen to the Town Hall?

Get it oper­a­tion­al asap, start appre­ci­at­ing it once again and earn­ing income from it as a conference/concert ven­ue

10. How long have you lived in the area you are stand­ing for?

Nearly 16 years in the Onslow-West­ern ward along with my hus­band and our daugh­ters. (Last 22 years in Wel­ling­ton, pri­or to that Christ­ch­urch and UK)

11. What’s one thing from the 2013–2016 Coun­cil term you think was really great and why?

More people are now inter­ested in who to vote for, more are vocal about they want the new coun­cil to do and more will vote.

12. What do you think of the Auck­land Unit­ary Plan and what can Wel­ling­ton learn from it?

Bite the bul­let and get mov­ing with devel­op­ing a new com­pre­hens­ive Dis­trict Plan fit for the 21st cen­tury (not the 20th) before it’s too late.

13. What’s the biggest risk Wel­ling­ton faces in the next ten years?

Earth­quake, so we must keep a strong focus on pre­pared­ness

14. How will you work with the rest of the coun­cil to achieve the things you’re set­ting out to do?

Find out where there is com­mon ground, get a shared vis­ion, give a little, get agree­ment on a plan for­ward and reg­u­larly get togeth­er socially ’

15. Who do you nom­in­ate for Wel­ling­tonista Wel­ling­to­ni­an of the Year (assum­ing we run the TAWAs again)?

Helen Kelly-giv­en what she is going through per­son­ally and to still strongly cham­pi­on key issues for the coun­try. Abso­lutely amaz­ing determ­in­a­tion.