The council voted for chairperson and deputy chairperson at its meeting this morning.
Cr Calvert, who had made clear her aspirations for the role, was the only candidate for chair and was elected unanimously.
Kevin Malcolm was elected deputy, also unopposed.
Interviewed before the meeting Cr Calvert said the council, like many councils around the country, had become more and more expensive and people were very concerned about their rates.
"It’s time to look, to figure out how to get better value for money for people’s rates. They need to not be going up," she said.
"They need to be, if anything, going down. And the argument that people want the services and they, therefore, need to pay the rates isn’t a credible argument to me."
She said there was not a direct relationship between the cost of rates and the provision of services. She believed the council can do things differently and use ratepayers’ money to do the work that council needs to do.
She said there were like-minded people on council.
Asked if she believed she had the numbers to chair the council she said it would be decided today. She was "not one to look at a clutch of eggs and decide how many little hatchlings will be there next week".
She had not thought about being the chair until she was elected.
"I wasn’t thinking of it during the election campaign, but I have spoken to all of my fellow councillors since then about what they are hoping to achieve by standing for council and becoming a councillor. And I think my sense of direction is reasonably widely supported."
She was on the regional council from 2019-22 and on the Dunedin City Council from 2013-16. She stood for mayor in 2013 and came second to Dave Cull.
Cr Calvert was the highest-polling candidate in the primary vote for the regional council’s Dunedin constituency.
She stood on the One Vision ticket which also elected Michael Laws and Gary Kelliher in the Dunstan constituency.
Gretchen Robertson was the council chairwoman in the last triennium. When asked a couple of weeks ago about her candidacy she said it would be decided by the council at the meeting as it should in a healthy democracy. She could not be contacted yesterday.
Cr Laws had ruled himself out, saying a person had to live in Dunedin to do the job and he had work commitments.
Former chairman Andrew Noone said two weeks ago he did not want to be chairman again and Molyneux constituency councillor Kate Wilson said yesterday she did not want to be a chairwoman.
Dunedin constituency councillor Alan Somerville said he was not seeking to be chairman. Kevin Malcolm and Gary Kelliher could not be contacted.
New councillors Neil Gillespie, Chanel Gardiner, Robbie Byars and Matt Hollyer are unlikely to seek the chairperson role.
