Climate change dominated the discussion during the hearing on the Dunedin City Council's 10-year plan yesterday.
Many of the submitters told councillors they were disappointed climate change was not the main focus of the council's $860million budget for the next 10 years.
Donna Peacock said as unexciting and dull as it seemed, the council needed to shift its focus away from major projects and only use debt to address the effects of climate change.
"I understand you need to develop a 10-year plan but we need to be looking out 30 years and how the city is going to cope with the changes that have already started," Mrs Peacock said.
Senior Climate Action Network representative Patricia Scott told councillors the next 10 years were particularly urgent in terms of addressing climate change, but the 10-year plan did not do that.
While upgrades to the infrastructure in areas vulnerable to climate change, like South Dunedin, were important, adaptation was an incomplete response without mitigation, Mrs Scott said.
The single biggest issue facing the city would be food security and the council needed to ensure the city was able to feed itself, she said.
Oil Free Otago and 350 Dunedin representative Adam Currie implored councillors to put climate change at the "core" of the 10-year plan for a low-carbon future.
Dunedin could lead the rest of New Zealand with a progressive "roll out" of electric charge stations for both bikes and vehicles, Mr Currie said.
"We implore the council to shift away from a focus on cosmetic upgrades and instead invest in a low-carbon future."
The council should also publicly announce no oil industry conferences would be held in council-owned buildings in the city.
"This would send a clear signal to oil companies they are not welcome here," he said.
