A commissioner involved in the Queenstown Lakes District Council plan change hearing yesterday on the definition of visitor accommodation says having let her home previously to holidaymakers would not influence her decision.
Cr Cath Gilmour sent a letter on the QLDC letterhead highlighting the perceived conflict of interest to all submitters on September 5 and it was posted on the council website.
Remarkables Park Ltd said it had no objection to Ms Gilmour continuing as commissioner. Later in the hearing, Peninsula Road Ltd solicitor Warwick Goldsmith and Real Estate Institute of New Zealand solicitor Malcolm McLean also said they did not object.
Ms Gilmour wrote that since the June hearing dates, she had reflected on the fact she and her husband offered their Queenstown home as rented holiday accommodation for 7 to 10 days, four times in the past 13 years. The couple advertised on the New Zealand Holiday Homes and Baches website.
She had consulted council's solicitors and was advised the level of activity was not in conflict with the moratorium currently in place. She had assured council chief executive Duncan Field her property letting would not influence her role in hearing submissions, deliberating and reaching a decision, and had raised the matter with all concerned "in the interest of open government".
At the request of commissioners Gilmour and Lyal Cocks, the officers' report included amendments to the definition of visitor accommodation and a two-page application form for certification as a registered holiday home and registered homestay.
Mr Goldsmith suggested "legal improvements" to the report. The application should be made a statutory declaration that stipulated basic safety requirements, such as smoke alarms, and required the signature of a solicitor or Justice of the Peace so it carried weight with the applicant.
Simon and Mary Stamers-Smith, Dalefield homestay operators for six years, said they were "appalled" at the suggestion in the officer's report that a registration regime be set up, describing it as a "monstrous intervention by council in the ownership rights of individuals".
Mr Stamers-Smith suggested the "definition of homestay be amended by providing for five guests [and] that the exclusion of residential unit be amended to provide `the short term letting of a resident unit for up to 90 days in any one year'.".
New Zealand Motel Association vice-president Peter Smith said he had "serious grief" about the enforcement of registration requirements and 90 days should remain the limit.
The commissioners expect to make their recommendation to the council in the next few months.
