On April 23, the panel, of Crs Lyal Cocks (chairman), Melissa White and Cody Tucker, sat to hear two objections to "dangerous" classifications being slapped on Henry van Asch and Caroline Hutchison’s 9-year-old pet labradoodle, Alfie, and fellow Queenstowner Timothy Hardley’s German pointer-lagotto, Otto.
They were classified following an alleged attack on sheep at Dalefield last October.
The hearings — which were publicly notified by the Queenstown Lakes District Council and open to the public — were attended by the Otago Daily Times in Queenstown.
An article was published in the ODT the following day, naming the parties — they were named again in a second story on April 26.
The newspaper subsequently asked the council for copies of the panel’s decisions and were told that would be treated as an official information request, given the likelihood of "personal details that would require review and potential redaction".
The panel released its decisions last Monday rescinding the classifications.
Another story ran in the ODT last Tuesday, again naming the parties, with comment from Mr van Asch.
But when the council responded to the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act (LGOIMA) request on Tuesday, it redacted the names of the dog owners — which weren’t suppressed by the hearings panel — "to protect the privacy of natural persons".
"In this case, the hearing decisions contain some personal details of the dog owners which we have considered to be private," the LGOIMA response said.
It noted the council was aware "the personal details of the dog owners are publicly available", but said the redactions were necessary to protect the owners’ privacy "because it pertained to a hearing process which involved the dog owners and council officials only".
"Promoting the accountability and transparency of local authority members and officials is in the public interest, as is the general public interest in ‘good government’," the response said.
"Where possible, we have favoured the release of information. However, council does not believe there to be any public interest in releasing any personal details of the members of the public engaging with council."
Last year, the council redacted Kim Turton’s name from another decision after his singing sheepdog, Happy, was also given the "dangerous" classification, which was upheld.
In that case, Mr Turton had already spoken exclusively to the Mountain Scene newspaper, had been photographed with Happy, and his details published in a report following the hearing.
