Arrowtown residents and ratepayers woke up yesterday morning to a letter in their mailboxes from concerned citizens - one of them a councillor - over the future of the Queenstown Lakes District Council ward system.
The six-yearly review of council representation has been carried out and the outcome indicates Arrowtown is 200 residents short of having its own ward representative, according to an outdated 2006 census estimate.
Arrowtown ward representative Lex Perkins and former councillors David Clarke, Taylor Reed and Jim Ryan have sent a letter to eligible voters, telling them there may still be an option to retain the Arrowtown ward councillor if they make submissions.
"Please make a submission to retain the status quo, at least until the next representation review, when the true population of Arrowtown will be known", it reads. "If the Arrowtown ward councillor is removed, Arrowtown will never get it back."
Mr Perkins said the reason behind the letter was to notify the Arrowtown public and "find out what the Arrowtown people want".
The purpose is to get the community making submissions in favour of the "alternative 2" option, which would retain the same ward structure, despite the 2006 census estimates which show Arrowtown's population as 2774, the minimum to qualify being 3000.
The letter was placed in every Arrowtown mailbox.
However only eligible voters could submit, meaning those living in Dunedin or Invercargill would not be voting for the QLDC ward, he said.
Although the six-yearly review may have removed Arrowtown's representative, Wanaka has gained one and now has three, and left Queenstown as it was, with six.
Mr Perkins, a first-term Arrowtown councillor, said the letter was not a conflict of interest and that he had written it as a citizen and resident, and not a councillor.
"They could take it as a conflict of interest. I'm thinking of the future of Arrowtown.
"I could have not put my name at the bottom of the letter but I am a resident, too, and I have concerns over this ward referendum."
Mr Perkins said it was important to keep the 127-year-old representation system, whether the representative be him or another, because the alternative of a community board would not have the power a councillor has in dealing with the "in-house issues".
"It is important to have someone who lives and breathes Arrowtown; someone to walk the halls of the council and someone liaising with councillors, council planners, day in and day out.
"There are no guarantees that a community board would have decision-making powers," the letter reads.
"We consider there are considerable benefits in having a local resident with the knowledge of our special village, articulating Arrowtown's specific concerns."
Arrowtown's optionsnow are three: the proposed Arrowtown community board; an alternative "dedicated ward councillor"; or, at the last resort, extending the Arrowtown boundary to Hunters and Speargrass Flat Rds to increase the population to 3000.
The council's corporate and regulatory services general manager Roger Taylor said the last option was not as clear-cut as changing a boundary to fit with the numbers.
"You can't just willy nilly change boundaries without considering the government criteria. There are other things that need to be considered."
He said he encouraged the letter, as the wider the view from the community, "the better informed" the council would be to make a decision.
The eventual decision, which will be recommendedat the council meeting on June 26, will be made by an independent working party including local barrister Michael Parker, Janice Hughes, of Wanaka and Darren Rewi, of Queenstown.
"It's not a numbers game. It is about the argument put forward," Mr Taylor said.
"One hundred submissions will make a difference, but no more than one, as they will all be considered."
Submissions close next Friday.
The working party will review them, starting on either June 6 or 12.
