Photgraphs of damage done to a South Otago wetland are a "shocker", Otago regional councillor Michael Deaker says.
Cr Deaker was referring to before and after photographs of the Lundy Marsh (formerly the Cairns wetland) published in the Otago Daily Times yesterday, after Fish and Game Otago investigated reports that it had been drained and its peat bog and tussock vegetation destroyed.
Council policy and resource planning director Fraser McRae said yesterday the wetland was on leased council-owned Kuriwao Endowment Land but under the 1948 Act governing the land, the council had no control over what was done on the land by the lessee.
The wetland was not in the current water plan so was not subject to any protective measures, he said.
Taking and draining water from a wetland was a permitted activity (did not need a resource consent) if it was not in the schedule 9 of significant wetlands.
The council had undertaken a massive exercise to identify wetlands in the current plan and an extra schedule was added during the appeal process but neither identified Lundy Marsh as being significant, he said.
However, it had been included in the consultation draft for the wetlands plan change which was soon to be notified.
As part of the consultation process, the lessee had been informed 15 months ago that there was a possibility the wetland could be significant and protected under the changes to the plan.
The council was looking at what happened to the wetland and would look at it again but given the damage done it was possible it would no longer meet the significant wetland standard, he said.
At a meeting of the natural resources committee yesterday, Cr Deaker said photographs of the wetland were "stunning" and "if that is not a significant wetland what is?"
Chief executive Graeme Martin said the council had been talking to Fish and Game and was in process of organising a meeting to discuss the legal and technical issues regarding the wetland.
There were serious issues about what constituted an offence and what controls the council and public wanted on land use and vegetation change, he said.
