The Rural Plan Change provides opportunities for limited countryside living in the rural and coastal areas, encourages the protection of our unique environments and directs growth to particular villages. The Rural Plan Change seeks to:

• Provide for limited countryside living in the rural and coastal areas by rewarding those who enhance and/or protect environmental features on their land with some potential for subdivision.

• Direct growth to particular villages and away from areas where valued environmental features could be jeopardized.
• Provide incentives for latent development potential to be transferred away from already subdivided sites into areas where the environmental effects could be better managed.
• Better define the diverse environments within the district so that their character could be taken into account for consent decisions

Where We've Been

The Franklin community, Council, and the Hearings Panel have been involved in the Rural Plan Change process, formally known as Plan Change 14, for several years. The Rural Plan Change was first notified to every ratepayer by mail and in the newspapers on 30 September 2003. A total of 589 submissions were received before the closing of the submission period on 11 March 2004. On 20 May 2004 the Council requested further submissions and 403 were received before 30 June 2004. In total over 3500 individual submission points were received, many requesting specific amendments to the Rural Plan Change.

But even the notification of the Rural Plan Change wasn’t really the beginning for us. In 2002 and 2003 (prior to the notification of the Rural Plan Change in September 2003), the Council undertook a series of community consultation meetings and published a “discussion document” for public comment. This consultation helped shape the Rural Plan Change.

Hearing Panel and Hearings on Submissions

The Council appointed a Hearing Panel to hear all the submissions. The hearings were held between October 2004 and March 2006 with a large number of submitters presenting their submissions in person. The Hearing Panel then considered and deliberated on the matters raised in the submissions, further submissions and evidence presented at the hearings.

During the course of the hearings the Panel became aware that the notified Rural Plan Change did not achieve the expectations Council and the community had when the plan change was first promoted. Some parts of the Rural Plan Change as notified in 2003 did not seem to match fully what was stated in the Plan Changes objectives and policies. The full range of submissions enabled the Hearing Panel to correct these omissions and reset the focus on directing growth within both the 10 year-horizon and the longer-term approach of the Regional Growth Strategy. Council believes that the Rural Plan Change as it stands now provides for growth in the district over the next 30 to 50 years.

The Hearing Panel presented its recommendations on the submissions to Council in May 2006. The Council accepted those recommendations on 15 June 2006 and this decision was notified to the submitters and public on 11 July 2006.

Summary of Rural Plan Change Methods

The Rural Plan Change is a comprehensive replacement of the existing sections relating to rural and coastal areas in the Operative District Plan. The management of growth and its impact on the rural and coastal environments in Franklin will now be governed by the Rural Plan Change. The Rural Plan Change provides for limited countryside living in the rural and coastal areas, encourages protecting our unique environments and directs growth to particular villages. Council sees the Rural Plan Change as providing for managed growth over the next 30 to 50 years and the Rural Plan Change contains a number of different planning methods to achieve this.

A brief description of each method and the expected related outcomes are: