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With Mayor Glyn Lewers (centre) are from left: Jess Pauling, Hamish Murray, Lee-Ann Lines, President Grant Ress and Nell Hunter Mayor Glyn Lewers made his first address, post-election, to Rotary on 21 February. Glyn began with an account of his life and work to date including his air force beginning, surveying and engineering degrees, and his work in Australia before coming to Queenstown 10 years ago and establishing a structural engineering practice. Since being in Queenstown Glyn has been a junior sports coach, a member of the Frankton Ratepayers Association for 6 years (4 as Chair), a ‘Destination Queenstown’ board member, has served a 3 year term as a QLDC Councillor and was elected Mayor at the 2022 local body elections. Glyn outlined his 5 key priorities looking ahead: - Electricity power security – upgrading the capacity and reliability of the current single electrical power supply from Clyde and the need for emergency generator capability at the Frankton sub-station.
- Health – the under investment in hospital care provision in Central Otago/Lakes and the dual mayor lobbying for a base hospital in CO/Lakes, given our combined population of 75k and our growth.
- Public Transport – the issue of the driver shortage.
- Accommodation – the housing intensification proposals coming using the ‘town house’ concept and encouraging developers in this direction.
- Council funding – QLDC nearing its borrowing limits and TA’s seeking a Govt strategy to support councils with major infrastructure issues.
Rotarians asked questions relating to a variety of topics including AF8 earthquake resilience, future QLDC Airbnb policy, the urgency for designated worker accommodation, water quality and wilding pine eradication, and any future expansion of public libraries. |
NZ Golf Open.
