Council is required to review its representation arrangements in preparation for the local government elections to be held in 2013.

Council is currently made up of the Mayor and 14 councillors. The Mayor is elected by the whole district, whilst councillors are elected within eight wards. There are also community boards for Lawrence-Tuapeka and West Otago.

Some decisions on Council’s representation arrangements have already had to be made, including the decision to retain First Past the Post as the voting system, and the decision not to establish a Maori Ward. However, Council still needs to make decisions on:

• How many councillors there should be on Council.

• Whether Councillors should be elected by ward or by the whole district.

• If councillors are elected by ward, how many wards there should be, and what their boundaries and names should be.

• Whether there should be community boards in the district.

• If there are community boards, how many there should be, what their boundaries and names should be, and how many members there should be on each board.

A discussion document covering these issues will be distributed to Clutha District residents via the Clutha Leader on Thursday 26 January. The discussion document is also available on the Council website below, at Council Service Centres, or on request by calling Council on 0800 801 350 during office hours.

Feedback on the discussion document is due by Friday 24 February 2012. You can either submit the online submission form below, fill out the submission form contained in the discussion document and send it back to us via freepost, or email your comments to help.desk@cluthadc.govt.nz with the subject line 'Representation Review'.

Representation Review Discussion Paper

(PDF, 318kb, opens new window)

Representation Review Online Submission Form