Kevin

I was involved with the eradication of the plague skink invasion with Josh and Dylan. It was 6 weeks of trapping and replacing traps before we had the all clear. I would guess it cost 10's of thousands of dollars with my, Josh and Dylan's in put free. Lets not squander our rates on un-necessary expenditure or our voluntary time on the avoidable disasters.

I know Billie pretty well, we've known each other since she first arrived on Rakinos. I was amazed how well she accepted my idiosyncrasies, yeah I get it, I'm an odd ball raving on about biosphere collapse etc but she's never held it against me. 😉

My personal position is that the Hall, library and art studio remain where they are and the council honour their obligations to the community hall facility. When I came to Rakino as a ratepayer 19 yrs ago there was a satisfactory sea wall to the south of the Hall constructed with Gabian baskets. I believe if that modular wall was replaced it would provide adequate protection to both the Hall and the Wharf structure. More info on Gabian Baskets below: http://www.gabionz.co.nz/

I think that the Hall should stay where it is and be maintained by the Auckland Council and possibly some crowd funding by some of the Islands rate payers and renters. Surely the hundreds of us who use the hall can make a contribution. What about an added levy to the RRA's annual levy where the revenue is held specifically for maintenance. I don't agree with letting Council off the hook, pardon the pun.

My position on the fire fighting/management issue is we should buy our own equipment, have regular drills to ensure we know how it works, keep up to date with the latest firefighting protocols and shame the Fire service into providing us with suitable equipment. They could have their own equipment on the rock under lock and key and in 15 minutes could have professional fire fighters on the ground. Why should we be the only community in the country without a formal government fire fighting service.

A fantastic summary of our endeavours at the nursery. I'm proud to be the "water boy" although not for the last week in which we have measured almost 200mm of rain. I would hope that our water tanks are full, I'll check when the rain abates and report back.

Bravo Lyndsey, happy to have you along for the journey.