Houses for 300 low income tenants opened today in New Lynn
Nearly 300 homeless and low income tenants have started moving in to 82 new homes in Auckland.
The Thom St development in New Lynn is being opened by Housing Minister Megan Woods today. The new properties replaced 16 standalone homes which were built in the 1940s. The development includes seven two-storey standalone homes, 27 two-storey townhouses, and 48 apartments across three buildings. All of them are built to modern standards, with double-glazing and insulation, and the site is near key public transport routes.
Woods said it was "enormously satisfying" to see the progress which was being made on public housing in the city. "The unseen part of a lot of public housing, particularly in our large scale projects is the significant infrastructure work that enables other affordable and market homes to be built, which is key to increasing supply," she said. The New Lynn development, which was announced under the National-led Government, will provide much-needed relief to around 292 people on the state housing waiting list. The list soared to 20,000 last month - triple the number in 2017. So far, 33 of the homes have been tenanted. While the Labour Government is aiming to build 12,400 state houses over the next four to five years and another 2000 transitional homes, that is not enough to keep up with rising demand. That demand is driven by escalating house prices, rents increasing faster than incomes, and a dire undersupply of affordable homes. The Government says the growing wait-list is partly because it is not turning anyone away, while previous governments applied more discretion. The new homes are part of the largest house-building programme since the 1960s, in which 5000 state houses are being replaced by 25,000 homes in Auckland - a mix of public, affordable and market homes. The scale of the construction, while much-needed, has upset a few communities along the way. Some housing advocates are upset at the ratio of affordable houses to houses which are sold on the open market. In one of the largest developments, in Māngere, 2700 state houses are being demolished for 3000 new state houses and 7000 private homes. In its defence, the Government says selling homes on the open market allows it to fund further development, and that building large blocks of public housing concentrates poverty - leading to ghettos. Advocates have also expressed concerns that mixed developments can lead to gentifrication, which breaks up people's social networks as they are priced out of the area. Kainga Ora must find homes for the original state housing tenants while the sites are redeveloped. The Government has previously said that most of the New Lynn tenants were rehoused within other Kainga Ora properties.
==========================================================
Poll: Should drivers retake the theory test every 10 years?
Drivers get where they need to go, but sometimes it seems that we are all abiding by different road rules (for example, the varying ways drivers indicate around a roundabout).
Do you think drivers should be required to take a quick driving theory test every 10 years?
Vote in the poll and share any road rules that you've seen bent! 😱
-
49.5% Yes
-
48.6% No
-
1.9% Other - I'll share below
Here's Thursday's thinker!
I am lighter than air, but a hundred people cannot lift me. What am I?
Do you think you know the answer to our daily riddle? Don't spoil it for your neighbours! Simply 'Like' this post and we'll post the answer in the comments below at 2pm.
Want to stop seeing riddles in your newsfeed?
Head here and hover on the Following button on the top right of the page (and it will show Unfollow) and then click it. If it is giving you the option to Follow, then you've successfully unfollowed the Riddles page.
Why make picking up reserved library books harder? What do you think? Challenge: Write the last stanza for the first poem attached below.
Once books are reserved in Auckland Libraries books, when they are available no longer go alphabetically by customer but instead go into a Holds pickup shelf number based presumably somehow on when each book needs to be picked up by.
I had two books reserved that arrived on two different days in the Blockhouse Bay Library and hence each book has a different shelf number. Hard to find unless you knew the shelf number in the notification email. Even if you knew the shelf number I found myself three books by the same author on the two shelf numbers.
More recently yesterday a book I reserved was on a different shelf number than was specified in my notification email (see image below).
Sadly it is clear from library staff that a numerical system for reserves is here to stay.
I suggest that so that all books for each person has the same shelf number, the shelf number becomes the last digit of a person's library card (0-9).
Within each shelf number a book is found under the day the reserve arrives in the library (01 to 31, hopefully the same date the email is sent).
Since a customer appears to have 10 days to pick up a book, ten days of the month would appear to be required at any time (for each digit 0-9).
Once there are 10 days used the next day's reserves could go back at the beginning of the shelf number after any remaining books not collected (hopefully none) are removed (along with the old day number and the new day number (01 to 31) inserted) after the last day available and future days' books remaining moved forward to make room.
Each day number (01-31) would appear once for each shelf number (0-9) before the first book on that day- perhaps cover an old withdrawn book with paper with each day number on the spine?
When a reserved book arrives in the library the last digit of the library card could be placed on a piece of paper in the book to be removed when it is put on the shelf, to be recycled the next day.
What do you think?
See the image below and page 3 below for a letter appearing in the Western Leader on 9 September:
www.neighbourly.co.nz...
Loading…
