A group of Havelock North residents are considering legal action in a last-ditch bid to prevent a crematorium being built in the middle of the village.
Lawyers say the only avenue open to them is to get the 2024 resource consents, issued by Hawke’s Bay Regional Council and the Hastings District Council, overturned.
Hastings District Council says the application to include a crematorium at the existing Terry Longley and Sons funeral home in Cooper Street, over the road from the New World supermarket, was carefully assessed.
Resource consent required an air discharge consent from HBRC, and a land use consent from HDC.
A Hastings council spokesperson said its resource consent department determined that when measured against the criteria, the proposed crematorium’s adverse land use effects on the environment would be “less than minor”.
That meant that notification of the community was not required.
A spokesperson from the Havelock North group, Andrew Fulford, said they would be focusing on fighting the fact the consent was non-notified.
“To slip it through without communicating with the community – unnotified – that’s the point we would go to court with,” Fulford said.
“We haven’t decided yet if we will continue with the legal pathway, because of the potential cost,” he said.
“It’s a lot of money but it’s not out of the realms of possibility. We have had some generous support.”
He said one option was to apply for an injunction, which meant if the crematorium were to go ahead, any work would be at Terry Longley and Sons’ own risk.
The Havelock North group, who met with Hastings District Council last month, claim building a crematorium in the middle of the village is “distasteful”.
Local Democracy Reporting contacted Terry Longley & Sons for comment but they “politely declined to comment”.
At a public meeting called by the funeral home in late March, general manager Terry Longley said they had looked at alternative sites, including ones in Napier, Omahu, and the Tukituki Valley with no luck, so had turned their attention back to Havelock North.
There are only two crematoriums in Hawke’s Bay, serving a population of 180,000. There is a need for another, with Hastings District Council’s crematorium at Hastings Cemetery nearing 100% capacity.
The other is a private facility also near Hastings Cemetery.
Longley said the alternative would likely be cremations taking place in Taupō, Gisborne, or Palmerston North.
Councillor Henry Heke, who attended the meeting, said he agreed the community should be heard and that a Crematorium in Havelock North village was not ideal.
“It has so many perceived risks,” Heke said.
“But owners have the right, as they went through a process they believe to be the correct.
“I, however, believe that possibly the zoning could have been reviewed or the community around the industrial area consulted on changes in the area.
“I do support the development of a new crematorium, but I don’t support the current proposed location.”
The council spokesperson said the council understood there were some concerns within the community.
“However the Resource Consent has been approved (within the regulatory framework per the requirements of the Resource Management Act 1991) and therefore there is no formal opportunity to oppose the granting of consent.
“The only party able to decide whether to proceed or not with the consented project is the business which holds the consent, in this case Terry Longley & Sons.”
The funeral home is owned by Australian company Propel Funeral Partners Ltd (Havelock North) which also owns two other Hawke’s Bay funeral companies Tong and Peryer Funeral Directors (Hastings), as well as Howard and Gannon Funerals (Taradale).
The resource consent for the site was first issued in 2015 but lapsed in 2017.
Since then, a New World supermarket has been built across the road.
The crematorium would have a 14m chimney, clad in stainless steel, the only feature visible beyond the site.
The resource consent says there will be no visible particles, smoke or haze emitted from the cremator and the cremator’s heat, which creates a shimmer, is all that will be seen above the chimney.
LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.
