A small Tasman town faces an important question: Keep an infamous statue of Richard Nixon or build a community hub instead?
The life-size bronze statue of the disgraced US president has bemused residents of Wakefield, about 20km south of Nelson, for more than a decade.
The statue, holding Nixon’s signature double peace sign pose, stands on the notorious 52 Edward St site known as Fort Haldeman – reportedly the former office of the locally-defunct publishing company Haldeman LLC, that had been partly owned by controversial businessman Tony Katavich.
According to a list on Wikipedia, the statue is only one of two Nixon statues in the world.
But Nixon’s days, as well as those of the White House-inspired building he welcomes visitors to, could be numbered.
Tasman District Council is currently progressing plans for a new community hub for Wakefield to replace the ageing and earthquake-prone village hall.
The hub had earlier been assumed to be built on the Wakefield Recreation Reserve, but the current owners of Fort Haldeman approached the council in early 2025 about the possibility of building the hub on their site instead.
Peter Verstappen, a Waimea South Community Facility trustee, said the opportunity “came out left of field a little bit”.
“Until six months ago, this wasn’t even a question. We were always heading to the reserve,” he said.
“In a way, it kind of has complicated the process going forward, because suddenly we’ve got this other whole dimension that we now have to think about.”
The council is now consulting the community on its preference between the two locations.
There are pros and cons to each site, with the reserve offering more space for future expansion but higher costs for infrastructure and utilities, while the Fort Haldeman site is closer to the centre of the village but has fewer future expansion opportunities.
Verstappen said, “in all honesty,” he doesn’t have a site preference.
“From what I’ve seen, I’m reasonably confident we can build the facility that we want, that answers most of the needs of the community, on either site.”
The council and trust held two community meetings last Tuesday for residents to learn more about the two options.
Martin Brown, the council’s project manager for the hub, told around 20 attendees of the afternoon session at Wakefield School that it was “very early days” for the Fort Haldeman site.
“We’re having conversations with the vendors currently. It may or may not progress, but that’s part of the process we’re having.”
A representative for the company that now owns Fort Haldeman declined to comment due to commercial sensitivities.
The final decision on the location rests with the council and is expected to be made in August, with detailed design work and community fundraising to occur afterwards.
Elected members will be presented with site information as well as community feedback ahead of their decision.
While the full range of feedback might differ, comments from attendees of the Tuesday afternoon meeting indicated widespread support for the original Wakefield Recreation Reserve site due to its development potential, possibly saving Nixon from removal.
“We’re building this for not just the present, or even the present decade; we’re building it for 50 years, and we need expansion space,” one woman said.
Moutere-Waimea Ward councillor Christeen Mackenzie has been pushing the project since she was first elected six years ago.
She said trying to plan for 50 years’ time was like trying to look into a “crystal ball”.
“Do you have one big shooting box for absolutely everything in one location? That is not necessarily what you might need into the future. Introducing the idea of Site 2 [Fort Haldeman], I think it’s giving the community an opportunity to think about that,” she said.
“If someone comes to the council with a proposal, you’ve got to do your due diligence and think about it.”
The Wakefield Community Hub has a budget of around $11 million with $6.4m coming from developers, $2.5m from community fundraising, and $2.1m coming from a loan that will be repaid over time from an existing community facility pot that was funded through rates.
Residents can have their say at shape.tasman.govt.nz/wakefield-com-hub.
The Wakefield hub used to be part of a collective community facility project for Waimea South, including the town of Brightwater.
But the two town’s projects have since been split apart, and Brightwater’s public hall will be upgraded at a cost of about $2.5 million.
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