Tauranga City Council has made good progress in improving its consenting performance for the 2024/25 financial year, but acknowledges there is still room for improvement.
Despite economic challenges throughout the country, application volumes overall have remained steady, which is a positive sign of continued growth in Tauranga.
A report presented at the City Delivery Committee meeting on Wednesday highlighted efficiency gains in processing both building and resource consents on application volumes that were slightly lower than the year prior.
Tauranga City Council City Delivery Committee Chair and Deputy Mayor, Jen Scoular acknowledged the progress made, while also noting the need to keep making improvements.
“The team have worked hard to refine processes, and it’s good to see tangible results. Going forward we have asked the team to keep a focus on making consenting faster and more efficient for our community.
“Council gave staff a steer to set a plan that engages with the construction sector, to better understand the blockages and issues. Staff were also asked to look at comparison times with other councils to help define what good looks like.”
Staff confirmed they are committed to refining the Building Consent processes further, and continue to enhance its systems, including piloting a new “reference consent” system where the team can pre-approve simple repeat buildings. This is expected to increase the speed of consenting for these buildings, but also free up staff time to speed up other more complex applications.
Tauranga City Council staff are gearing up for the next IANZ audit in September 2025 after achieving its best Building Control Authority audit result in over a decade in 2023.
Jen emphasised the importance of adapting to future legislative changes and noted that while council is moving in the right direction, consents will remain an area of focus.
“Upcoming reforms in the Building Act and Resource Management Act will bring further changes to how consents are processed. Changes being proposed by Central Government will take away some of the risk adversity we are seeing, as a number of activities will no longer need consent.”
Building Consents:
- 1,471 applications received year-to-date, showing a slight decline compared to previous years.
- Compliance with the 20-day statutory timeframe has improved to 82%, up from 75% in 2023/24 and significantly higher than the low of 35% in April 2022.
- Median processing time has dropped to 14 days, matching national benchmarks.
- Reliance on external contractors has reduced from 60% to just 18%, signalling strong internal capability growth.
- Inspection wait-times remain under two days, with 97% of Code Compliance Certificates issued on time.
Resource Consents:
- Application volumes remain stable, with a 22% increase in subdivision consents suggesting future development opportunities.
- On-time decision-making has increased to 96% compliance year-to-date, a significant improvement from 38% in July 2022.
- The average processing time is 56 working days, with 31 days typically spent on hold.
- External consultant use has decreased due to strengthened in-house expertise.
| Image caption | Deputy Mayor Jen Scoular. |