Small scale living in the Tasman District
The Tasman District Council is by now known for their controversial approach to people living in mobile homes, caravans, trailers, house busses or other vehicles. One of the earliest stories is that of an intentional community in the Motueka Valley which ended up in the Environment Court and later in the District Court.
Later, around 2018, a young Moslem family made the news as they were enquiring with the Council about the legality of putting a tiny home up on a piece of land in the district. Everything seemed easy first, but became difficult over time. Apparently the advice from the Tasman District Council to the couple changed over time and now they have left the country and recently tried to sell the tiny home. Unfortunately, even when trying to sell the tiny home, one of the Council’s staff for some reason got involved and asked on a social media post whether or not the tiny home had a building consent. Some could think that the Council may be prepared to sour a private sale. Others may be grateful for the Council’s diligence in even monitoring sales in the district. However, a Community Board member commented on the social media platform that no such consent was required as the tiny home was clearly mobile and was then publicly challenged by the Council staff to a “bare knuckle fight” as he called it. Quite interesting methods by a public authority who needs to act for the well-being of their community.
In contrast, this Community Board member received a code of conduct complaint and the council spent $40,000 on the investigation in 2024. The same Community Board member was also one who had issues with the Council in regards to his tiny house in the past. They first wanted it to have a building consent and then, when the Alan Dall case came through court and concluded no such permit was needed under the Building Act, the Resource Management Act (RMA) came in and with it the definition of “structure”. The person then asked the Council what they mean by “fixed to land” which is part of the definition of structure which then is part of the district’s definition of building and dwelling. Instead of responding as promised with a legally robust response, nothing happened, no response provided. The tiny home got sold.
A further case was our case which started back in 2022 when the council claimed to have received an anonymous complaint about an unconsented dwelling that needs to be investigated. This ended up in Court after search warrant and detention and was centered around the same issue, namely “what is fixed to land” and does this extend to vehicles?
We stated as early as March 2022 that what the Council called a structure is in fact a vehicle. The council clearly understood that we did not think to fall under any rule relating to structures, buildings or dwellings. Instead of responding to us or releasing any evidence about why they think it’s fixed to land, they alleged we were refusing to comply with the rules and even recently in the High Court reiterated they had tried to engage with us without success. I don’t know what they meant by that other than to force us into “do as you are told”, which is not quite what democracy is about. At this point in time, we will have to wait what the High Court Judge will find on the question.
Interestingly, the Tasman District Council submitted to the previous Government, weeks before they initiated Court proceedings against us that they don’t know what “fixed to land” means and that the government could please advise the council as they get a lot of enquiries on that topic. That was signed by the Mayor Tim King in February 2023 and retrospectively approved by the Council at the end of March 2023. At the beginning of April, Court proceedings were initiated against us.
What we did not know, but thanks to a recent newspaper article learnt, is that those “enquiries” may well be the 104 “complaints” about unconsented dwellings that the Council was dealing with over a three year period. This is a huge number. This is most likely also quite interesting in terms of money that people have paid to the Council in order to not go through what we went through.
Another recent case is yet another communal living arrangement in the district, again based on an anonymous complaint. The people there made it clear to the council that they are happy to engage when the council provides the neccessary paperwork. This means the warrants their officers are carrying with them as well as the validity of the anonymous complaint. The case is at a standstill since the beginning of the year. Multiple requests to the Council have not resulted in any updates or way forward.
In Motueka, there is a property who has been working with the Council for quite some time in trying to get their tiny homes approved. They were told that the tiny homes were not in need of a resource consent because they were not structures. However, they were not able to connect them to the town sewerage system because it was at capacity. Personal enquiries about the sewerage capacity have revealed quite a different picture. They finally got served with an abatement notice. They filed another resource consent application. What is happening there for their people apart from waiting, we don’t know. But the landowner made it very clear to the Council that if the Council wanted to get rid of those residents, then the Council would have to do it, the landowner is not making these people homeless. And clearly, all this has cost a lot of money.
A case that was becoming known only very recently was that of yet another property in the Moutere where the owners wanted to build a granny flat for the ageing mother-in law and they also allowed their daughter to stay with them on their land in a tiny home. They did engage with the Council right from the start, lost more than $80.000, the elderly lady does not live in the granny flat that was built for her and the daughter has since sold the tiny home, lost lots of money on that, bought a bus and left the district.
Well, there are all those stories in between, from properties which had tiny homes but gave up after they were financially exhausted, people that are afraid and don’t want to speak up and have to live in fear and hiding. The red thread through all these stories is that it is difficult, if not impossible, to live in a tiny home in Tasman without coming to a financial and emotional breaking point. Some people get exemption consents for tiny homes because of only minor discharge and no resource consent is required for the tiny home, others are being targeted for the exact same setup. One standard for some, another for someone else. There is an absolute lack of transparency when it comes to anticipated costs for such projects. For some it feels like the Council is trying to extract money out of them from every available angle, no matter how nonsensical it may be.
It is a density of issues in the Moutere, Motueka and in the Motueka Valley. Not in Golden Bay, for example as Golden Bay Community Board member Grant Knowles confirmed just recently. Two of the enforcement staff live in the Moutere and these two are often involved in these cases. An unredacted complaint was provided to the Court and showed that the last name of the complaint is the same as the the officer who performed the investigation into the complaint. The same officer also instructed NZ Police to detain us.
We have highlighted significant issues with the warrants held by these officers. However, the Council does not want to take notice or self-investigate or even offer an apology. It ignores the fact that there is a concerning involvement of their staff in “anonymous” complaints. They are happy to make plan changes for various suburban developments, but can’t even think of changing their District Plan for more clarity around tiny homes. Is the Council afraid that going through the public process would invite strong submissions? It is clearly ignorant of the fact that the Council’s District Plan is stricter than the Building Act and the Resource Management Act. It chose to include definitions that were not made by Parliament. That was their choice.
Now, we have a Mayor saying that they will wait for the Government to make the rules and even went so far as to ask the Government to include tiny homes in their Granny Flat proposal, when this is a completely seperate topic, promoting it as liberal. The enormous advantage of people in buses, tiny homes and the like is that even though these people don’t own land, at least they own their homes. Making these subject to be registered on another person’s title, takes that small freedom away from them. It is not a liberal approach, it is an approach of pure greed and disrespect for those that try to help themselves in a market that is not accessible to them.
The Council however, is happy to promote the idea that there are people feeding off others not wanting to contribute to community by paying for consents. Well, that’s convenient to divide people, but couldn’t be further away from the truth. One main question should be openly discussed by the Council: Do we have authority to make people homeless? If so, what are those environmental effects that offset a person’s right to shelter?