Light: We put the local in local government

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This term’s elected members of the Howick Local Board, with Damian Light, fourth from right. Photo supplied

豪维克地方理事会主席达米安-莱特报道

As part of Auckland Council, local boards are responsible for your local assets and services like your parks, libraries and community centres.

We fund local environmental and safety programmes, as well as providing grants for community groups to deliver their own projects.

If it’s regional (like rubbish, rates or regulations) it’s sits with the governing body (mayor and councillors).

The Howick Local Board is made up of nine elected members who represent and advocate for the 150,000+ residents of Howick, Pakūranga, Botany and Flat Bush.

Together we make decisions for our whole community, balancing priorities and a constrained budget.

Providing more transparent democracy

We make our decisions in our business meetings, held on the third Thursday of each month starting at 12pm at the Pakūranga Library building.

They’re open to the public and have bookable slots for people to present (online or in person). They’re recorded so you can watch them later.

In order to make good decisions on your behalf, we need to receive and process a lot of information.

Workshops are informal sessions used to canvass issues, prepare for upcoming decisions, and enable discussion between elected members and staff.

We don’t make decisions in workshops, only at business meetings.

As of January, 2025, our workshops are open by default. We still need to close some sessions to protect sensitive information which isn’t ready for release yet.

Everyone is welcome to attend to observe our open items, although there’s no opportunity at workshops for the public to speak or ask questions.

Our materials are published online for each workshop so you can see the same information we get.

Our workshops are held every non-business meeting Thursday, starting at 10am.

Listening to our community

If you’d like to talk to us about an issue or idea, don’t hesitate to reach out. You may wish to talk to your local representative, the chairperson, or any member of the Howick Local Board – we’re all here to help.