On 24 June 2025, Council voted to:

• Adopt the Hearing Panel’s recommended decisions in their entirety as the Council decisions on the submissions received on Proposed District Plan and Variation 2 (Financial Contributions).
• Adopt the Independent Hearing Panel’s recommended decisions in their entirety as the Council decisions on the submissions received on Variation 1 (Housing Intensification / Medium Density Residential Standards).
• You can view the Council decision report here The Extraordinary Council Meeting recording adopting the Panel’s recommendations.

The Council delegated the hearing of submissions and further submissions on the Proposed District Plan, Variation 1 and Variation 2 to a Hearings Panel of Commissioners.

The Hearings Panel for the Proposed District Plan and Variation 2 comprised four Independent Commissioners and two Councillors who are Commissioners. While the Independent Hearings Panel for Variation 1 comprised the four Independent Commissioners only.

You can find more information on the Commissioners here.

The Hearings Panel heard all the evidence presented by submitters and issued recommended decisions to the Council on all submissions received. The Hearings Panel’s recommendations can be viewed here.

Council considered the Hearings Panel’s and Independent Hearings Panel’s recommendations and made the decision to adopt them all in their entirety.

In some cases, there are changes to the objectives, policies, rules and other methods (known together as 'provisions') in the District Plan. Some of these changes are minor in effect or improve the functionality of the provisions while other changes are more substantial.

There are also changes to the planning map including the rezoning of land for residential purposes.

Within Decision Report 1 - Overarching (paragraphs 68-75) the hearing panel have outlined their ‘exceptions’ approach to recommendation to accept or reject submissions.

The Hearing Panel have relied on the comprehensive summary of submissions and recommendations within the s42A Reports of each hearing topic.

To avoid unnecessary repetition or duplication, the Hearing Panel adopted the s42A summary of submissions and recommendations, except where they did not agree with the s42A recommendation. Where they did not agree, they have outlined their reasons and recommendation within the relevant topic report.

Refer to the Decision Report 1 – Overarching

Refer to the relevant s42A report on the Council website

The decision reports were written on a ‘by exception’ approach, meaning it only directly addresses submissions where the Hearings Panel had a different view to that recommended by the Council Reporting Officer. To find the Council Reporting Officer’s recommendation on your submission that the Hearings Panel recommended Council adopt, refer to the relevant s42A report on the Council website

‘Accept in part’ is used where only part of a submission is accepted, or where an alternative solution has been developed by the Hearings Panel to address the concerns raised.

The Resource Management Act 1991 allows Council to make amendments of minor effect, or to correct any minor errors (via Clause 16 of Schedule 1). Any errors that are more significant can only be corrected through an appeal, or plan change.

There are some Waimakariri based projects currently going through the Government’s fast-track approvals process that were also addressed through the Proposed District Plan review process. The fast-track approvals process is independent from the Proposed District Plan process.

For more information on the Waimakariri based projects going through the fast-track approvals process, visit the Council website.

The next step in the process is appeals through the Environment Court. If you disagree with Council’s decision, you can appeal the part of the decision you oppose to the Environment Court within 30 working days of decisions being notified.

Any person who made a submission on the Proposed District Plan can appeal the Council’s decision, provided the submission referred to the provision or matter it seeks to appeal.

You can join an appeal as a Section 274 party if you support, oppose or are neutral on the nature of an appeal. You could become a ‘Section 274 party’ if you lodged a submission on the Proposed District Plan or if you have an interest in the appeal greater than the public generally.

A Section 274 Party will be kept informed of appeal proceedings and has the right to be involved.

After the close of the appeal period, there is a 15 working day period for someone to apply to become a Section 274 Party to an appeal.

To find out if an appeal has been lodged, or to find out more about becoming a Section 274 party to proceedings, visit the Environment Court website.

Once the process moves into the appeals stage, Council’s management over the process concludes and the appeals become the responsibility of the Environment Court.

Council will be involved in appeals through the mediation process and in hearings heard by the Court.

People interested in the progress of appeals are encouraged to keep an eye on the Council website or the Environment Court website.

Appeals can take some time to resolve, although the Environment Court often sets tight timeframes for reporting back to the Court to ensure progress is made.

Variation 1 is subject to a different process under the Resource Management Act 1991 than the Proposed District Plan and Variation 2 and therefore different appeal rights apply. The Council’s decision on Variation 1 cannot be appealed to the Environment Court and can only be appealed to the High Court on points of law (judicial review).

• To support plan users to understand what provisions are affected by Variation 1 and cannot be appealed, Variation 1 provisions are shown with yellow highlighted text in the ePlan.

All Variation 1 provisions became operative on 14 July 2025 when the Council issued its decisions (as per clause 103 of Schedule 1 of the Resource Management Act 1991), which is why the District Plan is referred to as ‘Partially Operative’ at this point.