Selwyn-Waihora Zone Committee meeting

The Selwyn-Waihora Zone Committee will meet at 1pm on Tuesday, 7 May, in Rolleston for its monthly meeting to discuss local water management.

The meeting will begin with an opportunity for members of the public in attendance to contribute to the meeting if they wish.

Next, the committee will receive an update from its representative on the Regional Committee, which covers region-wide environmental restoration and repair; land use impacts on water quality; as well as water storage, distribution and efficiency options.

The zone committee will then continue its work to develop water quality and quantity limits for the zone. These limits will become part of a Selwyn-Waihora sub-regional chapter in Environment Canterbury’s proposed Land and Water Regional Plan (LWRP), due to become operative in 2014.

Environment Canterbury’s proposed Land and Water Regional Plan (LWRP) is one of a number of key mechanisms that will deliver the goals of the Canterbury Water Management Strategy – to deliver long-term social, economic, cultural, and environmental benefits from the water resource.

The proposed plan will start with default limits for water use, water allocation, and nutrients, and then put the limits in a catchment context. The sub-catchment limits being developed by the zone committees, and involving a wide range of stakeholders, will then be reflected in the sub-regional sections of the proposed LWRP.

By building its understanding of the impacts of limits (via scenario testing) the committee will be able to make technically and socially informed recommendations on limits. The underpinning assumptions of the scenarios being tested are available on the website www.ecan.govt.nz/selwyn-waihora .

At Tuesday’s meeting the committee will specifically discuss options for improving ecological and cultural flows in the lowland streams and hillfed rivers, and identify the options it wishes to explore in more detail and include in their solution package.

Following this, the committee will look at the Target Stream Augmentation (TSA) project that explores how the Selwyn District Council (SDC) stock water race network could be utilised to provide targeted recharge that augments lowland streams in an efficient and timely manner.

Providing piped and channelled water systems for drinking, drainage and sewerage is the responsibility of the SDC. Sustaining natural waterways (lakes, rivers, groundwater) is the responsibility of Environment Canterbury.

At the meeting the committee will discuss how a collaborative approach to the project can align the desired outcomes with the committee’s priority of protecting and enhancing the health of lowland waterways in the zone.

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