Smoothing the Path to Consent

Resource management planning is all about helping you bring your ideas to life so you can make the most out of your land. Whether your land is zoned rural, commercial, industrial or residential; whether you’re in the Waimakariri or Queenstown Lakes District (or anywhere else in the South Island) - local Council rules not only vary across zones but they’re different from region to region. So when do you need it? And what should you consider first?

Here are just a few examples of when resource management planning is needed:

• Development for new buildings
• Creating a subdivision with land and titles to sell
• Re-purposing a non-living building (e.g., garage) into a home-based business space
• Establishing a new commercial activity or commercial building
  

From helping many clients through this process, here are three things we’ve learnt that you might find useful…

We can’t stress this enough. So much time and money can easily be wasted on an idea that isn’t viable. Whether you think a resource consent is required or not, engage a planner for advice at the concept stage.

Just because you own a piece of land doesn’t mean you can do whatever you like with it. People often don’t realise there are rules that govern what activities you’re allowed to do on it, or the types of structures you may build on it. A planner will be able to help you develop your idea and help you design a proposal your local Council is likely to approve.

Once granted, you also need to comply with the conditions of that consent. This is important to remember because designs can (and do) change as the project progresses and this can mean the amendments are no longer within the scope of your consent and a variation has to be obtained. It’s really important to keep on top of this along the journey or you will find yourself in an expensive and tricky situation trying to get final sign off from Council.

Every day we prepare applications on behalf of landowners; we can prepare any kind of land use consent, regional consent and permit applications for Council approvals.

We have experience in preparing private plan changes to rezone land for different rules to apply where it is possible to do so. We can make submissions on District Plan reviews and Local Government Annual Plans to ensure our clients don’t miss out on opportunities to ‘have their say’ in Council consultations as rules and Council requirements change from time to time.

And we know how to speak Council language. We tailor your application to meet requirements and make sure the necessary technical information is provided; often this is as easy as tapping into the rest of our team. Should Council come back with questions, we can front those too. We have also built strong relationships with all of our local Council staff and often know who the right person to talk is.

We are friendly, helpful and approachable, and we have all the skills in-house for anything you might need. This helps keep the consent process moving.

So how do you get started?

It’s as easy as sending us an email here, or giving us a quick call; we have 6 offices around the South Island.