Lance Girling Butcher, Victoria Coleman and Wally Garrett say the whole community suffers if disability and aging is ignored. Photo: Supplied
A plan to downgrade community input on disability and ageing issues in New Plymouth is tokenistic, condescending and would cost the district money, advocates say.
For nine years the Age and Accessibility Working Party (AAWP) was a channel for disabled whānau and older people to give New Plymouth District Council advice on things like accessibility, universal design, and positive ageing.
The working party was swept away in the new mayor's drive to make NPDC's structure more efficient - but after public backlash councillors will consider whether to resurrect it on Thursday.
Victoria Coleman's son Levi has atypical Down syndrome with developmental delay and two rare bowel conditions "so he's very, very high needs".
Coleman said the working party advised on a broad range of needs across council projects.
"They could come back and consult with the community, the community could come to them - it was sort of a funnel into council, to ensure we were considered."
Coleman said a few councillors had gone behind closed doors and decided to replace the AAWP with a 'focus group' with no real power.
"It's a tokenistic, tick-box approach and it'll make our life harder."
Coleman said councillors were warned ignoring the community would "blow-up for them" and she expected a strong turnout at Thursday's meeting.
After Lance Girling-Butcher went blind he quit as editor of Taranaki Daily News, became a councillor, and then spent two terms on the AAWP.
Girling-Butcher said the focus group was being promoted by people with no experience of barriers that disabled people are trying to remove.
"It's offensive, it's condescending, and it isn't going to get the results that they seem to think it will."
He said uninformed decisions on things like building design would lead to costly rebuilds.
"We were invited to look at plans before they were finished.
"We were invited to check on progress so we could make sure they were sticking to the plans, which didn't always happen."
Wally Garrett's been an amputee for 25 years and took over leadership of Positive Ageing from Girling-Butcher
"You have well-meaning able-bodied people trying to solve these problems and they don't have that lived experience."
Garret said solutions from disability advocates - such as properly accessible public toilets - also benefited the aged.
"Whatever makes life easier for a person with a disability, for an older person who doesn't have that disability … it must make it easier for them."
Mayor Max Brough said there was talk of a legal challenge, so he had to limit his comments.
"We will work through that at tomorrow's meeting and look forward to hearing the presentations and debate," Brough said.
For seven years councillor Dinnie Moeahu's whānau have looked after his sister-in-law at home, as she needs 24-hour care for the rare neurological disorder Rett syndrome.
"There are nuances that able-bodied people just don't understand."
Moeahu said lack of consultation had created friction but there was now a way forward.
"Having it led by the community - to get them to voice what they're wanting - is critically important."
Councillor EJ Barrett said it was a failure of leadership that the working party was "ripped away" without consultation.
"That failure landed on a community already carrying more stress, more barriers, and less margin for error."
Barrett has an incurable genetic condition that saw them use a wheelchair for two years.
"This whole thing was clumsy at best, cruel at worst."
They said public pressure had now led to alternatives being put forward and a lesson for councillors.
"Don't mess with disabled people and their caregivers - they're organised."
LDR is local body journalism funded by RNZ and NZ on Air