Victor Luca is on a mission to be Whakatāne's next mayor, but first he has another mission to complete, to help build the capacity of the Argentine Nuclear Energy Commission.
Though he is headed overseas, residents can expect to see Victor Luca back in Whakatāne in July, delivering election pamphlets on his Aprilia scooter as he campaigns for the mayoralty. Photo:
Dr Luca has been invited to travel to Argentina for two months as a consultant in a United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency funded "expert mission", to build nuclear technology capacity at the South American agency, where he previously worked for 10 years.
He said he was flattered to have been given the position.
"They don't just let any chump in," he said.
Luca expects to be teaching graduate students in the area of medical isotope production, nuclear diagnostic imaging and radioactive waste management; supervising PhDs, consulting on laboratory development and conducting proof-of-principle active chemical processing trials.
The 60-year-old Whakatāne district councillor has had a successful international science career at the top levels of university and government agencies, including 12 years as principal research scientist and research leader at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, and 10 years as a senior research scientist, research leader and facility manager at Argentina's Comisión Nacional de Energía Atómica.
He is proud of what he has achieved so far, but has set his sights on the Whakatāne mayoralty. He leaves for Argentina next week and plans to be back in good time to conduct his campaign for the October election.
"I know the timing may not be great. It is what it is. I will still be participating in council via Zoom, which is what we're doing now anyway."
From a large Whakatāne family, who ran the Lyric Restaurant on The Strand for 36 years, he returned to his home town in 2019, abruptly cutting short his career to fulfil his long-held plans to "return to paradise".
He applied for a few jobs in chemistry "but it turned out that no one in New Zealand was looking for a top-level nuclear scientist", he quipped.
Luca still has three PhD students in Argentina who he supervises, but his main occupation since coming home has been "serving his apprenticeship" as a Whakatāne district councillor.
He first ran for mayor in 2019; having been a leader in big organisations with the crème-de-la-crème of the science world, he thought he was well qualified for the leadership position. However, he felt voters were reluctant to vote someone into the role with no experience on the council.
"It's all about projects. I work in radioactive waste management, so waste management is right up my alley. I work in water treatment, removing contaminants from quite aggressive toxic solutions. It's not really that much different. [The council] is talking about climate change now. It's an area I've been working in for 30 years."
He said he now had a pretty good idea of "how the council machine works".
"A single councillor is only one vote out of 11 and that reality hits you pretty hard, pretty quickly."
Describing himself as an Earth warrior, he has advocated for the council to lead the way in increasing solar power in the district, and intends to keep up the pressure.
"We love to brag about how sunny our district is but we don't use it for anything. We use it to get sunburnt and attract tourism and that's it."
Luca would like to see more innovative initiatives in waste management; pyrolysis of used tyres for example - a process that locks up carbon and creates fuel, amongst other products. Currently tyres are incinerated.
He would also like to see more initiatives in housing and in health, a technological hub in Whakatāne to take advantage of its optic fibre line, and concerted efforts toward progress on a second bridge.
"I think there needs to be more science at the council table given the challenging times we are in."
He had learned over the past three years that, to a large extent, what happened in a particular electoral term was defined by what was decided in the preceding term.
"The project pipeline in council is slow. Projects such as the boat harbour were already more-or-less locked in before the present council was elected."
He said he would never have voted for it.
"Ditto for the Town Regeneration Project. I like our CBD as it is."
Another project he was against was the full refurbishment of the Civic Centre.
"I didn't see the need. I wanted to improve the ventilation system for workplace health and safety reasons, that's all."
While back in Argentina, he plans to reconnect with his family, his wife Cristina and two children Stefano and Agostina.
"I will be back in July to fight the mayoral campaign."
Local Democracy Reporting is Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air.