A proposal to lease a parcel of land to Nelson Tasman Kindergarten Association (NTK) was officially approved last week following a period of public consultation.
NTK purchased the former Scout Den off Treeton Place earlier this year, with plans to turn it into a new kindergarten for the Wakefield community, as waitlists climb across the region.
The association has been searching Wakefield and Spring Grove for a suitable location for the past two years.
Brightwater’s Pinegrove Kindergarten, just 3km away, currently has a waitlist of 100 with 250 tamariki on the waitlist for the four NTK facilities in the Waimea catchment.
While NTK now own the building, the land it sits on and surrounds it is managed by Tasman District Council. Council approved an initial lease of five years, at its environment and regulatory committee meeting on Thursday.
If it is able to establish a viable kindergarten space in that time, it will then have two rights of renewal of 10 years each, totalling 25 years.
TDC programme leader - land and leases, Robert Cant, said in his report to council that at the time of drafting the report, 70 submissions had been received, with an “overwhelming” 65 in favour of granting the lease and five opposing.
Those opposed to the lease raised concerns over the increase in vehicles along Treeton Place, removing an informal dog exercise area, and noise from the children impacting on the tranquillity of the neighbouring Faulkners Bush Scenic Reserve.
Others said that if the waitlist in Brightwater is so high, another facility should be built there. However the report to council commented that without any kindergarten facilities in Wakefield, there are no doubt children who are transported from Wakefield and beyond to Brightwater to attend, and the new facility would mean many families wouldn’t have to travel so far.
“The pros outweigh the cons,” said councillor Dan Shallcrass.
NTK chief executive Craig Vercoe says, now that they have certainty in a lease being granted they can progress to applying for resource consent.
He says this consent process will address traffic management and access to the buildings.
Extensive work will then be undertaken to the former Scouts building, in keeping with the natural environment but providing heat and energy efficiency.
Craig estimates that following the resource consent process, a kindergarten should be able to open six-nine months later.
“I’d like to commend Craig… for doing a lot of good community discussion... he did a lot of proactive discussion, answered a lot questions, so [I] commend him for that,” Robert said.
“There will be some detriment from bringing in 40 children a day to a space, but the benefits from that for Wakefield and the wider community are significant enough that, in my opinion, they outweigh the detriment.”
Craig says they will need to form a group of community members and parents to be involved in the process and encourages anyone who would like to take part to contact him at craig.vercoe@ntk.org.nz
