Affordable housing misses out in forward planning

Ms Jones says people with young families and on wages do not buy apartment-style housing or rent houses on the beach at $200 a day.

"We are catering to the well off executive or the comfortably retired but we need working people to keep the community moving ahead and vibrant."

Ms Jones says wages have not kept pace with inflation on the east coast.

"We are paying city rates on our properties but we?re not earning city incomes. The average family with a couple of kids can hardly afford to rent a place in Whitianga, let alone buy their own bit of land."

At a recent future planning meeting, Mercury Bay Community Trust secretary Ada McCallum said there is a lack of affordable housing for the elderly in Mercury Bay.

She called for the council to set aside a portion of the developers' reserve contributions to provide land for this.

"The trust administers nine elderly peoples" units in Simpson Place," Mrs McCallum said. "People are always ringing me to put their names on the list, but the waiting list is full."

Thames Coromandel District Council used to administer the flats but Mrs McCallum said housing for the elderly is no longer a core business of council.

"I would like to know whose core business it is."

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