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AUGUST 14, 2025
In fear of rainy days By Chris Gardner
Te Kūiti neighbours Clyde Jones and Gary McGougan dread torrential rain. Every time the town receives heavy rain the manhole cover on McGougan’s section pops, causing sewage to flood the front of his section and spill onto his neighbour Jones’ property. McGougan, a retired builder who moved to Ngatai Street with his wife Beth in 2023, said the sewer overflowed a couple of times a month. “It’s getting worse,” McGougan said. “It’s caused by a smaller amount of rain now.” The couple have called the council out on several occasions, but it has so far been unable to fix the problem believed to be partially caused by a small, 300mm aging sewage pipe, collecting unconsented storm water further up the line. “It should be a closed sewage system, but it’s not.” “They have been trying,” McGougan said. “They have had cameras down there and discovered two blockages caused by collapse.” McGougan said he was considering asking the council for a rates rebate to compensate him for the regular mess. “It’s not only an inconvenience, but also a health hazard.” Jones, a retired construction company owner, moved into his home more than a year ago, is upset the problem was not recorded on the Land Information Memorandum (LIM) report supplied by the council. “They are going to have to upsize the pipe,” Jones said. “One hundred years ago the pipe was 300 millimetres, but now it needs to be two or three times that.” On occasion, his chook house had been flooded. Jones also suffered regular knee-deep
Te Kuiti neighbours Gary MGoughan, left, and Clyde Jones want Waitomo District Council to stop sewage inundating their sections. Photo: Chris Gardner
stormwater overflow from the street, given his section sits below the road, until the council installed a recent drainage pit on his section. Jones said he had threatened to withhold
his rates from the council until the sewage problem was sorted. Speaking at the council’s July meeting, councillor Eady Manawaiti said it was unacceptable for people to have to live
among sewage. “Weather events are going to be more frequent,” he said. “The conversation around modelling and costs has to come back to the table. We don’t want to be behind the eight ball, because these weather events are not going to stop.” Waitomo District Council chief executive Ben Smit said sewer overflows happened in limited parts of Te Kūiti in isolated high rainfall events. “Wet weather overflow is caused by stormwater entering the wastewater pipes and inundating the wastewater network that is only designed to handle wastewater, not stormwater. Stormwater has a separate network,” Smit said. “The inundation happens through several ways such as flood water entering the low gully traps; stormwater entering through manhole lids when the surrounding ground or the river level is high, cracks in pipes or faulty joints; downpipes from roof connected to wastewater; saturated groundwater entering pipes.” Smit said wet weather wastewater overflows were likely to be a major concern for all councils. “What is really unfortunate is that there is no short-term fix for them,” he said. He urged anyone impacted to report inundations with the council as they happen for staff to investigate and lead the clean-up. “Council staff will provide a report back to elected members on the extent and locations of the problems, possible long-term solutions which will likely require modelling of the wastewater network during dry weather and wet weather events and then considering options. An isolated fix in one area will likely move the overflow to another site. The problem is the wastewater system cannot cope with the level of stormwater entering the system, so the water needs to come out somewhere – i.e. up through wastewater manholes.”
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