Council falling short on building WOFs
Queenstown's council is missing targets on building checks, which have been highlighted in the wake of the fatal Loafers Lodge hostel fire in Wellington.
Government guidelines state councils should carry out building warrant of fitness (BWOF) audits on between 20-33% of eligible buildings each year, with a particular focus on buildings such as backpacker hostels.
But Queenstown Lakes District Council only checked 13% in the past financial year (FY22/23), some 109 of the 838 eligible commercial buildings in the district.
The years before that, there were even fewer checks carried out, with 99 in 2021/22 and 88 in 2020/21.
Dave Wallace, QLDC's acting General Manager Planning and Development, admits the council should actually be carrying out somewhere between 167 and 276 BWOFs each year.
"QLDC is working hard to move closer to the guidelines and, in doing so, is using a risk-based assessment to ensure those building at higher risk are prioritised," Wallace says.
The audits are a double-check that commercial companies hired to check fire alarms, sprinklers, fire doors and other safety measures are doing a proper job.
Wellington City Council (WCC) has come under fire for its BWOF performance following the hostel fire, which killed five people on 16 May.
A RNZ story today, by reporter Phil Pennington, says MBIE told WCC eight months before the fire that the volume of checks were not up to scratch.
WCC was conducting checks on fewer than 4% of eligible buildings each year, "well below what we would expect for an effective auditing regime," MBIE said in a September 2022 assessment, according to RNZ. It also criticised the council for being too soft on enforcement.
WCC said yesterday it is now checking between a third and a fifth of the 2800 commercial buildings.
In contrast, a MBIE report into QLDC's schedule was less damning.
On the 161 BWOF audits undertaking by QLDC between 2018 and 2021 it noted: "It is pleasing to see the audit numbers for the last year are close to target levels and that the risk factor of buildings is being considered with audit frequency. No further enquiry or follow-up required at this time."
An earlier RNZ story stated that QLDC was one of three councils that had conducted no audits at all, but QLDC says that was inaccurate and it requested a correction/clarification.
The victims of the Loafers Lodge fire were Michael Wahrlich, 67, Melvin Joseph Parun, 68, Peter Glenn O'Sullivan, 64, Kenneth Barnard, 67, and Liam Hockings, 50.
