Compliance work from Otago Regional Council (ORC) had a strong focus in Central Otago over the past year, given the number of water schemes and water take and bore consents.

The Annual Operational Compliance Monitoring Report 2024/25 was discussed by ORC’s environmental delivery committee on Thursday (September 4).

As at mid-August 2025, a total 8,252 combined consents and permitted activities throughout Otago were assigned priority from 1-6.

Priority 1 site audits and inspections completed in the Queenstown Lakes and Central Otago districts were typically dominated by earthworks relating to development and in-stream consented activities.

The Central Compliance Team also completed a large number of septic tanks and medium-sized privately owned wastewater treatment site audits and inspections, under Priority 2.

Water schemes, water takes and bore consents came under Priority 3.

Manager compliance Simon Wilson told the meeting there didn’t appear to be any worsening trend of significant non-compliance of consents in the past 12 months.

“We have put in a lot of effort into discharge consent monitoring, and many are proving better than they have been,” he said.

Discharge monitoring could be carried out by the team monthly because of the direct impacts on the environment, and when there was significant non-compliance.

Simon said he was pleased with the general level of compliance and engagement from people attending education focused events, plus the increased use of ORC’s 24/7 Pollution Hotline.

The team had a target of completing 6,000 planned performance monitoring assessments (monitoring required under a consent) and 1,000 audits and inspections in the 2024/25 financial year.

There were also a total of 8,794 performance monitoring returns graded and 1,264 audits and inspections completed.

“The compliance monitoring and enforcement teams continued to meet and exceed targets largely through the effectiveness of solid work planning, on-going training and in implementing efficiency gains across the respective teams,” Simon said.

The Otago-wide 24/7 Pollution Hotline was also an excellent resource for people and communities to engage directly with ORC, effectively acting as “eyes on the ground”, he said.

“Using the Pollution Hotline enables us to get staff to these events quickly and assess whether there is in fact an impact on the environment, and how best to contain it.”

There were 1,042 individual incidents associated with the 1,407 complaints reported through to the Pollution Hotline during the 2024/25 financial year.

The most common complaints received within the 2024/25 financial year related to water pollution (331), outdoor burning (230), odour (160), and domestic chimney smoke (92).

The investigation and compliance teams issued 125 formal enforcement actions, an increase from 100 formal enforcement actions taken in the 2024/25 year.  

The focus was always on education first, but it is important that the right compliance tool was used at the right time.

Enforcement actions during the year included five formal warnings, 62 infringement notices and 56 abatement notices. One enforcement order was applied through the Environment Court while one prosecution was initiated. 

Two prosecutions were concluded with two prosecutions still in progress. Of the two prosecutions concluded one person was convicted for outdoor burning, while the other resulted in an offending company and individual being convicted in relation to tyre storage.

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