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Bay of Plenty Regional Council has responded positively to a call from Nga Potiki to protect pa sites near Papamoa.
Chair Doug Leeder says the council has agreed to buy 25 hectares of farmland adjacent to the existing Papamoa Hills Regional Park.
He says it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to protect the cultural and landscape heritage values of the land, and secure open space that will meet the needs of an increasingly developed city and region.
“It also secures the park’s public road access and gives us more options for developing visitor facilities in the future,” Mr Leeder said.
Ngā Potiki representative Matire Duncan, a member of the Papamoa Hills Tangata Whenua Advisory Committee, told the council the ridgeline, Te Rae o Papamoa, is an ancestral landmark and an outstanding cultural landscape that has been occupied by many different iwi over the centuries including Waitaha, Ngati Ranginui, Ngai te Rangihouhiri, Ngati Pukenga, Nga Potiki and Ngati He.
“It’s one of the most outstanding examples of pa and settlement complexes in the Pacific,” she says.
The purchased land contains two important pa complexes, Maraeroa and Kaingapakura.
Ms Duncan says adding the pa sites to the park protects information about the early inhabitants of Te Moana a Toi and honours the whakapapa and cultural connections of Te Rae o Papamoa.
The park is closed until late summer because of logging operations.
www.boprc.govt.nz/papamoahills
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