November 04, 2022
Housing plan prototype for iwi services
The chair of Ngāti Kahungunu Inc says failure is not an option for its government-backed $45-million dollar Maori housing program.
Bayden Barber says while the objective is to build up to 131 desperately-needed homes for whanau, the program is the springboard for other developments that could leverage off it.
“It’s about commissioning and partnering with iwi to fulfil in this instance housing aspriatiins but in future it will be health, it will be social services, it will be Corrections, so these prototypes are really important and they need to suceed and so we are going to do all we can as Ngati Kahungunu Iwi to make sure that happens,” he says.
Ngati Kahungungu was the third district to benefit from the Government’s $730-million dollar Whai Kāinga, Whai Oranga initiative – with other projects in Taranaki, Tairawhiti and Tai Tokerau also underway.