The Importance of Timeframes – Resource Consent Timeframes That Is…

Christmas seems to be a magic deadline for people – apparently the 25^th of December is the date at which the professional world as we know it will cease to exist and heaven help us if we miss it.

While Christmas is more of a perceived deadline for things, there are some real resource consent timeframes or deadlines that you should be aware of.   As over-allocation of our resources has become an issue, so has the methods by which councils can use to reduce over-allocation.  This is where timeframes around consenting are beginning to bite and councils are actually using their powers. 

Lapse Date and the Cancellation of a Consent

The first is the lapse date on a resource consent.  This is not the expiry date, but rather the “use it or lose it” date.  From the date of grant of a consent, you have up to five years to use the consent, or you lose it.  This is particularly important in over allocated water catchments for example as lapsing a consent is one of the mechanisms that a council will use to claw back over allocation.  You may apply to the council to extend your lapse date, but you have to be able to demonstrate to the council that you have taken considerable action towards actually using the consent.  The maximum extension that would normally be given is a further two years.

Even if a consent has been used before the lapse date, it can still re-lapse if it is not used for a five-year period after that, so this is something that you also need to be aware of.   This is referred to as cancellation of a consent. 

Renewal of Existing Consents

There are also important deadlines around renewing resource consents.  An application to renew a consent that is received by the council at least six months prior to the expiry of the consent is guaranteed to be given ‘continuation’.  What this means is that you can continue to operate under your existing consent until such time that a decision is made on the replacement.  Getting continuation is critical if processing the renewal is likely to take considerable time like we have seen here in Canterbury where renewal applications have spent years in process waiting on plans to be developed. 

A renewal application received after six months but before three months of the expiry date may get given continuation, but it is at the council’s discretion. 

Securing continuation also means that you have priority to a resource over someone else competing for the same resource.  So again, if we think water permits where a resource is nearing its full allocation, you want to be able to re-secure your access to that water ahead of a new user.   

If you find yourself within the three-month window, then continuation cannot be given, and you must cease your activity at the expiry date.  If you are in an over-allocation situation again, this may cause issues with your renewal, and there is a risk of the council not granting the renewal consent (another way to claw back over-allocation). 

Expiry Date

Once a consent expires, and if no application has been received by the council to renew the consent within the required timeframes, then you no longer hold a consent to undertake that activity or have any right at all to renew it.  If you find yourself in this situation, and you do want to carry on undertaking your consented activity, then you have to apply as if you are a brand-new consent.  In over-allocated areas, you may not even be able to apply for consent as many councils have now made it a prohibited activity to apply for consent in over-allocated areas.  Prohibited means that you cannot even apply to the council – the door is shut tight. 

These dates are all things that any consent holder needs to know.  A resource consent is not an unlimited right for unfettered access to a resource, or to undertake an activity.  It can be revoked by not using it, or by failing to meet the timeframes around the renewal process.  

Also, a small request from this consultant.  An application for resource consent can take a fair amount of time to prepare – even if it is for a renewal, the amount of information required to be supplied is just the same as it is for a new application.  Therefore, please give your consultant plenty of time to get the application in – it is no good fronting up a week before the application must be submitted and expecting that it can and will be done in that timeframe, and the same goes for that magic Christmas deadline…

By Keri Johnston, Irricon Resource Solutions

Phone 0272 202 425 or email keri@irricon.co.nz

www.irricon.co.nz

Resource Consent Compliance

Resource consent compliance…three words that will generally illicit reactions such as a long sigh, a shuffle of feet, or a desperate look for just about any alternative to this less than exciting aspect of farming. There is a long list of things that need sorting on any farm and compliance management isn’t usually very high on that list.

However, as we all saw in the lead-up to the general election, society's microscope was placed squarely on the agricultural industries. Now more than ever, a higher level of diligence is required and expected to be sure that the correct resource consents are in place for what you are doing and that you are adhering to their content. A she’ll be right attitude won’t cut it and is likely to lead to some quality time with your friendly Regional Council Compliance Officer. The days of getting a consent, stuffing it in the desk draw and forgetting about it are in the distant past.

Let’s take a step back here. What is a resource consent? In essence, it is a licence to do something. In simplistic terms, you want to do “X” and to do “X” you agree to do (or not do) “A, B & C”. If you live in the Canterbury region and have been granted a new resource consent in the last few years, or renewed an existing one, there is a good chance that "A, B & C" has had a good portion of the alphabet added to it and the level of what is required has gone up a notch or two.

Don’t get me wrong, not every condition is onerous, and in fact your everyday on farm management will be ticking the boxes for a lot of conditions. “Don’t discharge effluent to frozen ground.” Done. “Avoid leakage from pipes.” Of course. “Avoid irrigating non-productive land and impermeable surfaces.” No worries, the end gun is programmed to turn off across there.

There are, though, going to be conditions that are less straight forward or just simply not easily remembered. Implementing a program of water quality monitoring on the stream that runs through your property with annual summary reporting isn’t something the average Joe has to deal with very often. And likewise, getting your water meter verified every five years isn’t exactly front of mind for most farmers.

How you deal with these types of conditions will vary according to your situation. For some people, it can all be a bit much at times and a bit of help is needed to tidy it all up.  At Irricon we offer a wraparound service to help out, called Compliance Pro. In the first instance, we can look at your consents to make sure they are right for what you are doing. With the aid of a software package we can store relevant documents and set up reminders for things such as meter verifications and backflow prevention testing. The software package works as project management tool where conditions can be worked through and ticked off so that you can be confident you are front footing your obligations rather than following a visit from the Council Compliance team or a firm letter in the mail. We can implement the work required to undertake and administer such things as water quality monitoring, seepage test or monitor the standing water levels of bores during the off season. We offer varying levels of involvement from help on just a couple of things to becoming the nagging mother you never wanted but always needed.

Ultimately, you have a choice in how you manage your compliance. You can be reactive or proactive. If you are sick of having the Council on your case, if you think you could use a bit of help or want to change the approach you take to your compliance, let us know. We’d love to hear from you. Come over and check us out online at http://irricon.co.nz/.