Not quite clear yet, but it seems the anticipated crunch has hit as some Aucklanders involved in 'organising' and assisting in logistics in Christchurch. Just as it would be hard to deny that panel beaters and towies know that following unexpected rain there are often car crashes that result in work. So too would Fletchers quickly register after the February 22nd quake that there would be more work for them in Christchurch. A number of Auckland demolition companies headed south soon after the quake and also the President on The Demolition Association.
The President, Diana Stil, is also involved with Nikau Contractors in Auckland who proclaim a nationwide service. Quiet early on Diana (perhaps after volunteering and announcing her Presidency) was seconded into helping Urban Search and Rescue, primarily sourcing specialist equipment that USAR required. She brought in help and was thanked by USAR for the job she and the others were doing voluntarily. It would be fair to say that contractors probably throughout the country were hoping for work and it seems not just a few went to the city expecting work. Complicating Diana's role of course, and despite her best intentions, was the impression that she was wearing 2 hats however noble her intentions were.
And so the big bad wolf arrived - a leader of Environment Canterbury, along with a local demolition company owner, and surprise, surprise, an Auckland competitor of the Company Diana is involved with. Environment Canterbury were unimpressed by the efforts of the NZDemolitionAssociation President, and so too the other two demolition company owners who had probably spent no little time working their way into the centre of the scene. Not quite gunfight at the OK Corral but a passable version.
The pity is that it is hard to distinguish a double role such as Diana attempted and it probably made her easy prey for the suggestion that she was intent on feathering her nest, the irony is, that even if she had an eye on finding work for her company, then no doubt the other 2 company owners had the same intention for their businesses - but not the complicating 2 hats role that was so obvious with Diana. I guess it is the nature of business, and additionally it's the nature of partisanship that the locals don't like the hotshots coming in from other cities and making public comment that doesn't pay regard to the local businesses and contractors.
To this point only one side of the story has emerged, Dianas, and it would be fair to say she has peppered her account with some feeling of being unappreciated. Whatever the case, I hope eventually that contractors in general will be able to be organised by an impartial body, such as tendering system and so forth, or preferred users lists by rotation because there's a lot of work to be done and faults such as false starts on who is in control waste time and cause bad feeling.
All said and done, if there were twenty tonne machines outside the cordon and a little more expansive thought for the problems faced in the suburbs and elsewhere, some of those diggers could have (or could be now) dug pits for plastic water tanks to be installed as holding tanks for sewerage, set up with temporary plumbing and water supplies to provide banks of flush toilets here and there about the city where needed. The tanks could be pumped out by suction vacuum trucks as they filled allowing a major problem to be temporarily bridged in a fairly inexpensive way while the more important protagonists fought the demo wars inside the cordon.
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