Piles of wet, smelly furniture, carpets, toys, and gib line the roads in Waiohiki, Napier after Cyclone Gabrielle. Photo: RNZ / Jemima Huston
Napier's local authorities were "hugely unprepared" for Cyclone Gabrielle, a new report has found.
The Napier City Council commissioned an independent review into its response to the deadly February cyclone that ravaged several parts of the North Island.
Cyclone Gabrielle stands as one of the country's deadliest and costliest disasters in modern history.
Grant Robertson, who was the finance minister at the time, warned Gabrielle would have a "multi-billion dollar price tag".
The Resilient Organisations report, which proposed 15 key recommendations, found the city council's preparedness for a major emergency was significantly lacking.
"[Napier City Council] was hugely unprepared for Cyclone Gabrielle in terms of [emergency management] capability.
"Emergency readiness planning was not institutionalised within NCC.
"Although I commend efforts that commenced in 2022 to rebuild this capacity, it was too little and too slow."
Information for the report was sourced from a mix of internal council documents, including response teams reflections, and 39 interviews with key responders.
Separate workshops involving councillors, internal council staff that responded and external agencies also fed into the report.
The report found very few council staff involved in the response had received any emergency management training.
"The result of so many people learning on the job (and in the absence of procedures, systems, and templates) was significant inefficiency, delays, duplication, extreme hours, and difficulties in becoming proactive rather than reactive," it said.
"It also exposed some staff to significant risk, including to their individual wellbeing."
Some reported high levels of anxiety and fear due to their lack of knowledge and confidence in emergency management situations, affecting their ability to make and perform effective decisions.
"Emergency management is a team sport.
"When a team has only one or two players with any knowledge of the rules it leaves them in an incredibly challenging position."
The dedication of staff, many of whom went "above and beyond", was highlighted as a positive in the report.
But this ethos was not across the board with the review proposing a lack of clarity around staff roles and responsibilities.
"Significant numbers of staff were unclear on the council's roles and responsibilities in emergency management.
"Many referred to CDEM as somebody or something else.
"While many staff went above and beyond any reasonable expectation to make it in to help, there is a perception from some staff that others who could have, did not."
The suitability of the Emergency Operations Centre location was also questioned after a power cut forced a relocation during the response.
"Although achieved very swiftly, the necessity of moving operations from Cape View to the Post Office is far from optimal and while great adaptability was shown in setting up the venue, there were significant shortcomings in the functionality of the space."
A gap in coordination between the city council and Hawke's Bay's Emergency Management Group was also highlighted, a matter that had caused "disappointment and frustration" for council staff.
"The concept of locally led and regionally coordinated was not necessarily well understood by the many staff working in response with no prior training."
Key recommendations include training for staff, greater resourcing, improving the resilience of the city's infrastructure, and bringing the iwi liaison function into council and improving its resourcing.
Council community services executive director Thunes Cloete said he welcomed the report's recommendations.
"The reviewers recognised the impact of future events may be different to the impacts from Cyclone Gabrielle," he said.
"The recommendations will help us to improve our preparedness for a range of potential crisis situations."
