Residents along the Kaituna River will today voice concern over an application to increase the speed of the Kaituna River Jet at a regional council hearing.

Aerius Limited, trading as Kaituna River Jet, has applied for a Speed Limit Uplifting on the mid-section of the river.

Some residents along the Kaituna River are not happy about a jet boating company applying to have the speed limit on the river increased.

But some residents along the river want the jet boats removed altogether saying the operation is a big contributor to river bank erosion.

Submissions on the application closed on Wednesday, October 16 and a hearing will be held at Classic Flyers in Mount Maunganui from 11am today.

In March this year farmers alongside the Kaituna River expressed their frustration at the BOP Regional Council's inability to act on a NIWA report recommending removing the Kaituna jet boat from the river altogether.

Locals have complained for several years that the jet boat tourist operation is a major cause of river bank erosion. Following complaints, the regional council commissioned NIWA to assess the effects of commercial jet boating on the river.

Kaituna property owner Janine McGowan says the NIWA report, released in February 2012, recommended removing stock access, and refusing licence renewal and consent to run the jet boat.

But that didn't happen and at a later meeting Janine says a regional council representative told the farmers they didn't see the NIWA report in the same light.

She says the council representative said the recommended non-renewal of the licence, and/or consent for jet boating, doesn't mean stop the jet boat, but instead means the regional council should focus on removing stock from river banks.

'His response typifies the denial of damage and the avoidance of river management responsibility pertaining to this commercial jet boat,” says Janine.

'No stock have access to our considerable stretch of the river, yet our banks are continually cracking back and then slumping in. Plants that I've planted over the last decade have all either gone, or are so far down by the water that I can't reach them.

'I personally think it is criminal that an organisation of this stature continually avoids its responsibilities.”

There is also confusion over the consent for jet boating on the Kaituna. The resource consent for the jet boat operation was part of the land use consent granted for the park's tourist operations in 1986 by the then Tauranga County Council.

Western Bay of Plenty District Council consents officer Chris Watts says that was all the information included in the application.

'It didn't go into any of the detail you or I might require in an application these days. The consent was granted subject to conditions, but that land use consent actually contains no review provisions or conditions.

'It doesn't provide any means of restricting or revisiting the scale or scope of the jet boat operation. There's no restriction on hours, noise, the numbers of jet boats or anything like that.”

The Western Bay of Plenty District Council handed over authority for the river to the regional council in July 1993. Since then the Western Bay has relied on the regional council to enforce that section of the plan.

The regional council is responsible for activities on the water, says Chris.

'We will do the land use consent, but we have no conditions to enforce. There's some dispute from the regional council that that was never completed, but there is a council resolution that shows those powers were transferred,” says Chris.

The jet boat operation has a current Navigation Safety Licence issued by the Bay of Plenty Regional Council Harbourmaster, which allows the operator to exceed 5knots in certain situations. The licence expired in March.

Its reissuing is purely a navigation safety issue. The regional council cannot use the jet boat's erosion of the riverbank as a reason to refuse a navigation licence.