A Mount Maunganui business owner has accused Tauranga City Council of a “she’ll-be-right” mentality before January’s landslide tragedy.

Six holidaymakers were killed after a section of Mauao collapsed into the council-owned Mount Maunganui Beachside Holiday Park at about 9.30am on January 22 during record rainfall.

The findings of the council’s external review into the landslide, prepared by retired High Court Judge Paul Davison, KC, were released yesterday.

Davison found the council “missed several opportunities” to evacuate campers to safety in a “preventable” disaster.

His review found more than two decades of recorded landslide risk to the campground and found that systemic issues within the council failed to ensure these were properly managed.

Tauranga City Council chief executive Marty Grenfell, Mayor Mahe Drysdale and the Hon Paul Davison, KC, at a media conference on the external review into the fatal Mauao landslide. Photo / Alyse Wright

The council has committed to implementing Davison’s recommendations, and its leaders have acknowledged the organisation had failed to properly manage risk at the campground over many years.

Rustica Pizzeria is located on Adams Ave opposite the campground but has closed “indefinitely” after seven challenging months following the slip.

Owner Michele Delaini said he believed the council had a “she’ll be right” mentality and in his opinion had “paid the price with the lives of six people”.

In his view: “I’ve done what I had to do to minimise the risk in my business. They [the council] didn’t do anything to minimise their risk.”

Davison said the hazard was not unknown and that, had a Trigger Action Response Plan (Tarp) been in place as experts had recommended, it would have prompted an evacuation and the victims would not have been in the path of the landslide.

“The loss of life could in all likelihood have been averted.”

However, the review did not determine civil, criminal or disciplinary liability, and Davison made no finding that any individual caused the deaths.

“It does not find that any individual did anything intentionally or deliberately wrong, or that any one or more persons’ acts or omissions caused these tragic deaths.”

Delaini said more lives would have been lost if Lisa Maclennan, a Morrinsville teacher who died in the landslide, hadn’t warned people to evacuate.

The six people killed in the Mauao landslide were (clockwise from top left) Pakūranga College student couple Sharon Maccanico and Max Furse-Kee, both 15; Rotorua property manager Susan Doreen Knowles, 71; Morrinsville educator Lisa Anne Maclennan, 50; Swedish tourist Mans Loke Bernhardsson, 20; and Rotorua interior design store co-founder Jacqualine Wheeler, 71.

Delaini told the Bay of Plenty Times he closed his pizzeria this month following further slippage at the campground site in July and the repeated closures of Adams Ave.

These are part of a landslide risk management process the council introduced after the January slip.

Delaini said he understood why the council was being cautious.

However, he said the council appeared to have done little about landslide risk for decades.

“They are trying to patch up whatever hasn’t been done for the last 25 years.”

Beach Hut Cafe owner Michelle Craig said the preventability of the slip tragedy was “horrifying” and “re-traumatising”.

“I couldn’t be more devastated.”

Craig said the council needed to “do better”.

She said she would like to see an evaluation of the council’s response to affected businesses after the tragedy.

Tauranga Business Chamber chief executive Matt Cowley said the review would be difficult news for Mount Maunganui businesses.

He said they were already facing prolonged disruption and “holding on for a really good summer”.

Cowley said Adams Ave businesses could face restrictions for another two years, adding to the financial pressure they had faced since the slip.

He said businesses relied heavily on foot traffic generated by Mauao, with its popular scenic walking tracks.

“Their rents are based on a million people walking around Mauao. With that significantly dropped off, that’s a lot of overheads and costs they have to bear.”

He said businesses had hoped remediation work on Mauao’s walking tracks would bring visitors back, but they now expected delays.

Cowley said businesses needed to work closely with suppliers, manage their finances carefully, and think creatively as they navigated the uncertainty.

“It’s a game of inches really at the moment … it’s gritting through.”

Bijou Johnson is a multimedia journalist based in Bay of Plenty. A passionate writer and reader, she grew up in Tauranga and developed a love for journalism while exploring various disciplines at university. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Classical Studies from Massey University.