Commodore Shenanigan for Pirate King of Tāmaki Makaurau

There hasn't been much updates here. I have been meeting with local board candidates, when I'm not searching for a new home.

The Housing Crisis

People have a lot to say on the housing crisis, but how many candidates know what it's like to pay 80% of your income towards renting a mouldy illegal house, go to tenancy tribunal, then try and find somewhere else to live?

How many candidates mayoral candidates have experienced homelessness?

My son and I moved into a van at the end of 2018. After three tenancy tribunals where we ended up being moved on (despite winning on everything we took landlords to court for!), and paying astronomical rent, it seemed more viable to live in a van than to rent anymore.

I tried to move back into housing this year. My son is as tall as me now and my toyota hiace is a bit small for the both of us. But this will be my fourth time moving, and I'm struggling to find something where we can both feel safe and stable.

The Pirate King will fight for tenancy rights.

Did you know almost 50% of Auckland rents? You're probably too busy working your ass off to know that your neighbours are renting too.

Did you know there are 30,000+ empty homes in Auckland?

As Pirate King, I plan on initiating a series of by-laws to solve the inequity of housing. The first will be to massively increase rates for empty homes. A quarter of the value of the property you are land-banking. 

The next, is the Anti-homelessness by law. Any property can be let out to live in, even if it is unliveable, but it will need to be at an incredibly reduced rate. A similar law exists in the Netherlands, where students might let an office building and take showers at the gym. For 30 euros a month, you can live somewhere. We will bring that to Auckland City.

Housing is a Right

We all pay rates. renters pay rent, which pays rates. homeowners pay rates. What if we stopped paying banks, and instead, as a city, bought all the housing at once. Then we all collectively own it and rates would pay for upkeep and intensifying the city rather than investment companies. Ideally, we would make a standard rent, based on how much space is required for a person to live, and that would be paid to the city. Council would be the property managers, and it would become almost impossible to be evicted from your home.

Villas on Villas

What about those lovely Mt Eden Villas?

First off, those villas are poorly designed for New Zealand living conditions, they mostly face the wrong way, and we need more intensification where they are. 

We could stack them. Place them on platforms and make a cool looking shrine to the villa on every corner, and clear the space for a redesign of intensification and parks.

Or we could do an assessment of which houses are worth keeping and move them out of the city centre. 

How many houses do we need?

Let's be honest, the sea is coming. The floods and fires are coming. Global warming is here. And we have a responsibility as a nation to the pacific who are going to feel the worst of it. Auckland's population is likely to double in the next 30 years. I've not got statistics on that, I'm just assuming that climate refugees are going to want to come here, and we are going to have to let them in. With my civic planning team we are working on strategic designs for our city to expand its population but reduce its borders. No more ticky tacky houses with no yards, and no more museum of villas for the wealthy while the rest of us get pushed further and further away from the city.

For now, I will be cruising Auckland in my van. Illegally living because I have no other choice. I have to move out of this temporary accomodation and I'm not having any luck finding anything suitable permanently. As a parent, it makes me want to ugly cry every night. I'm one of 10,000 people in Auckland living in a vehicle.