Indian dishes not to official taste

KELLY HODEL/The Waikato Times

TOO MUCH?: From left, Dilip Kurien at his house beside one of the large satellite dishes, with Sagin Tholath and Lily Sagin.

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The cost of getting news from home is making the news among Hamilton's Indian community.

They are questioning a Hamilton City Council demand that they spend $1500 applying for resource consents for oversized home satellite dishes.

About 200 members of the Hamilton Malayalee Association have installed 1.8 metre satellite dishes so they can get news from home. But the dishes breach council policy that says they cannot be larger than 1.2m.

Council staff wrote to the Malayalees in mid-February demanding about 40 of the association's members remove their dishes by March 31 or stump up $1512 to obtain a resource land use consent.

Association chairman Dilip Kurien, one of the Hamilton West residents who received a letter, said the community did not want to break the law. However, he said that paying $1512 for a consent was too much. The community had asked to sit down with council staff and come up with a solution like paying the fee in instalments, but the city council says it won't budge.

"Any news we get here is second-hand news and we want to hear it first hand. It's a humanitarian issue," Mr Kurien said. "We have checked with the neighbours. Nobody has complained. If it looks ugly, paying $1500 won't make it look pretty."

Council spokeswoman Christine Watson said the rule was in place to protect the amenity values of residential areas and for the council to remain consistent in its approach to breaches of the district plan it could not exempt one community.

The council has granted the community a two-week extension to comply with its initial March 12 deadline "... so that they may continue to work with council to resolve their breach either by removing the dish or proceeding through the normal resource consent process to assess and mitigate any negative effects," Ms Watson said.

Hamilton West MP Tim Macindoe said his constituents had a valid concern and he had urged the council to meet the community half way. "The current council regulations effectively prevent migrants in our city from accessing programmes from their home countries."

He said he feared migrants would be put off moving to the city.

The district plan also states dishes cannot be installed closer than 3m to the road and 1.5m to a boundary. Neighbours may also need to give permission if they can see it from their property.

Rules vary in other districts and cities. Manukau City Council and Auckland City Council allow satellites up to 2m wide to be installed without a consent, while in the Waipa district satellites cannot exceed 1.5m wide.

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