Fran Wilde. Photo: Supplied
A former MP, Wellington mayor and regional council chair says she ran to be mayor of a Wairarapa council after people in the community told her they needed "strong experienced leadership".
Fran Wilde has held a number of high profile roles throughout her career, and progress results from this month's local body elections has her securing the South Wairarapa District Council mayoralty.
The well known politician decided to run this year with her key promises relating to transparency, collaboration and making timely decisions for the good of the district.
She told RNZ that she was not planning to run for the mayoralty but said over the past couple of years people had told her the council needed strong leadership.
"It wasn't going to be what I was going to do, I have been happily chairing boards."
Wilde said she lived in the area now, after buying a home there nearly 25 years ago.
She said it was the "most amazing place in New Zealand".
The councillors that made up the newly elected council were the people she wanted, Wilde said.
"They are highly experienced in multiple different fields and they will be able to bring to the council knowledge and understanding [decision] making processes that will be really valuable for us."
She said alongside a focus on the basics such as rates and water she wanted to drive economic development in the region.
"We can't just rely on the council to fund everything, we actually need our economy to grow and we are a small economy but it has great potential here in a number of areas."
The poor condition of the district's water treatment plants were driving up rates, Wilde said.
"I'll be working on that with the chief executive and the staff to see how we can take any cost out of that."
She said there needed to be a lot of focus on managing and renewing infrastructure in the coming years.
Wilde noted that the turnout for the latest local body elections in South Wairarapa was 58.16 percent - significantly higher than the national average of 32 percent.
"People are engaged, it could have been much higher of course, but nothing like some of the abysmal figures elsewhere.
"So one of the things I really want to do is get that engagement going and make sure we are using the wealth of talent we have."
It was "quite exciting" what could be done in a small population if they were working together, Wilde said.
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