Well that’s a wrap. Another election pretty much done and dusted and thankfully without the huge disappointment experienced in 2016 – in terms of participation and diversity.

If you haven’t been keeping up… Paula Southgate is our new Mayor elect beating incumbent Andrew King. She’ll be joined in the council chamber by…

East Ward
Mark Bunting
Kesh Naidoo-Rauf
Maxine van Oosten
Margaret Forsyth
Ryan Hamilton
Rob Pascoe

West Ward
Angela O’Leary
Martin Gallagher
Geoff Taylor
Sarah Thomson
Dave Macpherson
Ewan Wilson

Those following the voter returns for the weeks leading to election day know we were tracking to beat turnout for 2016 and 2013, and with special votes still to be counted we’re at 38.78% a 5 % increase. The highest turnout since 2004. Still painfully low but an encouraging increase nonetheless.

I’m celebrating – improved gender balance in our elected council, going from three women to six.

I’m celebrating because in 2016, none of our councillors were under 40, this time we have two – and an overall younger council.

I’m celebrating – councillors elected who advocated for the environment, climate action and cycleways.

I’m celebrating because we unseated four incumbents, which is basically unheard of – we traditionally like the status quo. Consequently we got rid of climate change deniers / racists and an anti-vaxxer.

We get the final final final results on Thursday – I’ll post again then. I’m still keeping my fingers crossed for Louise Hutt to take the sixth seat for the West.