🧵 1/2
While the story hook is Brad Pitt abandoning a QT river shoot, the reality is Queenstown Council polluting the Shotover river.
Regulator ORC has recorded illegal sewage discharges up to 9,000 times consented levels from the Shotover wastewater treatment plant. The disposal field is hopelessly broken, so QLDC is releasing 12,000 cubic metres of sewage *per day* for up to five years.
🧵 2/2
While 6,000 new homes are planned for the Wakatipu under National's fast track legislation, the infrastructure is not there to support them. They can't even service existing needs.
The jewel in NZ's tourism crown is pouring poo into the Shotover River.
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The small independent Crux is the only media properly pursuing this story, despite influential people wanting it hushed up.
The ODT which receives >$1m in ads from QLDC each year is conspicuously quiet.
In more bad news for QLDC, the wastewater systems in Wanaka and Hawea are both in desperately in need of upgrades. They're currently trucking waste from Hawea to a treatment plant.
https://www.odt.co.nz/regions/wanaka/infrastructure-%E2%80%98not-viable%E2%80%99-growing-need
Bob LeFridge 
Gruff Harding