September 2025 project update

For Māori, Mahuru/Hepetema/September is a time of renewal, regrowth and the birth of spring.

We are on the cusp of gently closing our 2025 planting season, the largest regeneration season we have experienced. With 4,400 new natives in their rightful place to support recloaking Papatuanuku, we are becoming a part of the new ngāhere/native forest that is starting to surround us like it did a century ago.

The mahi that more than 780 volunteers have achieved to date in 2025 has enabled phenomenal scale, at pace. Local iwi, businesses, education institutions, retirement villages, NGO ecology experts, sports, public services and community members offer our rohe a genuine sense of hope that, if we wish to, can regenerate canopy cover across Albany Basin to an extent we have not witnessed for four generations.

The moral imperative to regenerate our depleted ecosystems and the non-human life that should or could be living in harmony within our urban space is irrefutable. The social, cultural and for many, spiritual imperative to restore the natural world is widely endorsed as paramount for the wellbeing of current and future communities' health.

The business case for investing in Te Taiao is no longer debatable as both our polar regions have hit four degrees warming, our natural defence from the sun thus eroding, and the climate crisis is already incumbent on us, impacting economies across the globe, with an expected global financial impact of 38 trillion dollars per year within 14 years. For indigenous cultures and for first movers in the commercial sector, nature is well recognised as a stakeholder in our economic success. This is a particularly pertinent concept for business in Aotearoa where we have the highest economic dependency on environmental health in the OECD.

The planet’s ecological systems offer habitat, shelter, shade, coolness, biodiversity, food, reduction in pollution, and protection from adverse weather as well as finite resources industry and society depends upon. She is a lifeforce and must be given the respect she deserves.

All partners in Te Hōnonga a Iwi have ably demonstrated their commitment to local people. More importantly though, they have shown the courage we needed to ensure we are committed to planetary perpetuity that is steeped in moral, cultural, ecological, and commercial imperatives to do the right thing. This enables us to reverse the impact generations of businesses, governments, and communities have had on depleting the planet’s finite resources and stimulating the greatest existential threat to humanity, the climate crisis.

More recently, society has been overconsuming and overproducing products and services that have resulted in overshooting the planet's available resources by July each year, at best ‘borrowing’ but at worst, pilferaging from children’s and the planet’s future in the pursuit of unsustainable growth and profit. We acknowledge the quest for lineal economic growth has had devastating consequences for planetary resources and non-human lifeforms. And we are committed to support each sector of our community to strive toward climate positivity.

Actions and outcomes achieved across September include:

-        Securing $56,220 from Auckland Council to pay for 0.75 FTE to cover working bee coordination and activation in 2026. This is extraordinary and we thank Sinead Brimacombe and Tim Johnson (UWEN) for their work in enabling this security. We understand the level of funding will not be available from this point onwards and are working to secure active business partnerships to have a blended resilience funding model from 2026.

-        We secured $10k from BUPA Foundation to erect a pergola over the new glasshouse to create all weather access to the mara kai working pad for people managing pain, balance or mixed abilities and to protect it from wayward hockey balls. Permission still needs to be granted from NHHA and AC within the LOA. We hope the roofline for the pergola and a future one to shade the water tanks, will offer us capability to install solar to run the irrigation pump, structures to facilitate vertical greening and increased freshwater collection capacity for watering the mara kai.

-        Since inception, all the value we have created at Te Hōnonga a Iwi amounts to $816,500 integrated value. This is a remarkable achievement from all our investors, thank you.

-        We are exploring applying for an Upper Harbour Local Board arts grant to generate more art within the restoration to increase public awareness for the role of nature in their lives, develop our culture and belonging within Rosedale Park and Albany and offer beauty to support enjoyment of our natural and built assets.

-        We are on the cusp of applying for the Meridian Energy grant for the materials and installation of solar power to power our irrigation pump at the mara kai.

-        We are in the process of sending an Auckland Council climate grant application for the extension of the food forest and finance to support the development of an education programme to build local business investment in travelling lightly to Te Hono, bringing their organic waste for vermicomposting, and beginning to green their gardens to increase local canopy cover and their walls with food forests

-        We have expressed interest to host a screening of Think Like a Forest, a remarkable NZ film that inspires ongoing action at pace and scale.

-        We are gearing up to apply for the waste minimisation grant to request support for four more vermicomposters to have capacity to build soil health through local business waste.

-        Elouise and Daniel have worked hard with support from many local schools and business investors including Trees that Count, Auckland Council, UWEN to finish our epic planting season. Untold thanks to you both.

-        They have successfully begun weekly trapping with the student leaders along the new trapline.

-        We have been gifted another F&B trap donated from a local whānau who are lifelong nature supporters, Louise and Brian Rogers. We look forward to welcoming them to site this month so they can get a sense of the work their Flipping Timmy will be doing to place pressure on invasive pest animals. Thank you for investing in Rosedale Park.

-        We continue to have our youth, hockey and community leaders investing hundreds of hours each month in water quality testing, chicken care, journalism, drone and camera photography, seed whakapapa, water management, vege seedlings, composting, education, mentorship, the newly formed strategic committee, research, innovation and development as well as animal and plant pest management whom form the backbone for the project and are our unsung heroes. Thank you to the core team for setting us up so we can achieve the vision and mission.

-        Adverse weather meant we had to cancel our first working bee in three years this month, but to form, Elouise swiftly managed to catch up on lost time and our coordinators have delivered 11 working bees at the restoration or mara kai in September! Magic! We especially thank Avient, KPMG, and Forbes for your ongoing partnerships for the restoration.

-        The mara kai has been transformed with the completion of the water tank and irrigation installation funded by NZ Landcare Trust and Upper Harbour Local Board, the installation of the glasshouse funded by Foundation North, the food forest constructed by Rangitoto College students, led by Brotherwood, and funded by Sky City foundation, the Auckland Council Shadehouse, and the tool shed built and installed by the Avient team funded by Theo Jaycox, Park Ranger. Our 2025 vege seedlings and the beehive and education session was part of Sky City’s funding as well as the development and installation of our first rat proof vermicomposter! Untold thanks to all these funders for investing in our ability to operate a native nursery in the shadehouse. The place looks near complete now and we will gain momentum with learning how to garden across the next few months with grateful support from Ben Zhang.

-        We must acknowledge local business leaders North Harbour Hockey Association, Albany Vet, Graydon from Atlas, Cat from Grow My Greens, Phil from IBC, Daryl from Hilton Brown, Chrissy from Central Landscapes, Matt from Untangled Landscapes, Ben from Little Ben Gardens and Josiah and Chris from NZ Machine Hire. This team is actively investing in the project regularly across each year and we could not do without their expertise, material supplies, equipment and loyalty. Thank you all. 

-        Research and Design post doc student Leane Makey is undertaking a qualitative research project looking at four different restoration projects across the motu using the More than Human design concept. We met with Leane and asked for her consideration to use Te Hono as one of the four regeneration projects. For members who are new to the concept of the More than Human Design model it helps people to better understand the rights and needs of non-human living entities in a way that does not separate the rights of nature from human rights. The model asks the question ‘why are our designs human centered when we coexist alongside billions of animals, plants and other living things?’ It might be helpful to imagine that our cities share the land, water and atmosphere with thousands of animals, plants and the microbiome. And our impacts should reflect our knowledge of their existence and their value and importance in their own right, not just their value to humans. If you would like to understand more about the More than Human model, the link takes you to one of the artists featured in the London Design Museum More than Human Exhibit https://futureobservatory.org/news/more-than-human-moth-rights-mural

-        UWEN submitted an application for one of our volunteers to be considered for the national emerging volunteer awards and they have been shortlisted as a finalist. We will enjoy the opportunity to learn what other organisations across the motu are achieving at the award ceremony in October. 

-        The Te Hōnonga a Iwi application to become an Incorporated Society, a process driven by Board Chair Sharyl Blythen and Secretary Matt Wardle, with professional support from Mayne Wetherall, was accepted. Amelia Porteous, MW, is now pursuing charitable status on our behalf. As we position ourselves to come out from UWENs umbrella, we have taken out insurance for our structural assets, arranging director indemnity and public liability to meet our LOA and IS requirements. It's been a big and rewarding job and we thank Matt, Sheryl and Jody Gilfilan for their skills and determination to secure our independence and ability to grow.

-        We have three new community members Peyton, from the Landing who will begin undertaking regular water quality testing at that end of the catchment, Andrew, direct from the States who is learning to trap with us and Lucy, a skilled communicator, who has joined the communication team as a journalist to reduce Sheryl’s load and support our capacity to share our learnings, knowledge, impact and outcomes. Thank you all for your roles and we look forward to meeting each of you soon.

-        We have talked with Plant Pass to ascertain if we could have their IP support to ensure we are rigorous with our biocontrols as we set up a new seed library next month. The costs are prohibitive for NFP organisations but their framework has strong value. With climate warming, and novel plant pests likely, we are interested in ensuring we grow safe ecological practices as we share our produce and become a seed library venue. Plant Pass will respond to our request for consideration of an alternate payment structure for NFP’s.

-        Education; we attended a seed island webinar, governance training, a workshop on regenerative modelling, a biodiversity accreditation webinar and we have expressed our interest for Sheryl and Matt to undertake a free local governance course with Auckland Council.

-        With partner Westminster School, we have a small feature for our mahi in the  Sustainability Initiatives Delivered by the Education & Community Climate Action Group Environmental Services July 2024 – June 2025 report (see page 13)

-        We are turning our focus on finding a temporary solution to protect the glasshouse from rogue hockey balls, if you have any idea for a material that will let light through but prevent an incidental hockey ball from entering the glasshouse area, please email Nicky on hello@restoringrosedalepark.org.nz

-        Graphic Designer Sam Weston has created a map to support volunteers to find us  easily- please take a look at the bottom of our website pages and click the link as required. We thank students who have fed back their difficulty in getting to us for the guidance to make improvements in this space!