Te Kopuru is a village just south of Dargaville and is steeped in 150 years of history.

The local Domain was once a busy space boasting an athletic track and bowling club, a real hub of community activity however overtime has become a barren space waiting for something to happen.

The Te Kopuru Community Development Group (TKCDG) was formed in 2019 to support the development of the Te Kopuru Domain. This had come after members of the community had shown an interest to develop areas of play there for the tamariki.

The TKCDG has several projects they would like to do in the park which sees stage one with a bike park which incorporates a pump track.

While it has been a slow process to date with no monetary allocation for this park, recently the Kaipara District Council Long Term Plan submissions were held and the TKCDG submitted to the Council asking to provide some monetary support to the plan to help with the development of the Pump Track.

In addition to the submiss, a large group turned up to the Council submission hearing with photos and a word each of them carried, spelling out a sentence simply saying, “Please help us make a place to play at T K”.

This really pulled at the heart strings of the elected members who were very interested in how they could help with the projects and asked what the voice of the tamariki had said. These ranged from Otis saying, “it will help us with our health”, Tikia explaining that it “gets kids off their phones and outside”, Manea describing that “we can get away from our Parents”, and Tama stating “bring the community back together”.

The Council, following their deliberations, decided to allocate $20,000 to the project which was fantastic and showed they were willing to listen to the voice of the community. Well done Kaipara District Council.