Business leaders to join Councillors in San Francisco

Business leaders will join a group of Christchurch City Councillors who will visit San Francisco next week to see how it made such a successful recovery from the devastation of its 1989 earthquake.

Representatives from engineering consultancy Opus International, transport specialists Abley Transportation Consultants, investment banks Murray & Company and Ocean Partners, Fulton Hogan and media group Mainland Press will join Councillors who will be hosted in the city by San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee.

The group will spend six days in the city, gaining an insight into the lessons San Francisco learned from its rebuild programme.

The delegation is scheduled to meet with experts and key stakeholders on a variety of subjects including urban design, public transport, housing reconstruction, restoring business confidence and tourism recovery, building code and building resilience, liquefaction, private sector partnerships and governance.

The Mayor of San Francisco Ed Lee says when San Francisco began the arduous task of rebuilding in 1989 after the devastating earthquake, countries from around the world provided essential aid to make the city’s rebirth a reality.

“Therefore we are committed to helping communities who have suffered an equal fate to come back as well,” Mayor Lee said.

“We are honoured to be considered a partner to Christchurch during this important phase of its reconstruction and we will do our best to connect its Councillors with the latest in policy and best practices that will help ensure its success.”

The delegation of five councillors – Deputy Mayor Ngaire Button, and councillors Jamie Gough, Aaron Keown, Tim Carter and Jimmy Chen – will leave for San Francisco on 15 May and return on 21 May. Air New Zealand have provided the airfares, however all Councillors have chosen to pay for their other expenses including accommodation and meals. They say it is important that there is no cost to ratepayers at what is a difficult time for the city.

The business leaders will pay for all their own travel expenses.

The group was due to spend time with Art Agnos who was Mayor of San Francisco during the earthquake and led the city during its recovery however Mr Agnos is now scheduled to be in New Zealand advising on the rebuild when the delegation is in San Francisco.