Hutt County Council Minute Book, May 1956

Hutt County covered a lot of the outlying areas of what is now Hutt City. As the towns and cities of Lower Hutt, Upper Hutt, Wainuiomata, Eastbourne, Petone, Wellington, Poriua, and Kapiti grew, more and more of the 'ridings' and Towns of Hutt County broke off to form, or where added to the Boroughs and City Councils. One of these was Stokes Valley. 

Caption: Hutt County Council Minute Book. Ordinary Meetings. July 1955 - 19 June 1956. Reference: Arch 31455

People who live in Stokes Valley may remember the often very heated debate as to whether they would be better off staying with the County or becoming part of the City of Lower Hutt. These pages show the minutes of the County Council from May 1956 when they were very concerned at losing what they saw as an important part of their territory. Minute books are often seen as rather dry – very much the official record - but beneath the polite language its not difficult to see the personalities and emotion.

The minute books of the council and its predecessor authorities form what are called the core records. In other words even if we lost all the other items in the Archives, if we still had the minute books we would have a record of Council’s decisions over the years and how that impacted on the people of Lower Hutt.