'Home Videos’ help explain Council business

The short videos, called Home Videos, explain topics from understanding consents, to creating warmer and healthier homes, to tips on earthquake strengthening.

The clips can be found on huttcity.govt.nz/video-library and other links throughout Council’s website; they are also shown on some of the digital screens in libraries and Council offices.

Divisional Manager Environmental Consents Helen Oram says, “About a year ago we discussed how much time our officers were taking to explain building consent processes to the public. We thought about the best way to simplify the information and in this visual world, an animated suite of short videos was created. When the quake happened, it stimulated ideas on how we could get information out about home safety as well.”

The six short videos cover:

• Upspec Your Build, building beyond Code for better warmth, comfort and energy efficiency
• Get a LIM, explaining what it is and why they are useful when buying or selling a home
• Building Consents Explained
• Resource Consents Explained
• Home Pool Safety
• Earthquake Strengthen Your Home, with achievable ideas for home owners or renters on how they can make their home safe in a quake.

So far feedback has been good. “We direct customers to view Home Videos and have had positive feedback. As a result this has freed up time for administrative processing work so we can meet consent deadlines as early as possible.”

Oram has even greater plans as she thinks Hutt City Council may be one of the first councils to have created this resource for customers. 

“We have created these videos with the ability for other councils to use them and lay over their own branding and contact details. So far we know Wellington City Council is linking to some of the videos and we are beginning to let other councils and relevant agencies know about them.”