Winner of the Brighter Future Leading Innovation 2025 Award, the Build, Own, Operate and Transfer Model created as template that can pave the way for future social and affordable rental housing projects on marae across Aotearoa New Zealand.
A gathering place, Marae is a focal point for a community to be able to carry out cultural practices and traditions and basically be Māori. Up until the 1960s many rural marae had houses and whanau residing there. Over the years the houses slowly disappeared but more recently there’s a trend of whanau, particularly kaumatua (older people) wanting to return to live on their Marae. This in turn supports the oranga (wellbeing) of the marae.
The building of social and affordable rental homes on marae has traditionally been difficult and often unsuccessful. Past attempts have failed because marae were not the centre of the process, there was not a plan for the long-term viability of the housing and there was a lack of organisational capacity building for the marae.
When Tauhara North Kāinga secured the funding they needed to to build 16 affordable rental homes for kaumatua across four Ngāti Tahu-Ngāti Whaoa marae, an innovative way had to be found to enable the project to meet the requirements of all the critical partners and succeed. They developed a new model called
Build, Own, Operate and Transfer (BOOT) which establishes a housing partnership with each marae, based on tikanga (cultural principles) and the principle of mana motuhake (autonomy).
BOOT includes well defined responsibilities, capability building support to the marae and a definite plan to transfer the ownership of the homes to the marae within 15 years. It addresses past issues, creates long-term viability and enables sustainability.
This groundbreaking model brings kaumātua home to their marae and revitalises communities where homes haven't stood since the 1960s. And best of all, it establishes a template that other marae across the country could follow and learn from.
Note: Tim refers to the Invisible People podcast, which you can listen to here.
From more presentations from the Australian Homelessness Conference,
visit AHURI's YouTube channel.
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