{"id":365415,"date":"2026-04-05T22:15:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T22:15:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/365415\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T22:15:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T22:15:12","slug":"horowhenua-mayor-says-street-racing-events-are-being-used-to-intimidate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/365415\/","title":{"rendered":"Horowhenua mayor says street racing events are being used to intimidate"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Horowhenua<\/p>\n

\nHorowhenua mayor Bernie Wanden.
\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Angus Dreaver\n<\/p>\n

The mayor of Horowhenua says street racing events are being staged to intimidate the public, and those involved will face consequences.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, four people were arrested after 200 cars gathered in Manawatu and Horowhenua<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It comes as the government progresses a law change<\/a> which will expand police powers and increase maximum fines.<\/p>\n

Mayor Bernie Wanden said he was confident the law change would make a difference.<\/p>\n

“There will be consequences for this stuff,” he said.<\/p>\n

\"Police<\/p>\n

\nPolice arrested four people, siezed two vehicles and issued dozens of infringement notices after busting a boy racer event in Manawat\u016b.
\nPhoto: NZ Police\n<\/p>\n

Police also ordered seven vehicles off the road and nine were impounded.<\/p>\n

Manawatu area commander Matenga Gray said police had received intelligence to suggest that there was going to be a meeting of boy racers.<\/p>\n

“So becoming aware of that, we launched an operation to deal with it.”<\/p>\n

Police from Wellington, Manawatu and Whanganui prevented the drivers from forming one big group, he said, and that made all the difference.<\/p>\n

“I think that led to the success of the operation. Historically we have been sort of caught off guard a couple of times but not anymore, we are well prepared for these, we know our tactics, we know what’s required and we respond appropriately.”<\/p>\n

Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Horowhenua mayor Bernie Wanden. Photo: RNZ \/ Angus Dreaver The mayor of Horowhenua says street racing events are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":365416,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48,47,111,43,139,69,49,46,44,45],"class_list":["post-365415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-audio","tag-current-affairs","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=365415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365415\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=365415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=365415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=365415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}