{"id":479692,"date":"2026-06-16T07:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T07:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/479692\/"},"modified":"2026-06-16T07:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T07:22:09","slug":"south-waikato-councillor-zed-latinovic-censured-investigation-costs-ratepayers-34k","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/479692\/","title":{"rendered":"South Waikato: Councillor Zed Latinovic censured, investigation costs ratepayers $34k"},"content":{"rendered":"

Latinovic loudly raised his opposition<\/a> to that adjournment by the mayor.<\/p>\n

The second part of the complaint related to the deferred meeting in March, where Latinovic accused the chief financial officer of \u201ccreative accounting\u201d.<\/p>\n

Both the mayor and Latinovic declared their conflicts of interest and excused themselves from last week\u2019s proceedings, leaving deputy mayor Maria Te Kanawa to chair the hui and Rotorua Lakes councillor Robert Lee to speak on Latinovic\u2019s behalf. Latinovic left his chair and sat in the public gallery.<\/p>\n

\u2018Natural justice\u2019 via social media<\/p>\n

\"\u201cWe\u201cWe will not be participating in a sham. Good afternoon,” Rotorua councillor Robert Lee said. Photo \/ Laura Smith<\/p>\n

Lee requested sufficient time to present a PowerPoint presentation in Latinovic\u2019s defence. <\/p>\n

Te Kanawa denied the request, giving Lee 15 minutes to speak to the investigator\u2019s report.<\/p>\n

He contended time was needed to fulfil his role in mounting a decent defence on Latinovic\u2019s behalf.<\/p>\n

The seriousness of the allegations, along with the potential to be, \u201c… named and shamed publicly, let\u2019s say defamed,\u201d was how Lee framed his request.<\/p>\n

Te Kanawa replied, \u201cCouncillor Latinovic has had natural justice by going through that [investigative] process. He had also had natural justice by expressing his concerns on social media.\u201d<\/p>\n

She reiterated that Latinovic\u2019s sentiments were public knowledge.<\/p>\n

\u2018We will not be participating in a sham. Good afternoon\u2019<\/p>\n

The refusal to conduct a defence caused Robert Lee to call out the proceedings and to walk out.<\/p>\n

Lee said they would not bother mounting a defence \u201cif this meeting is going to be a sham\u201d.<\/p>\n

The deputy mayor then asked Lee if he would use the 15 minutes allotted to him, to which he replied: \u201cWe will not be participating in a sham. Good afternoon.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then Lee, Latinovic and his supporters walked out.<\/p>\n

\u2018English is not his first language\u2019<\/p>\n

\"Put\u0101ruruPut\u0101ruru Ward Councillor Dave Shaw. Photo \/ South Waikato District Council.<\/p>\n

Fellow Put\u0101ruru Ward councillor Dave Shaw then advocated for Latinovic, calling him a friend, saying he knew him, \u201c…better than most people in this room.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important to understand the back story today, behind these events.\u201d<\/p>\n

In regard to the first complaint, Shaw said:<\/p>\n

\u201cWe [Shaw and Latinovic] honestly felt that (Standing Order) 12.4<\/a> allowed Mr Simpson the right to film. And that the mayor would be unable to force Mr Simpson to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shaw said when the public attending the February hui began to become abusive, Latinovic intervened, calling on the attendees to calm down.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, he stated that there was video evidence that \u201cexonerated Zed from yelling or being abusive at the meeting\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is the man that I know!\u201d<\/p>\n

Shaw continued to defend his \u201cbest friend\u201d, saying that English was Latinovic\u2019s third language. He explained Latinovic\u2019s choice of words to the chief financial officer was unfortunate and a correction had been made.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve had to help him from time to time to help him find the right word in English.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is clear to me that Zed means no harm, but rather the opposite.\u201d<\/p>\n

Latinovic \u2018did not fully understand\u2019<\/p>\n

Tokoroa Ward councillor Josiah Teokotai raised a motion that formed the core of Latinovic\u2019s censure.<\/p>\n

He said elected members should have the utmost concern about any complaints raised by council staff.<\/p>\n

Latinovic\u2019s behaviour was \u201c… destructive of the critical trust between staff and elected members\u201d.<\/p>\n

Teokotai said this impeded the council\u2019s ability to do its best for the community.<\/p>\n

He had formed the opinion that Latinovic didn\u2019t understand \u201cmuch of the technical information that comes before us as a council\u201d.<\/p>\n

Teokotai noted it was the finding of the investigation that Latinovic\u2019s lack of understanding contributed to his behaviour towards council staff.<\/p>\n

Latinovic told Local Democracy Reporting in a statement yesterday that, in his view, the council\u2019s decision wasn\u2019t reached through a fair process and he refused to accept their censure.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remain approachable and willing to participate in constructive discussion if [the] council is genuinely willing to take that opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

What the investigation report says<\/p>\n

Hill\u2019s report notes the complaint was made by the council\u2019s chief executive on behalf of council staff.<\/p>\n

Latinovic provided a comprehensive written response to her questions, followed later by a 52-page response.<\/p>\n

In the report, Hill said she found two breaches of the code of conduct. The initial breach, at the year\u2019s first council meeting, was at the low to moderate end, while the incident in March was moderate to serious.<\/p>\n

She did not consider it warranted one of the more serious penalties under the code such as removal of responsibilities.<\/p>\n

She noted the expense to ratepayers of such processes, though said in this instance the complaint was \u201cproperly raised\u201d.<\/p>\n

The council\u2019s censure means Latinovic is required to go through a range of remedial actions including a written apology to council staff, further training and mentoring on his duties, council procedures and conduct as councillor.<\/p>\n

Bronson Perich is a Local Democracy Reporting journalist for Taup\u014d and South Waikato based at the Waikato Herald.<\/p>\n

\u2013 LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Latinovic loudly raised his opposition to that adjournment by the mayor. The second part of the complaint related…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":479693,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[93774,16574,27079,802,5205,38290,26519,7557,87047,12898,241337,101,111,43,139,69,25718,1240,165,1524,102,53033],"class_list":["post-479692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-34k","tag-bill","tag-censured","tag-costs","tag-council","tag-councillor","tag-councillors","tag-district","tag-fivefigure","tag-investigation","tag-latinovic","tag-left","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-ratepayers","tag-south","tag-their","tag-waikato","tag-with","tag-zed"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479692","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=479692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479692\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/479693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=479692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=479692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=479692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}