{"id":71495,"date":"2025-10-11T06:24:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-11T06:24:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/71495\/"},"modified":"2025-10-11T06:24:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-11T06:24:07","slug":"local-elections-2025-tania-tapsell-re-elected-as-rotorua-mayor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/71495\/","title":{"rendered":"Local elections 2025: Tania Tapsell re-elected as Rotorua mayor"},"content":{"rendered":"

While subject to change, progress results have Tapsell holding a giant lead over her two nearest candidates, councillors Don Paterson in second and Robert Lee in third.<\/p>\n

Paterson congratulated Tapsell on her win, saying she had some \u201cbright policies\u201d he looks forward to seeing \u201ccome to fruition\u201d. <\/p>\n

\"RotoruaRotorua Mayor Tania Tapsell celebrates after being re-elected for a second term today. Photo \/ Facebook<\/p>\n

Paterson has been re-elected to the council and said he is looking forward to working with Tapsell again. <\/p>\n

Lee also offered congratulations to Tapsell: \u201cDemocracy has spoken and good on you,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Tapsell has been a Rotorua councillor on three occasions and was first elected mayor in 2022. <\/p>\n

Her campaign saw her seek re-election based on \u201cunfinished business\u201d from her first term, including the reopening of the Rotorua Museum and delivery of core services.<\/p>\n

Tapsell confirmed that Sandra Kai Fong will return as deputy mayor, following her re-election to the general ward.<\/p>\n

\u201cTogether we gave the previous term our all, I\u2019m so proud of the progress we achieved for this great place we call home.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council seats<\/p>\n

Paterson and Kai Fong will be joined on Rotorua\u2019s council by new faces Ben Sandford and Te-Rika Temara Benfell. <\/p>\n

Initial results place Sandford, a former winter Olympian, third in the voting for Rotorua\u2019s general ward, <\/p>\n

He will be joined by returning councillors Fisher Wang, Gregg Brown, Paterson and Lee from the general ward, although it is close between Lee and Conan O\u2019Brien for the sixth seat. <\/p>\n

In the M\u0101ori ward, Temara Benfell has come out on top in the early tally for the three seats.<\/p>\n

Trevor Maxwell is in second and set to crack a half-century as a councillor, setting an outright New Zealand record for his service. <\/p>\n

The third seat is currently going to former Rotorua Lakes councillor Merepeka Raukawa-Tait, but her narrow lead over sitting councillor Rawiri Waru could easily change in the final wash-up.<\/p>\n

Karen Barker was elected unopposed to the rural ward. <\/p>\n

Bay of Plenty Regional Council<\/p>\n

Newcomers Raj Kumar and Anna Grayling will be the Rotorua Constituency councillors on the Bay of Plenty Regional Council, ousting long-serving councillor Lyall Thurston.<\/p>\n

Allan Iwi Te Whau is set to be the new \u014ck\u016brei M\u0101ori constituency councillor, meaning Te Taru White loses his seat.<\/p>\n

Story continues after blog<\/p>\n

Full progress results<\/p>\n

Mayor<\/p>\n

Tania Tapsell<\/p>\n

General ward<\/p>\n

Fisher Wang<\/p>\n

Sandra Kai Fong<\/p>\n

Ben Sandford<\/p>\n

Gregg Brown<\/p>\n

Don Paterson<\/p>\n

Robert Lee<\/p>\n

M\u0101ori ward<\/p>\n

Te Rika Temara-Benfell<\/p>\n

Trevor Horowaewae Maxwell<\/p>\n

Merepeka Raukawa-Tait<\/p>\n

Rural ward<\/p>\n

Karen Barker<\/p>\n

Rotorua Rural Community Board<\/p>\n

Colin Guyton<\/p>\n

Tina Marshall<\/p>\n

Karen Forlong<\/p>\n

Tina Rose<\/p>\n

Bay of Plenty Regional Council – Rotorua constituency<\/p>\n

Raj Kumar <\/p>\n

Anna Grayling<\/p>\n

Bay of Plenty Regional Council – \u014ck\u016brei M\u0101ori constituency<\/p>\n

Allan Iwi Te Whau<\/p>\n

Mathew Nash is a Local Democracy Reporting journalist based at the Rotorua Daily Post. He has previously written for SunLive, been a regular contributor to RNZ and was a football reporter in the UK for eight years.<\/p>\n

\u2013 LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While subject to change, progress results have Tapsell holding a giant lead over her two nearest candidates, councillors…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71496,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[836,3225,806,7797,56662,440,10934,111,43,139,69,13194,56522,5909,1327,44160,56661],"class_list":["post-71495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-836","tag-according","tag-as","tag-elections","tag-landslide","tag-local","tag-mayor","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-progress","tag-reelected","tag-results","tag-rotorua","tag-tania","tag-tapsell"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71495","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=71495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71495\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}