Earthquake-prone buildings policies

The Building Act 2004 requires territorial authorities to develop policies on earthquake-prone buildings within their districts. The Department of Building and Housing has prepared policy guidance material to assist building officials. See Earthquake-prone building provisions: Policy guidance for territorial authorities. Hard copies are also available.

The guidance material is in two parts.

• The first is a high-level template providing a broad overview of what a policy could contain and how it could be set out.
• The second part is guidance information that follows the format of the template, but discusses issues in more detail and provides options that territorial authorities could follow.

A model policy that is based on the guidance material is also included.

The material does not set any mandatory requirements, but indicates the issues that territorial authorities may wish to consider during the preparation of policies.