Auckland Council will regain control of Motukorea Browns Island for the first time in 26 years after the Government agreed to hand management of it over to the city.
The inshore 60-hectare island, which is one of the best preserved volcanic cones in the Auckland area, has been managed by the Department of Conservation (DoC) since 1990.
"It makes sense for Auckland Council to manage an island it owns," DoC's Andrew Baucke says.
Auckland Councillor Mike Lee says it should become Auckland's next regional park. "Hopefully the decades of neglect of this marvelous gift are over," he says.
It was sold to Sir John Logan Campbell and business partner William Brown in 1840 by Ngati Tamatera, and remained in private hands until 1955 when it was gifted to Auckland City by business leader Sir Ernest Davis.
DoC took over control of the island, the nearest island in the Hauraki Gulf to Auckland, after the abolition of the Hauraki Gulf Maritime Park Board.
A fire damaged a quarter of the island in November when person stranded there lit a signal fire which got out of control.
Newshub.
