Invercargill Mayor Nobby Clark announced a public meeting this week to address youth crime in the city. Photo: ODT / Supplied
Invercargill mayor Nobby Clark will be censured for a second time this year after he was found to have breached the council's Code of Conduct multiple times.
Two councillors complained after an interview where the mayor defended the previous times he had used the N-word at events, again repeating the slur as well as using homophobic slurs.
Invercargill city councillors voted to formally censure the mayor and ask him to make a sincere public verbal apology, during an extraordinary meeting this afternoon.
Councillors also voted to review the outcomes of the resolutions in their October council meeting.
It was an emotional meeting with a lot of frustration and disappointment at what councillors described as a pattern of behaviour.
Some were concerned he did not appear remorseful or to fully comprehend the impact his words were having on the community.
Councillor Steve Broad said the mayor had had multiple opportunities to reflect, apologise and change his behaviour and instead had chosen to double down and use obscene slurs.
"Following the opportunity right there to reflect and attempt to bring some good to a fairly bad situation at that point, instead our mayor repeatedly and provocatively - words from the report - challenges the interviewer to say a word that is universally understood to be obscene," Broad said.
Clark said he fully accepted his behaviour in the interview brought both the mayoral role and council into disrepute in a written response to the investigation.
He did not attend the meeting and sent his apologies.
"I have undertaken many external presentations over the last four years and while most are well received, I am not perfect and I accept that this type of interview cannot occur again," Clark said.
"I apologise to my colleagues for the impact on them and the Invercargill public."
While some councillors accepted the apology was enough, others questioned its sincerity.
Mana whenua representative Reverend Evelyn Cook said the apology did nothing to address the harm Clark had caused to many people in the community.
"If you are a young person of colour who lives in this city who is not sure of their gender identity or is very sure of their gender identity, you've got two strikes against you in the eyes of the mayor, given the words that were said or the inferences that were made," Cook said.
Councillors Ian Pottinger and Ria Bond lodged the complaint, with Pottinger describing the report as vindicating their decision, but said it came at a personal cost with both being villainised for wasting council time and money.
Councillor Darren Ludlow said Clark's behaviour and comments did not represent what the council believed, calling it embarrassing and a distraction.
Councillors voted that he had materially breached the council's Code of Conduct, agreeing to formally censure the mayor.
They voted that the apology he made in response to the investigation satisfied the report's recommendation, but a sincere apology should be made in person and in public at a council meeting.
Councillor Alex Crackett also successfully suggested a motion that council should check in and review the outcome at a meeting in October.
Deputy mayor Tom Campbell - who put forward the motion to formally censure and have the mayor apologise - also put forward a motion which included that council determined no further action would be in the broader public interest at this time.
But that failed to gain traction and was withdrawn.
A vote of no confidence or inviting the mayor to resign were possible actions they could take, but while councillors discussed both options, they didn't go to a vote.
Last month, Clark was formally censured, asked to step down from public appearances and a vote to formally ask him to resign was narrowly defeated after a separate complaint for offensive behaviour at a firefighter prizegiving.
