Wayne Brown will continue as Auckland's mayor, with progress results showing a substantial election victory.
With about 80-90% of Auckland's votes counted by the afternoon of election day, Brown was about 90,000 votes ahead of Kerrin Leoni, who had received just over 56,000 votes.
The mayor spoke to media at Karanga Plaza Harbour Pool, which he calls 'Brownie's Pool', shortly after results were published on Saturday afternoon.
Glad to be done campaigning, he was ready for his victory lap.
"It's been like being in the dentist's chair for six weeks," Brown said. "I didn't enjoy it, I don't enjoy campaigning."
Brown earlier confirmed this would be his second and final term as mayor.
He said he was relieved and humbled to receive overwhelming support from Aucklanders.
"They've seen what I do, and it won't be much different - just finishing the job that I started."
Asked why he thought he won by a large margin, Brown said it was because he had been "quite plain about what I'm doing".
"I haven't quite finished everything I've set out to fix," he said. "Even today [Saturday] in the paper, somebody said I hadn't really done the things on the streets with transport that I said I'd do, but I haven't actually got my hands on AT [Auckland Transport] yet, but it's coming shortly."
Brown said a focus of his next term would be reforming the city's transport operator, which recently had its strategic powers stripped away and given to councillors.
"It's taken me three years to get that done, but I know exactly what I'm going to do there, so you can look forward to things getting better on our public transport and our roads."
He was joined by Desley Simpson, who, after being was re-elected unopposed for Ōrākei Ward on the mayor's Fix Auckland ticket and will be deputy mayor again.
"I genuinely believe what the mayor has done this term has probably been the most transformational change that Auckland has had since becoming a supercity in 2010," she said.
"One of the reasons the mayor has been re-elected is because he has made a huge leap, and people want... the changes embedded and finalised over the next couple of years.
"The Auckland Future Fund is part of that and Auckland Transport, we haven't finalised that agreement, and we're working towards that.
"It's going to be a dot the i's, cross the t's kind of term and I look forward to sharing the role in support of the mayor," she said.
Brown and Simpson said Aucklanders had a lot to look forward to, including the opening of the City Rail Link and the International Convention Centre on Wellesley Street.
"This is the biggest city, it's going to look like the biggest city and people will be proud to be here," Brown said.
Who else will sit at the council table?
The mayor congratulated those who would join him around the council table. He said a robust campaign had been fought across the city's wards.
Brown's 'Fix Auckland' ticket fielded council candidates in Albany and Manukau, trying to unseat councillors who had been critical of him, but he was only partially successful.
Fix Auckland candidate Victoria Short came in first in the Albany Ward race, with 12,862 votes. Incumbent Albany councillor John Watson maintained his seat, coming in second with 12,299, but Wayne Walker lost his seat by just a few hundred votes.
Incumbent Manukau councillors Alf Filipaina and Lotu Fuli also came out on top in their patch, both beating the third-ranked candidate by more than 5000 votes.
No other incumbent councillors lost their seats. Three councillors - Manurewa-Papakura's Angela Dalton, North Shore's Chris Darby and Howick's Sharon Stewart announced - their retirements from council and did not stand for re-election.
Other new councillors included Sarah Paterson-Hamlin for Whau, which is Leoni's former seat. Leoni only stood in the mayoral race and not for council.
John Gillon was elected as a North Shore ward councillor, alongside incumbent Richard Hills, who received more than 15,000 votes, the most of any councillor in the city.
Auckland voter turnout low
Auckland Council's governance and engagement manager Lou-Ann Ballantyne said voter turnout in the city's local elections was disappointing, tracking at about 24% with 80-90% of votes counted by Saturday afternoon.
She said, despite more opportunities for Aucklanders to have their say than ever before, voter turnout was one of the lowest compared to other regions.
She said the number of drop-off locations had increased, and Aucklanders could enrol and vote at places like markets, universities and marae. Areas where voter turnout had historically been low were targeted, including in South Auckland.
"There's no sugar-coating it - it is disappointing, but it might just be because our community is OK with the way things are or didn't know which candidates to vote for.
"We'll look into what we might do differently next time around."
Ballantyne said special votes seemed up this year, compared to previous elections.
Long queues formed at special-vote stations across Auckland, before the polls closed at midday Saturday.
"We heard there was quite an influx of people where you could do a special vote, especially libraries," Ballantyne said.
Those in line before the cutoff had been able to vote.
By Jessica Hopkins of rnz.co.nz
SHARE ME