Consultation on the proposed amendment to the Freedom Camping Bylaw 2023 closed on Friday 14 November 2025.
An amended bylaw was adopted by Council on 16 December 2025 and comes into effect on 22 December 2025.
The purpose of the Freedom Camping Bylaw is to protect our unique environment and our residents from issues associated with freedom camping and provide information on areas within the Waikato district that are appropriate for freedom camping.
Waikato District Council respects the privacy of individuals and is committed to complying with the Privacy Act 2020 in respect of the personal information we hold.
This Privacy Statement describes how Waikato District Council collects and uses your personal information collected through the 'Shape Waikato' website.
Waikato District Council collects your data as part of providing its online community engagement services, informing you about these services, complying with contractual and other legal obligations, responding to your enquiries and administrating its community engagement technology.
The information we collect about you includes:
User feedback
We collect comments, votes, posts and selections you contribute when interacting with the feedback mechanisms provided through 'Shape Waikato' which include:
This information is analysed by Waikato District Council staff and third party contractors who have been engaged to assist in the analysis of data collected to inform the creation of better projects, plans and policies.
Can you remain anonymous or withhold personal information?
Yes. You can access and participate in select 'Shape Waikato' engagements anonymously, without disclosing any personal information. Some identified engagements may require you to register and establish an account in order to participate.Users may choose to adopt a pseudonym for these engagements.
Registered Users
When you register for a 'Shape Waikato' account or sign-in to your existing account, the information we collect includes:
For engagements where you do not register for a 'Shape Waikato' account, we may seek to collect from you:
Demographic details are requested in order to help us determine the degree to which views of participants are representative of a diverse cross-section of the community.
By providing an e-mail address you help us protect the integrity of the discussion from individuals and groups who may attempt to unduly influence the outcome of the consultation process anonymously. For example, we check to ensure each user has a single email account on site.We also frequently review the site for trolls and spammers.
If you are registered and signed-in to your user account, the contributions and feedback you provide may be linked with your username and any demographic details you have recorded in your account.
Council may use information collected in order to:
Personal information may also be collected and accessed by Social Pinpoint to internally analyse and improve their software. Please refer to Social Pinpoint's Privacy Policy for more information.
Only Council and its members, employees and agents will use personal information collected on Shape Waikato unless the law authorises or requires otherwise.
Email notifications
If you subscribe to receive notifications about upcoming consultations and other engagement activities, the email address you provided will be used by Waikato District Council to send you information and updates about new opportunities for you to have your say.You can unsubscribe from these notifications at any time.
Site visit data
The Site’s web-server automatically collects the following de-identified data for statistic and system administration purposes only:
To the extent that this data could make you identifiable, Waikato District Council and Social Pinpoint will not attempt to identify individuals from records the server automatically generates unless necessary to investigate a breach of law or regulation.
When you sign up for and use the ‘Shape Waikato' service you provide two types of information:
Publicly available information
Publicly available information is limited to your username and any comments you leave under that username in the forums or other feedback tools published to ‘Shape Waikato’.
You can use your first name or an anonymous username if you do not want your full name attached to forum and guestbook comments, stories or questions.
Feedback (including overall results of polls and surveys, and in some instances, quotes from forums and surveys) may be published in publicly available reports at the end of the consultation period.
Submissions made to Waikato District Council pursuant to the Local Government Act 2002 (submissions on annual plans, long term plans) are public documents. Names or usernames on submissions will be included in reports to Council.
Storage of personal information
Information entered into 'Shape Waikato' will be held in a server located in Sydney Australia and will also be downloaded into the Waikato District Council systems.
Disclosure of personal information
Waikato District Council will take all reasonable measures to prevent unauthorised access to, or unlawful disclosure of, your personal information.
Access and correction
You may seek access to your personal information that Waikato District Council holds.
You may also seek corrections to your personal information that Waikato District Council has collected if you believe it is inaccurate, out-of–date, incomplete, irrelevant or misleading.Waikato District Council is required to take reasonable steps to correct personal information to ensure that, having regard to the purpose for which it is held, the information is not inaccurate, out-of–date, incomplete, irrelevant or misleading.
Links
This ‘Shape Waikato’ Privacy Statement does not apply to third party websites or digital services which may be linked to from content published to 'Shape Waikato'. We recommend you read the privacy statement of the relevant service when you access these sites.
Contact
If you wish to access or correct your personal information please contact consult@waidc.govt.nz
Definitions:
Personal Information means information about an identifiable individual.
This site is owned and operated by Waikato District Council using software licensed from Social Pinpoint. For details of how Social Pinpoint may access personal information, please refer to Social Pinpoint’s Privacy Policy.
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