This Act may be cited as the Whakatane Harbour Amendment Act, 1917, and shall form part of and be read together with the Whakatane Harbour Act, 1912, which Act is hereinafter referred to as the principal Act.

This Act shall be deemed a special Act within the meaning of the Harbours Act, 1908.

Section eight of the principal Act, as amended by section three of the Whakatane Harbour Amendment and Empowering Act, 1915, is hereby further amended as follows:—

Paragraph (a) of section three of the Whakatane Harbour Amendment and Empowering Act, 1915, is hereby repealed.

Section eight of the principal Act is hereby amended by inserting, after the words “the improvement of the harbour,” the words “or of the Rangitaiki Outlet Harbour, or any other harbour or navigable estuary within the Whakatane Harbour District.”

Whereas that piece of land, containing one rood and twenty-six perches, included in plan deposited at the office of the Marine Department, at Wellington, under Number M.D. 4820, and lying between the Whakatane River and the road or street in the Town of Whakatane known as the Strand, has been gradually formed by action of the Whakatane River: And whereas on the formation of the Whakatane Harbour Board pursuant to the Whakatane Harbour Act, 1912, an adjustment took place between the said Board and the Whakatane County Council, which had previously exercised the functions of a Harbour Board in respect to the Harbour of Whakatane, whereby it was agreed, inter alia, that the said piece of land, not being required for road purposes, should be closed as a road and vested in the Board: And whereas the Whakatane Town District has since been formed, and the Board of such district has concurred in the said agreement upon the condition that the said Harbour Board shall, as soon as the said portion of road shall be closed and vested in it, transfer to the said Whakatane District Town Board, or to the Whakatane Borough Council if formed, the section of land hereinafter mentioned, which the said Harbour Board has agreed to do: Be it therefore enacted as follows:—

The said piece of land is hereby closed as a road and vested in the Whakatane Harbour Board for an estate in fee-simple, with power to subdivide and lease the same in the same manner as land vested in it under the Whakatane Foreshore Reclamation Act, 1908, and to grant or set apart such rights of way as to it may seem expedient.

The said Harbour Board is hereby further empowered to grant, transfer, or lease to the Whakatane County Council, on such terms as may be mutually agreed upon, a strip of land along the eastern side of Section 10 on a plan of a subdivision of a part of Section 1, Block III, Whakatane Survey District, deposited in the Land Transfer Office, at Auckland, under Number 7871, and being part of the land comprised and described in certificate of title, Volume 287, folio 23, in the Auckland Land Registry, not exceeding in area four perches, on which strip portion of the Whakatane County Chambers is now erected.

The said Harbour Board is hereby further empowered to grant and transfer to the Whakatane Town District Board, or Borough Council, if formed, a section of land to the east of the proposed diverted course of the Wairere Stream, such section to comprise an area of not less than eight perches nor more than sixteen perches.

Section four of the principal Act is hereby amended as follows:—

Section seven of the principal Act is hereby amended by inserting, after the word “Omataroa,” the word “Whakatane.”

The Schedule to the principal Act is hereby amended,—

Nothing in the foregoing provisions of this section shall affect the present representatives of the Omataroa Riding on the Whakatane Harbour Board, which representatives, or their successors, shall continue to hold office until the next general election of members of the Board.