There is an element of irony to discover that the first mention of a hospital for the Whakatāne District was for it to be located in Tāneatua . When the original plans were drawn up in 1895 for the establishment of the settler township of Tāneatua in the Ōpōuriao District , eight miles south of Whakatāne , provision was made for a future hospital to be located on the only hill within the township ’ s boundaries 11 . Section 24 ( 14 Morrison Street , Tāneatua ) on the northern slopes of the hill known locally as Te Puke o Ōtarahioi was set aside as a Hospital Reserve . Local residents , for many years referred to it as ‘ Hospital Hill ’.
In June 1910 , and again in 1912 and 1917 , the Board requested that action be taken to have the Section 24 land vested in the Board as Hospital Reserve 12 . Almost thirty years after the initial approach was made , Section 24 still had the Hospital Reserve designation and another attempt was made by the Department of Health to get the Board to agree to the cancellation of the reservation of the Section for hospital purposes . In January 1937 13 the Board responded with the following resolution :
That the cancellation of the reservation of this section be opposed on the grounds that it may be required in the future as a site for a residence for a district nurse .
Presumably at some point approval to cancel the reservation was finally given because , much later this section became the site of the Department of Conservation ’ s Urewera National Park Ranger Station from 1987 until 1993 and then from 1993 to the present day ( 2011 ), the campus for the Anamata Private Training Establishment .
11
Alison B . Heath , The Opouriao-Taneatua Settlement of 1896 , ( Whakatāne , Whakatāne & District Historical Society , 1989 ), pp 83-84
12
Bay of Plenty Hospital and Charitable Aid Board Minutes , Volume 1 [ 03.12.1902 – 21.06.1917 ], 8 June 1910 ( Auckland , Archives New Zealand , Reference . ADHL A1669 22975 6 )
13
Bay of Plenty Hospital and Charitable Aid Board Minutes , Volume 2 , [ 17.09.1917 – 25.03.1938 ], 28 January 1937 . ( Auckland , Archives New Zealand , Reference . ADHL A1669 22975 7 )
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