Each year nominations are called to recognise excellence in the preparation of formal resource management documents such as policy statements and plans. The best overall document award this year went to the Proposed Waitakere City District Plan as an example of a document which clearly identified the resource management issues affecting the city, formulated objectives and policies which were linked to these issues and adopted methods which would, in high probability, lead to the achievement of the environmental results anticipated. It was presented in a clear, concise manner, including a high-quality colour map series and user-friendly liftout plan sections.

The Hawkes Bay Regional Air Plan, which received a document merit award, also exhibited many of these features and represented a state-of-the-art appreciation of guidelines, techniques and industry codes of practice which operate in this area of resource management.

Manukau City also received a special prize in recognition of the size of their one volume `omnibus' District Plan document - a pair of 4kg training dumb bells to assist their staff in their preparation for transporting the plan to meetings and hearings.