Historical Council Minute Books

A fascinating window into Councils past.

Read the minute books on the Tasman Libraries Heritage website.(external link)

Through the hard work of our staff and the amazing assistance of NZ Micrographic Services, we have recently completed a project to make over 200 minute books from old Council meetings available online.

The minute books, featuring former county and borough council minute books between 1863 and the 1989 amalgamation to form Tasman District Council, have been published on the Tasman Heritage section of the Tasman Libraries website.

The digitisation project offers the public free online access to historical information. The books are in PDF format so at this stage, all records still have to be manually scrolled to find the specific piece of information you are after.

The information contained in the books, neatly handwritten or compiled with the help of a typewriter, offers a window into the past and how meetings proceeded. Providing an accurate record of the past means readers may find statements within the many pages that reflect the period in which they were created but may not be appropriate in 2023. However, it’s reassuring to see how far we’ve come.

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