In addition to the management team we also have highly valued employees in these areas:
There are too many to name individually but these are the people who are the backbone of our company and who often are our on the job point of contact with customers and clients. They give our company its character and their work ethic is what the Rooney reputation is built upon. Our many skilled and dedicated people are a key asset in the success and performance of their work group and are fundamental to the continued success of the entire Rooney Group of companies.
Gary Rooney is the Director of the Rooney group of companies. He maintains a hands-on approach to running the business and has close contact with the other key leaders withing the various business units.
Colin was appointed as General Manager in February 2012 to take over some of the Group Management workload and day-to-day running of the company. Colin has a 25 year background working with civil maintenance and construction contracts and has spent the last 20 years in senior leadership roles. His skillset fits well into the existing management structure as Colin heads a team of managers building a sustainable, effective future for the business.
Formerly Ashburton manager, appointed as Rooney Consulting Manager in 2011. Andrew has 28 years experience in the earthworks and civil construction fields and specialises in Project management and Autocad pond design.
Crystal started with Rooney Group in July of 2010 as a trainee designer fresh from completing her Batchelor of Engineering. She has developed under the training of Steve Agnew, to now undertake the majority of the civil engineering design at Rooney Group. Her competencies include subdivision concept and full design, irrigation concept and full design, three water structural design, pavement design and has an excellent knowledge of local and regional authority engineering specifications from the Canterbury region. Crystal plays an active role on the committee of the South Canterbury IPENZ and maintains her professional engineering reputation throughout the industry.
Beginning with the business in the 2014 as a survey cadet, Callum has developed a vast knowledge of the Rooney Group and its many operational functions. As a Civil Engineer, Callum has designed many small to medium projects in addition to supervising the build of various civil jobs. In 2021 Callum was promoted to Waimate/Oamaru Area Manager where he manages the day to day works operations based at the Waimate and Oamaru depots. Callum has an excellent support network of long-term workers, local knowledge of the region and works closely with a broad range of clients.
In November 2018, Richard joined the team as the Timaru Area Manager bringing with him a wealth of knowledge and experience from over 40 years working in a civil and electrical environment in and around South Canterbury. Richard provides Rooney Group with experience and knowledge, organising a significant team of people and resources from the base in Timaru. His skills and local knowledge support a range of construction tasks including cable and service trenching, civil concrete construction, earthmoving, surfacing, stabilisation, and subdivision construction. Richard is the “go to” for getting the job done at the Timaru branch.
Rooney Group, founded in 1976 by Gary Rooney in Waimate, South Canterbury, is a New Zealand-based company that specializes in earthmoving, farming, irrigation, and tourism. Rooney Earthmoving is a leading civil contractor with a staff of around 200, providing services in earthmoving, irrigation, pipe and cable laying, cartage, and transportation. The company's divisions include Rooney Farms, Rooney Consulting, Rooney Contracts, Rooney Boring, and Ecotech. The company has completed complex projects for clients like TelstraClear, Oceana Gold, and Transit New Zealand. Rooney Group is committed to comprehensive health and safety, environmental sustainability, and maintaining the highest standards of quality.
Founded by Gary Rooney in 1976, Rooney Earthmoving began as a small business with a single bulldozer in Waimate, South Canterbury. Over the last four decades Gary has grown this business upon the strong principles of trust, reliability, high quality, innovation and customer satisfaction. Today, the Rooney Group of companies extends well beyond earthmoving to fibre cable laying, cartage and transportation, farming, irrigation scheme development, civil consulting, pond lining solutions and tourism operations. The Rooney Group remains 100% locally owned by Gary who is the hands-on managing director assisted by a skilled team of managers, engineers and operators.
Rooney Earthmoving is a leading New Zealand civil contractor, specialising in earthmoving, irrigation, pipe and cable laying, cartage and transportation. A staff in the order of 200, is employed in various companies and branches in Waimate, Ashburton, Christchurch, Timaru and Oamaru. While it has grown in size, the company remains 100% locally owned by Gary who is a hands-on managing director with a skilled and experienced team of managers, engineers and operators. Along with extensive equipment and internationally certified systems for quality, safety and environmental management, Rooney Earthmoving consistently completes projects ranging in size and complexity, on time and within budget.
We have 40 years of completing complex projects for clients such as TelstraClear, Oceana Gold and Transit New Zealand.
We have 40 years of experience, completing a range of complex projects with clients such as TelstraClear, Oceana Gold and Transit New Zealand.
From RELs earliest beginnings in the 1970’s as a one man operation using a Case 1150 bulldozer, Gary Rooney realised that keeping the customer happy was the key to survival in a competitive industry. That small start has now grown into The Rooney Group with Offices throughout the central South Island and a dedicated and highly valued staff of around 300. Most of our staff live in the areas they work and good customer service is taken as read; Do it once, do it right. Our Customer satisfaction is not limited to small projects - The Rooney group also offers structured solutions to large scale development projects - Take the Rangitata South Scheme as an example; The decades old idea of irrigating the Rangitata Plains area was taken by the scruff of the neck and brought to fruition by Gary and Adrienne Rooney. At a time of Global financial Crisis they offered a Design, Construct and Own solution that enabled the scheme to be constructed.
There is an old saying that “Quality is remembered long after price is forgotten”. While we may not be the cheapest contractor, we pride ourselves on being thorough. When our client engages us to complete a project they will get the very best advice, management and workmanship that you would rightly expect from an ISO9001 Quality & 14001 Environmentally accredited company. In-house quality assurance is an essential part of our operation and we utilise external peer review on large scale projects to provide checks and balances of our design and construction methods. Our regional structure ensures that our staff are experts in design and construction using local materials. All of our jobs are fully resourced in-house, enabling full control of the construction programme and ensures consistent delivery of high quality contracts and projects.
The Rooney Group is the only New Zealand Civil Construction company that offers in-house irrigation scheme site investigation, design and management. In some cases we even provide funding or we are happy to retain ownership. We also develop new irrigation scheme turnout gates and structures with NIWA set-up telemetry to provide real time monitoring and control of irrigation schemes. We don’t rest easy on past achievements and we continue to develop new systems and products to save our clients time and money - sometimes we tend to do things a little differently, for instance when we needed a Geotextile material for lining large irrigation ponds and a suitable product was not available locally, we purchased a Geotextile production line, set up a factory and successfully produced our own. Now we are in the final stages of research and development of a Geotextile based Geomembrane.
