Mere Balzer (MNZM)

Mere Balzer (MNZM)

Mere Balzer (MNZM) has lived a life of service, vision, and aroha that touches generations. Of Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāi Te Rangi/Ngāti Ranginui, and Ngāti Apakura descent, she is a mother of five and the heart of a lively whānau, with a small village of mokopuna and mokopuna tuarua who light up her days.

From the very start, Mere brought care and understanding into the spaces she entered. Training as a Registered Nurse, including in mental health, she didn’t just learn to heal bodies — she learned to see people, their whānau, and their stories. In the 1990s and 2000s, she helped lead Te Kaunihera ō ngā Neehi Māori ō Aotearoa, and as president, she shaped kaupapa Māori nursing programmes that became lifelines for young Māori nurses and the communities they serve.

But Mere’s influence went far beyond the hospital walls. She sat on boards and advisory committees — from the Waikato District Health Board to the Health Research Council Māori Committee — always bringing the voices of Māori whānau into decisions that too often ignored them. She pushed for systems that saw people as more than patients, for care that embraced tikanga, whānau, and cultural connection.

As Chief Executive of Te Rūnanga o Kirikiriroa, Mere carried the same vision into social services, growing the organisation into a whānau-first hub that understood wellbeing as a whole — housing, education, justice, health, and community all intertwined. She believed deeply in the power of home ownership as a doorway to independence, and she worked tirelessly to make that a reality for whānau.

Recognition came with her appointment as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit (MNZM), but those who know her say her legacy lives in quieter, more enduring ways — in the young nurses she mentored, the whānau she supported, and the everyday kindnesses she quietly offered.

Now retired, Mere spends her days surrounded by her mokopuna and mokopuna tuarua, yet she remains fiercely engaged with the world — offering sharp insight, candid humour, and unwavering commitment to justice and equity. Her story is not in CVs or committees, but in the countless lives she has touched. She has spent half a century trying to be the change she wanted the world to see, and in every life she has touched, she has succeeded.