While Waikato Regional Council has managed to trim its 2014 rates increase to just 0.3%, its cousin, the Waikato District Council is planning to push its general rate take, up by 1.89% this year. That makes a rate of increase of 6.3 times larger than the regional increase.
Chairperson Paula Southgate said the Regional Council had arrived at an excellent financial forecast given the size of the council’s work programme which gave a big boost to work to protect water quality and solid funding for biodiversity and flood control feature in Waikato Regional Council’s 2014/15 draft budget signed off for public consultation yesterday..
“Over the past few years we have focused on increasing the council’s efficiency and effectiveness and it’s good to see our efforts paying off this year,” she said.
“While we have achieved this budget by concentrating on a few key projects, we need to signal now that there’s a lot of work ahead of us and we will have to be smart about finding further efficiencies.”
Chief executive Vaughan Payne said staff had put forward a responsible draft budget aimed at delivering on the council’s strategic priorities.
The Ngaruawahia based Waikato District Council hasn’t been as successful at trimming costs and in a glossy brochure distributed to Raglan households announced it plans to put the general rates up by 1.89%. (The Regional Council kept its annual costs lower by keeping ratepayers informed with a low cost newspaper style brief on its plan.) The District Council plans to spend money in Raglan on additional walkways in the Wainui reserve (23K), constructing a new water booster pump station ($127K) and a waterwater pump station upgrade ($36K). The water booster pump and the wastewater pump are paid for out of separate rates so Raglanders, get set for even higher higher rates to pay for these two!
So the rates increases planned are:
Waikato Regional increase of 0.3%.
On top of that there will be a Waikato District rate increase of 1.89% and then on top of that some special rate increases such as water. These have doubled over recent years and the LTP has this trend continuing at about 10% a year. And watch out for those minor charges that WDC often bumps up by doubling or tripling them on the grounds of ‘cost recovery’.
Both the Waikato Regional and District plan are open for submissions now.
WRC submissions close of the 17th April. You can read all about the proposed Regional Plan here. And make your submission here.
While the WDC’s glossy, ‘Waikato Navigator’ summarises what is planned for Raglan and other parts of the Waikato District you can pick up a full copy at the Council office in Raglan.
Waikato District Council has a webpage on their draft plan, but when we checked it had little information and some of the download links weren’t working.
There will be a ‘WDC Roadshow’ meeting in Raglan to explain the plan on Wednesday 30 April, 7pm at the Raglan Bowling Club.Mayor Allan Sanson said, “This is your opportunity to meet the people involved in the planning and delivery of our programmes, and learn more about how you can be part of your area and the district’s ongoing development.”