Last week several Raglan ratepayers made the trek to Ngaruawahia to voice their concerns about the Rating Review currently being undertaken by Waikato District Council. Submissions by ratepayers were heard from Wednesday through to Friday. The Review was initiated by the need to merge the Waikato and Franklin rating systems following the boundary changes caused by the Auckland super city.
On Wednesday, Raglan’s Murray Gibb highlighted the inequity of the targeted storm water rate based on capital values. Other Raglan ratepayers made the same point on Thursday and it appeared from comments made by the Councillors that they appreciated the issues involved. Ratepayers from the Tuakau and Onewhero areas came along and voiced their opposition to the stiff rate increases under the new approach. Transparency was demanded from the Council with an itemised billing system.
On Thursday, John Lawson from Raglan pointed out that Census data indicated that Raglan was a poorer town in terms of personal income and was now being asked to pay higher rates that were a higher percentage of income. John said, “Raglan risks becoming a town of absentee bach owners if key changes aren’t made to Waikato District Council’s rating structure”. John also pointed out the higher rates paid per metre of road by town ratepayers compared to rural ratepayers.
Later that day Rodger Gallagher highlighted how for the Council’s top expenditure, the $19 million annual spend on roading, there was no link up with Council’s own Rating Principles of user charges, transparency and targeted rates. He went on to add that the proposed approach was unfair to Raglan ratepayers. Rodger suggested that Council should either have a targeted rate system across all expenditure areas or drop targeted rates completely and move to a straightforward approach using a flat charge and a general rate.
This report doesn’t say what the councillors’ reaction was to being told that Raglan was being unfairly treated. They appeared to ignore the evidence and assert that it wasn’t so. Other speakers were referred to council staff for an explanation. Those saying Raglan was being unfairly treated were given no such explanation. Presumably the council knows there’s no explanation other than their prejudice in favour of the country ratepayers. Parliament has a rule saying elected members can’t call each other liars. There’s clearly no such restriction on Waikato District Council and the mayor joined in the fray, rather than asking for a retraction of the false accusation.
Raglan is going to get an unfair rate increase of around 15% on top of rates which are already unfair. Why are so few people protesting about it?