Central Otago ratepayers are facing an average district rate rise of about 5.9% for the coming year, if all the community boards in the district manage to keep their spending to the bare minimum. The first in a series of five draft estimates meetings was held in Roxburgh on Thursday.
At that meeting the Roxburgh Community Board approved a 5.6% increase for the Roxburgh ward component of the overall rate. The Vincent, Cromwell and Maniototo community boards will consider draft estimates for their wards later this month. After those have been dealt with the Central Otago District Council will decide on the district component of the rates and all those figures will be combined.
''The proposed average rates rise for the district for the coming year was forecast at 7.4%, but the mayor and councillors have told us to do everything possible to get that figure to 5.9%, so that's what we've been working to,'' council corporate services manager Susan Finlay said. ''With the figures we have at the moment, most of the essential savings have been from overhead-type expenditure and a large chunk is from holding salaries and wages.''
To keep the district rate rise at 5.9%, Roxburgh had to prune its ward rate rise to 5.6%, she said. Government legislation limited the amount of rates income local government could collect as part of its total income. Water and wastewater services spending was the major component of expenditure in the Roxburgh ward. Upgrading the Roxburgh sewage scheme last year and the Roxburgh and Lake Roxburgh water supplies were both expensive capital works.
Roxburgh board chairmanStephen Jeffery said the board had ''tweaked'' its budget but had made made all the spending cuts it could.
''The water account is our biggest account. We're struggling to keep the physical works contracts down and actually haven't rated high enough in the last few years to cover our costs of maintaining our infrastructure.''
Mrs Finlay reminded the board that every $8000 they spent was a 1% increase on the rates.
No allowance had been made in the annual plan for the ''gifting'' of the Roxburgh swimming pool, she said. The pool is now run by the community, after being ''handed over'' by the board. Plans for upgrading the facility were deemed to be too expensive and a community group, which included representatives from Roxburgh Area School, offered to take over running the pool.
