An email arrives.
The happy-joy narrative says Waitaki District Council has decided to do things differently this year, I can now submit feedback online about council’s performance and my submission will go into a draw for a $500 Prezzy Card.
Hmm, me thinks. Didn’t I recently attend a public meeting where indecipherable graphs and cutesy cartoons were clicked on to a washed-out screen while the mayor bounced about on a squeaky distracting floorboard saying he “was there to listen” yet waffled on ad-nauseum for three hours?
Didn’t I recently submit feedback to a survey that asked for Yes/No answers to complex questions?
Didn’t I verbally feedback via Zoom a few weeks ago about proposed spending and plead council to stop rating for unnecessary items?
Yes, I did. So much for all that effort.
Meanwhile: community consulted: box ticked: quarterly report to prove it.
It is hard not to be cynical and demoralised about local government. As someone who has been active in this area since my early teens, I’m really trying to get my head around what the hell has happened.
How did we get here? Why is it that a friend, a local stalwart in rural and social matters for most of her life, decided not to come to the council feedback meeting with me because the thought of attending it made her feel physically ill and too angry?
Local government should be easy and its aim and purpose clear, simple.
But the current system has become a monster and one that thousands of us now regard as well past its use-by-date.
The simple premise of local government is that it is a collective. It starts with a group of property owners getting together to decide to collectively share the financial load of building (mainly) infrastructure items, for example water reservoir, pipes, sewerage system, roads, toilets, jetty, etc, that individually we wouldn’t be able to fund ourselves.
The group is tasked with obtaining prices and budgets set for the cost to build new or manage these items. The group decides whether or not it can afford them.
If it is a goer, we "rate" accordingly so we can all share the burden across the district or region with the group.
The group becomes too big and cumbersome for effective decision-making, so its members decide to elect a few people who want to represent the group and help manage the items, now referred to as assets that we all, now, collectively, own.
Our elected representatives find they don’t have the skills or time to manage the assets so they hire one person to manage the workload with the responsibility to hire others to help do the work.
But here comes central government intervening, adding layers of rules and demands about how to govern and operate our collective (and that’s a segue to a deeper story for another day).
However, the basic premise stays the same. The ratepayer collective still cares about and needs to share the load of any new builds and continuing management of the basics: pipes, wastewater, drinking water and stormwater treatments, sewage management, roads, jetties, toilets.
Over decades nice-to-have items have been added to the list: libraries, museums, art galleries, parks.
Which is all fine if the owners can afford to fund them. (If you are interested, you’ll find all the requests and rate funded moneys itemised in the Activity Updates).
In 2023 in Waitaki District dozens of items were requested: school trips, church meetings, restaurant roof repairs, sports venues, stonewalls, shoes, tables, consultant fees, etc.
And who can blame people for sneaky requests when the elected people are too afraid to say "no". Cha-ching, cha-ching.
However, local government is not a retailer or a factory with items to sell, regardless of the user-pays portion.
Councils were not established to profit from its owners.
The $500 Prezzy Card? Spin it as you like, if it’s from funds saved, we’ve been overcharged and a refund is due.
New Zealand is in recession. People are reducing outgoings and rates raised for nice-to-haves or bonus items need to also reduce. Put projects on hold until they can afford them.
Some people will borrow to pay rates — or, as shamefully suggested by the Central Otago mayor, get a reverse mortgage.
It is disheartening that local government has morphed into this monster munching its way into our pay packets and pensions.
I believe it is happening because ratepayers are no longer considered as owners of councils, but as customers.
We have allowed ourselves to become customers and endure spun narratives while facts are hidden in boring, lengthy, reports full of statistical tables measuring feedback.
Captured customers distracted from the monster by the offer of prizes.
Well, I’m not buying it. I want the refund.
- Fliss Butcher is a former city councillor.
