The longer I have been on the Mosgiel-Taieri Community Board, the more I see the area as being the poor relation within the Dunedin City Council family.
The recent announcement of an upgrade approved for the Outram Glen is a reward for the board’s efforts for this upgrade over about 15 years, and was listed as a top priority by the previous community board.
I was disappointed to read (ODT 25.2.23) that the upgrade is being done based on cost savings, which included use of an Otta seal — an emulsion surface treatment that would last between two and five years.
A proper seal for the road would have a life of multiple years more than Otta, in my opinion a false economy cost saver. A formal turning circle will not be incorporated, that appears to be another cost saver. The project costs are estimated between $315,500 and $325,000.
When one looks at the dollars splashed out on other council projects such as the multimillion-dollar upgrade of the peninsula road upgrade, the multimillion-dollar cycleway projects to Port Chalmers and around the city, and the multimillion-dollar ($50 million-plus) George St upgrade, the Outram Glen is only peanuts in the scheme of things, and should be upgraded to the highest standard like those other council projects.
The Mosgiel-Taieri community has contributed to all these other council projects through rates paid.
We now find that rates on lifestyle blocks on the Taieri, of which there are many, are to increase by up to 20%, the highest increase of all classifications. What will they get in return? Seal extensions in these areas were stopped years ago.
Then we have the new Mosgiel pool, to open soon, with the community having to raise millions of dollars, to have a pool to meet today’s standards.
We now read (ODT 23.2.23) that it appears that councillors will consider a staff report on the possibility of council helping to invest in some school swimming pools. It would appear that schools do not contribute to the general rates of the city.
If this is correct, then what a kick in the guts to the ratepayers who also contributed with the community to raise more funds for the Mosgiel pool to meet today’s standards, if council is even to discuss contributing to what should be a tax-payer, and not a rate-payer responsibility.
Then, to rub salt into the wound, those same rate payers who contributed so much to the Mosgiel pool, were never consulted on the name for the new pool.
But it doesn’t end there.
Mosgiel is the only part of the city to have severe water restrictions, because of a lack of infrastructure.
A new consented residential development is to have water restrictions because of this.
One only has to read the 2GP District Plan hearing submissions to see the state of Mosgiel’s infrastructure, and to recognise that it is restricting Mosgiel’s future development.
Yet Mosgiel-Taieri — which has a main street which floods and what appears to be dangerous footpaths — must be one of the major rate contributors to the city’s treasury.
In my opinion Mosgiel-Taieri ratepayers get the least return on their rate investment.
- Brian Miller was first elected to the Mosgiel Taieri Community Board in 1995. The opinions in this article are his own and are not being made on behalf of the community board, or anybody else.
