The council this week began consulting on a proposed 4.35% rates increase over three years, starting next year, to attract increased NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) funding.
Its recently completed draft roading business case 2018-21 — published on the council’s website on Tuesday — states ‘‘customer satisfaction in 2012-13 dropped significantly down to 39% and remains low at 35% in 2015-16’’.
Mr Kircher said this week spending more on roads was a ‘‘no-brainer as far as I’m concerned’’. The low approval rating for the council’s ‘‘biggest activity’’ and infrastructure ‘‘vital to our economy’’ was due to various factors, but increased traffic volume and bigger vehicles were taking their toll on the roading system, which was being funded at levels that had only kept up with inflation.‘‘We just have not kept up. We have a focus on how much our rate increase is each year ... but when you have a whole lot more demand on an activity like roading, you’ve got to increase by more than inflation to deal with that demand,’’ Mr Kircher said.
The council’s two-week consultation period on its proposal to increase rates about 1.5% each year to take in an extra $1.305million over three years starting in 2018 ends on July 7.
A ratepayer contribution of $1.305million would attract $1.595million from the NZ Transport Agency’s (NZTA) funding assistance rates and allow the council to follow through on its $2.9million proposal to improve roads in the 2018-21 period. It is surveying residents on proposals for increased spending on widening high-risk sealed rural roads, using more gravel on high-priority rural roads and the smoothing of rural and urban roads.
The roading business case states the council plans to seek $36,712,267 in total from both ratepayers and the NZTA over the three years — a 12% increase on the 2015-18 funding.According to the report, the council’s overall investment in roading is ‘‘about $1000 per kilometre less than our peers’’; it has ‘‘about the lowest costs per kilometre for unsealed pavement maintenance and metalling when compared with our peers’’; and its costs per kilometre of sealed pavement ‘‘compared with our peers is about right, being just below the average’’.
Council roading manager Michael Voss said there was ‘‘a positive-negative side to that’’.‘‘To be personally honest, I think we are being very efficient in what we are delivering, but comparatively maybe we are not delivering enough to people. So that’s where we’re sort of looking at — do we need to adjust that expenditure?’’hamish.maclean@odt.co.nz
