Water Done Well - Out and about Roving Reporters…
We ran a post on Facebook in early November where a news item quoted how new cross council entities (in our case New Plymouth, Stratford and South Taranaki combined) can “Borrow up to 500% of operating revenue, almost double what they can borrow now” to upgrade their water infrastructure.
Currently with the Long Term Plan system they can’t borrow more than 135%.
We covered a story Glenn Maclean had written for Stuff in October this year, with options available for working collaboratively across the councils.
NPDC was keen to get together with Stratford and Hawera to discuss cost sharing across all 3 regions and had arranged meetings at the NPDC to get the ball rolling early on with how this could be done.
This prompted several of our team to see what the other councils are thinking about this issue so our Roving Reporters recently ventured down SH3 to meet with the Stratford Mayor and CEO. They had the opportunity to discuss how Stratford are progressing with the proposed new water plans for their region.
It was interesting to learn from this meeting that Stratford is below borrowings on their Balance Sheet for water assets, and are capable of this with only 50% of their ratepayers on Council water reticulation.
Stratford target all rates collected in respect of water in a consolidated fund for use with only water projects. With this careful management system Stratford are more than capable to stand alone going forward with the consents and reticulation systems that are currently in place.
There was discussion about the future waste water system when the current consents run out in 10 years, which may be an area with possibility of the regions working together.
Our team talked with the Stratford Mayor and CEO about the NPDC proposed new set-up covering representative numbers of each Council on a Board, or an administrative group. The Stratford viewpoint was there would need to be equal representation for each region if any of these groups were to be set up.
There are a lot of issues to be worked out across all three regions so the costs are spread equitably across the three Councils. The costs of water delivery, administration, plant, satellite offices, water departments and any extra staff all need to be considered and apportioned without any one region being worse off than they are at this point.
It was good to hear that all Councils in Taranaki currently co-operate on producing some commodities to get better prices.
The Alliance will continue to monitor and update you on the "Water done well" programme across our region.
We will also continue to monitor a Co-Governance model which is still part of discussions here in New Plymouth, long after the Taxpayers Union and the 3 waters roadshow tours put that model to bed prior to the last General Election.
Currently with the Long Term Plan system they can’t borrow more than 135%.
We covered a story Glenn Maclean had written for Stuff in October this year, with options available for working collaboratively across the councils.
NPDC was keen to get together with Stratford and Hawera to discuss cost sharing across all 3 regions and had arranged meetings at the NPDC to get the ball rolling early on with how this could be done.
This prompted several of our team to see what the other councils are thinking about this issue so our Roving Reporters recently ventured down SH3 to meet with the Stratford Mayor and CEO. They had the opportunity to discuss how Stratford are progressing with the proposed new water plans for their region.
It was interesting to learn from this meeting that Stratford is below borrowings on their Balance Sheet for water assets, and are capable of this with only 50% of their ratepayers on Council water reticulation.
Stratford target all rates collected in respect of water in a consolidated fund for use with only water projects. With this careful management system Stratford are more than capable to stand alone going forward with the consents and reticulation systems that are currently in place.
There was discussion about the future waste water system when the current consents run out in 10 years, which may be an area with possibility of the regions working together.
Our team talked with the Stratford Mayor and CEO about the NPDC proposed new set-up covering representative numbers of each Council on a Board, or an administrative group. The Stratford viewpoint was there would need to be equal representation for each region if any of these groups were to be set up.
There are a lot of issues to be worked out across all three regions so the costs are spread equitably across the three Councils. The costs of water delivery, administration, plant, satellite offices, water departments and any extra staff all need to be considered and apportioned without any one region being worse off than they are at this point.
It was good to hear that all Councils in Taranaki currently co-operate on producing some commodities to get better prices.
The Alliance will continue to monitor and update you on the "Water done well" programme across our region.
We will also continue to monitor a Co-Governance model which is still part of discussions here in New Plymouth, long after the Taxpayers Union and the 3 waters roadshow tours put that model to bed prior to the last General Election.
Posted: Tue 10 Dec 2024