Councils look at rates freeze

Councils around the country are considering rates freezes as the coronavirus lockdown sees the nation grind almost to a halt, and Taranaki councils are also crunching their numbers and looking ahead.

Typically, rates rises come into effect at the start of the new financial year on July 1.

In the draft annual plan, New Plymouth rates were set to go up by 6.42 per cent, or 4.75 per cent for the average residential property.

‘‘When we put up a proposed number, about six weeks ago, the world was a very different place,’’ New Plymouth Mayor Neil Holdom said.

Council is now working through a range of scenarios to inform decision-making, he said.

People were losing jobs, and council also had to look to cut costs, he said.

‘‘We know there is going to be a significant downturn in our economy and council has a leadership role to play in terms of supporting that economy.’’

Holdom said ‘‘significantly increasing’’ rates would not be prudent.

And council had also lost a lot of revenue – parking, council facilities where the Government was asking landlords cut tenants a break, and an airport that had lost 95 per cent of its traffic, he said.

There is also work still to do on core infrastructure, he added.

‘‘It’s about finding that balance.’’

Holdom has estimated it would take hundreds of millions of dollars to bring New Plymouth’s infrastructure up to scratch.

Earlier this year the council approved a $4.3 million repair package at the city’s wastewater treatment plant after years of cost cuts.

Stratford District Council is also in the process of finalising its annual plan

Its draft annual plan was forecasting an overall 5.72 per cent rates rise. ‘‘We will have a discussion about our rates increase but underlying that is still the fact that we have to do the work that we set out to do,’’ mayor Neil Volzke said.

It would be a matter of deciding whether or not items could be delayed or shelved as not necessary at the moment.

However, the Government is encouraging spending on infrastructure, and it would almost be contradictory to slow down infrastructure work, he said.

In South Taranaki, mayor Phil Nixon said he would be keen to see something like a rates freeze in theory, but until they crunched the numbers, they could not make any decisions.

They did not want to end up in a situation where there was a short-term release that actually caused more problems down the track, he said.

‘‘We don’t want to make any snap decisions. We want to do this right.’’

David MacLeod, chairman of the Taranaki Regional Council, said he would like to even see a small reduction in rates if they possibly could, but no large-scale changes can be made without a public consultation process – just ‘‘tweaks here and there’’.

‘‘It’s about doing things as efficiently as we can in this new environment.’’