Rainfall hurts bottom line
THE drenching that the Toowoomba region has copped in 2022 so far has also hit the council’s hip pocket.
The council’s finance and business strategy has revealed the organisation lost more than $2.6m in revenue from water rates, after bills were sent out to residents.
Finance acting general manager Ann-Marie Johnston said the drop was directly related to reduced water consumption.
“The budgeted water consumption charges income for the 2021/22 financial year was $36.9 million gross, based on projected annual consumption of 11.7 million kilolitres,” her report said.
“Actual water consumption charges income is $34.3 million gross, given actual annual consumption of 10.8m kilolitres.
“The overall shortfall in water consumption income for the financial year is $2.6 million gross which is directly attributable to the exceptionally wet weather conditions during the past year.”
It comes after Toowoomba saw more than 722mm drop over the past four months, including record-breaking totals in February that caused significant flooding across parts of the region.
Ms Johnston said the wet weather was also partially to blame for the council’s capital works program being significantly behind budget.
Capital expenditure as of April was below budget by $28m, or 22 per cent less than the revised amount.
“At this stage, we have delivered 50 per cent of our revised capital works,” she told councillors at Tuesday’s ordinary meeting.
“There are variances right across the organisation and across all asset classes, as a result of the inclement weather, supply chain issues and of course vacancies.
“These issues and others will be addressed when we’re developing the 2022-23 capital works program.”
Capital works underspending has been a longstanding issue for the TRC.