Tourism trust

In your editorial on Friday you commented that the Mackenzie Tourism Development Trust is ‘‘going cap in hand to the council for additional funding’’.

In fact 80 per cent of the funding is directly collected from only those identified by the Mackenzie District Council as being directly involved in tourism within the Mackenzie.

The MTDT had, in conjunction with the council, agreed to the use of the rating system to collect a targeted fee so as to give stability for marketing and staff employment going forward.

The remaining 20 per cent is collected as a quite small general rate from all Mackenzie ratepayers. If there is no Regional Tourism Organisation from August 1, then I assume the target rating will no longer be relevant.

My answer to Councillor Peter Maxwell’s question at the longterm plan hearing last Tuesday related to the level of funding that was being applied against the smaller operators.

I clearly stated that we accepted that this area needed more fine-tuning and that is why one of the five key performance indicators that we submitted specifically deals with this issue.

The targeted rating structure was changed just a couple of weeks before the hearing when we had to accept a reduced budget and the council’s acting chief executive officer tabled the targeted structure the council finally settled on.

I think your comments about ‘‘little consultation with smaller providers’’ is being confused with statements that you have reported from Murray Cox in this area. I certainly didn’t comment on this area at the long-term plan hearings. JIM SCOTT Chairman, MTDT