The newly-adopted South Waikato District Council Long Term Plan 2024-2034 achieves the difficult balance of keeping rate increases low at the same time as continuing to offer the same level of service delivery to the community.
Through the period of the Long Term Plan (LTP), average rate increases for the South Waikato are among the lowest in the country, despite Council maintaining the breadth and quality of community services.
Keeping rates increases low, as compared with other Councils, was achieved despite the presence of several ongoing challenges, including increases in Local Government inflation and the need to stop borrowing for operational expenditures.
Proposed average increases for years one, two and three of the LTP are 8.9%, reducing to 7.9% in year four and 7.5% in year five. From year six (2029-30) onwards it’s forecasted that the average rate increase for the District will plateau at 3%.
Rate increases at these levels will enable the Council to stop borrowing for its day-to-day costs and start building up reserves to replace assets such as water treatment plants.
We will largely do this by addressing financial challenges by committing through this Plan to adopting better ways of working with more efficiency and more cost effectiveness, which avoids further increasing the burden on members of the community already struggling with the cost of living.
Over the life of the plan, we have targeted $29m of savings.
“The fact is, this is a Long Term Plan that achieves a delicate balance that few Councils across the country have been able to achieve,” South Waikato District Council CEO Susan Law said.
“To commit to the operational savings we have, alongside addressing urgent maintenance or upgrades to core infrastructure and focusing on key initiatives required to lift our District out of its current levels of deprivation, has been an extremely challenging process.
“We have made savings that allow us to avoid reducing the level of community services provided.
“There are no nice-to-haves in this LTP. It’s a responsible roadmap forward for the District, produced after lengthy public consultation that attracted record numbers of submissions and attendance at hearings.”
