Rotorua community groups will be hit in the pocket under a proposal to increase pokie machine fees.
The Department of Internal Affairs is consulting with the gambling sector on proposals to increase monitoring and licensing fees on pub gambling machines - with an increase of close to 54 per cent on the cards.
As of December last year, 393 pokie machines were operating at 27 venues in the Rotorua district. The machines collected more than $5 million from October to December last year alone.
New Zealand Community Trust chief executive Mike Knell said the trust would lose half a million a year in funding for community groups and sports clubs if the proposal went ahead.
The trust operates at 158 venues nationwide, including Malfroy Tavern, Mo's Bar, Valentines, Kaspers Sports Bar, Hennessey's Irish Bar and Westbrook Tavern in Rotorua.
More than 90 per cent of the Rotorua funds go back into local community groups and sports clubs, Mr Knell said.
"It's outrageous to have a 53 per cent increase," he said.
"There used to be 81 societies running machines and now there's 41, and there's a reduction in machines so there's far less monitoring to be done. "Obviously we're concerned about any loss to the community." Rotorua Basketball Association is one of many Rotorua groups that have received New Zealand Community Trust funding (NZCT) over the years.
Association president Darrell Pene said the potential loss in funding was "a real concern".
"One of the attractions of being able to go for charity funding is you only have one level to work with," he said. "You have to do your application and you know within a month or two if you've got it. We get it for three reasons: one, to fund our development officer who runs the leagues, the [representative] programme and junior development; two, if we're travelling to nationals, and thirdly, if we're going to host a big tournament.
"It would be a real concern if that funding was used for another layer of administration."
Rotorua Touch Association president Kim Watson-Tanga said any loss of funding would be "detrimental to the community. "Our tournaments and competitions are expensive to run so we have to rely on funding for them to take place. If we lost that funding we'd have to put the costs to players up.
"It's already really, really hard for some families with two or three kids playing ... We've managed to keep the junior fees down but if we were forced to put them up there'd be kids that wouldn't be able to play."
Rotorua's Riding for the Disabled, Hospital Chaplaincy Trust, Multicultural Council and Arts Village Trust are among other local groups that have benefited from NZCT funding.
Mr Knell said they were pleased Internal Affairs was consulting as there needed to be more transparency about what the costs were.
New Zealanders' gambling spend had not fallen significantly, but the department's revenue from operators had, as it was tied to the number of machines.
Internal Affairs Minister Peter Dunne said the higher fees would cover the costs of the gambling law enforcement by the department, which has been financially stretched by investigations into increased non-compliance by pokie operators.