Masterton rates bomb lands

Masterton urban ratepayers are in for a rocky ride with confirmation yesterday of a massive cost blowout for building the new sewage treatment scheme at Homebush.
In what Mayor Garry Daniell has described as a "bombshell", it has been revealed by consultants Beca Carter Hollings and Ferner (Beca) that mistakes in projected costs provided to the council means at least an extra $5.1 million will be needed to do the work - and possibly as much as $6.6 million.
The news has sent shockwaves through the council, with councillors demanding answers of Beca executives.
On Wednesday night, councillors met informally to try to come to grips with developments and a meeting yesterday that was to be entirely closed to the press and public was instead declared an open meeting.
Mr Daniell said councillors were "thunderstruck" with the cost blowout revelations and confirmed ratepayers could now no longer expect any good news over the likelihood of projected urban rate increases being trimmed back.
Instead it is much more likely, looking at the new figures produced by Beca, that rates will hike up by about 19 per cent cumulatively over the next two years.
The massive underestimate mainly arose in two areas, known as Ponds SME and Border Strip Irrigation SME.
SME is an abbreviation of structural/ mechanical/ electrical and relates to expenditure such as pumps, pipes, motors and computers.
The Ponds SME was this month ramped up from around $2.3 million as estimated last September to $4.5 million, and the Border Strip Irrigation SME from $821,000 to over $2.1 million.
Along with other lesser cost variations and an amount of $1.5 million council has been advised to budget as Project Risk Allowance - which may, or may not, need to be spent - the total end-of-project cost is now just over $30 million, or nearly $6.6 million more than was catered for in September when the border strip decision was made.
Mr Daniell said he was at a loss to know how Beca could have "overlooked" differences to the magnitude that it had.
It was too late to go back on the project in any way and the challenge was to push ahead, get the new scheme up and running and in doing so "reprioritise" all costs and projects before the council to try to keep the lid on rate increases as much as possible.
He said the only pleasing aspect was that district council officers and staff were completely exonerated from any blame.