Letters to Editor: Make rates increases kinder

The Tauranga City Council needs to find a kinder proposition in relation to rate increase. Photo / File

Find a kinder proposition

The new Tauranga City Council ratepayers schedule is, in my view, a very cruel document in its first five years.

Why not take the average of the proposed 10-year schedule, 6.06 per cent (including the proposed new kerbside services rate) and apply that rate for the full 10-year period?

It's a far kinder, more predictable proposition for homeowners and for the council, knowing they have a finite, published budget to work with - no more, no less.

While many projects are in the concept stage, TCC is quite capable of rescheduling projects to suit budgets with no loss of quality, and homeowners with a 10-year plan to rely on. How about that?

Russell McKenzie
Papamoa

Faulty data?

The elected members of Tauranga City Council are being asked to make rates comparisons on faulty data in my view: (News, November 21). "Tauranga already had the highest average residential rates of NZ's metropolitan cities ... according to a report prepared by the NZ Taxpayers Union".

This statement is statistically invalid, as it compares two variables - average value and rates.

To be valid, it needs one standard (property value) and one variable (rates) for each city.
In simple terms, a small table with the various cities across the top and standard property values down the side (say $300,000, $600,000, $900,00 and $1.2m) and the specific rates for each property of that value in each city.

On anecdotal evidence, I would expect such a table to show that Tauranga has some of the lowest rates, which would mean that the TCC has been underfunding itself for years.

A. Gifford
Tauranga

State of road "shocking"

I read Peter Turmer's recent letter about the terrible condition of the road from Tauranga to Waihi.

Has Peter been down Omokoroa Rd this year - some people refer to the road as "the farm track". It is shocking, potholes been repaired so many times, one side of the road higher than the other.

I have heard of a couple of people who have had blowouts on their tyres and damage to tyre rims. There are signs saying partial new road being built, in the three months I was away nothing has changed apart from the road being worse than it was.

There are 13 developments on the peninsula and more to come. I flew from Auckland to Tauranga a week ago and was amazed at all the development sites you can see from the air.

Omokoroa Rd was not built for the heavy trucks that use the road, the Matakana Ferry has been replaced by a bigger ferry to cater for bigger trucks going to Matakana. The developments will not be completed for years. Do we have to wait years for something to be done to our road?

We are one the highest-rated areas in New Zealand but the road is shocking. Getting out of Omokoroa Rd onto SH2 is a joke, at 9.30 the other morning it took 10 minutes, no reason - just volume of traffic coming from Katikati.

Wendy Galloway
Omokoroa