Water crisis costs mount

$700,000 has already been allocated in response to the Havelock North water supply crisis.

Although more than $700,000 will be allocated in response to the Havelock North water supply crisis, that is not the end of costs for the Hastings District Council.

In a council finance and monitoring meeting yesterday, councillors agreed to allocate $710,000 in response to the Havelock North water supply contamination.

They also asked what further costs could arise from the incident, and how council would provide for these.

Since early August, around 5200 people had been affected by campylobacter after the Havelock North water supply was contaminated with E.coli.

The $710,000 will be drawn from the 2015-16 rating surplus. Of this $300,000, will cover a water rates remission for Havelock North residents - $57 to any property connected to the suburb's water supply.

Another $110,000 would go toward Havelock North businesses. Of that, $10,000 had been made available to the Havelock North Business Association to help it support its members. Council economic development group manager Craig Cameron said this would be geared toward promotional activities for Havelock North.

There would also be $300,000 set aside to cover expected additional costs while the remaining $100,000 was part of a recovery package for Havelock North businesses that had suffered financially from the contamination. The council was currently working out how to allocate the funds.

During the meeting, councillor Rod Heaps asked about potential extra costs related to infrastructure which could be incurred in the long term. He was told this would come back to the council.

Chief executive Ross McLeod added there was already provision in the long-term plan for implementing water infrastructure improvements.

"It may be that a lot of what we spend is just what we were going to do anyway," he said, adding this could change.

The council had not seen a need to recommend massive capital projects at this stage.

Councillor Simon Nixon asked whether the incident would affect the recent valuation of the council's water assets.

Mr McLeod said this would depend on the decisions made on the future of the Brookvale bores, the site of the contamination.

Although there was "a question mark over two or three bores", these were not hugely significant in the overall Havelock North network, which was still functioning.