Council aims to keep rates rise low

Rotorua ratepayers could be in for a surprise when they open their rates bills next year - although there won't be any rates decrease - any increase will be just 2 per cent, or less.
Rotorua district councillors and senior management staff met yesterday at an extraordinary meeting of the council's finance committee.
Council chief executive Peter Guerin said that after being told by councillors to go back to the drawing board and rewrite the draft budget for the 2010/11 financial year, management had come up with a much better model that could see a less than 2 per cent rates increase.
In February, council officers received a resounding "no" to a proposed 4.6 per cent rates increase for Rotorua residents.
Councillors were disappointed when senior management could only manage a 4.6 per cent increase after they signalled to ratepayers last year that any rates increase would be in line with the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The CPI for the year ending June 30, 2009, was about 2 per cent.
Mr Guerin admitted their first budget was not up to par.
"We didn't really get the chance to look at the whole thing as tightly as we have for this second cut," Mr Guerin said.
"Council has asked for a total rate increase of no more than CPI. This is a reasonable request given that the people paying rates, such as households and business, are affected by CPI.
"In order to achieve the goal, it has been necessary to review a range of activities and assumptions to achieve council's goal," he said.
Councillors and council staff spent the day going through budgets with a fine-toothed comb.
Mr Guerin said a considerable amount of change had been made to the budget, including the cutting of a number of projects that could be deferred to the next financial year.
This included an almost $15 million reduction in capital expenditure.
He said the possibility of some major projects being completed during the 2010/11 financial year was very small so could be deferred to the next year's budget.
Finance committee chairman Charles Sturt said the new budget was much more realistic.
"We have almost 500 people struggling to pay their rates right now. We are looking at every single cost centre in front of us," Mr Sturt said.
Council corporate services director Jean-Paul Gaston said staff would keep a record of all the changes and factor those into a revised budget, to be presented to councillors at another meeting of the finance committee next Tuesday.
After that the final draft budget would be presented for public consultation with a mind to have it signed off by late June.
BUDGET
SAVINGS * $4 million on wastewater treatment plant improvements
* $2 million on the Eastern Water Reservoir development
* $1 million on airport wetland mitigation work
* $4.3 million on urban water upgrades
* $282,000 on buying a new piano for the Convention Centre