Councillors Under Pressure To Keep Rates Down

Rates could go up almost 8% this year, but the public may agree to a reduction of some council services instead.

Invercargill City Council Chief executive Clare Hadley encouraged councillors at the Performance, Policy and Partnerships Committee today to have an open mind and listen to all sectors of the community, in regard to the Annual Plan 2022-23.

The annual plan discussion document has now been adopted by the committee and will go out public consultation this week.

The plan proposes an increase in council expenditure from $45.5 million to $72.6 million, and operational expenditure will go up $5 million.

That means the rates increase will be 7.78% instead of the forecasted 4%, due to changes in the Roadmap to Renewal projects, the bigger new museum option, changes to the capital works programme (inflation), supply chain issues and additional property maintenance.

Clare suggested to councillors if they wanted to trim 1-5% in rates, they could look at changing different levels of service, but the public may need to be consulted on that separately.

When asked if council could advise on that with some suggestions, Clare said “this is a partnership…however, I will say publicly, those suggestions that have driven the rates increase up, some of those are as a result of previous council decisions.”

She said there was also important expenditure that the public didn’t see, such as in property (asset management), including earthquake reports, and from an Audit office perspective they were very important.

Clare said councillors could start to really feel the heat and come under pressure once they had to start making some important cost cutting decisions.

Other options to reduce rates included selling some council land, having less attractive gardens at roundabouts and edges around the city, or reducing hours of operation at some community facilities, such as swimming pools and libraries.

“It becomes a very complicated roundabout and it’s not easy,” she said.

Consultation will take place between March 24 and April 29, and documents will be available and submissions can be made at the Civic Building, the Invercargill Public Library, the Bluff Service Centre and He Waka Tuia.

Following consultation, hearings will take place on 10 and 11 May 2022. The final version of the Annual Plan will be provided to Council for adoption and the rates struck before the end of June 2022.