The Waikato District Council adopted its enhanced Annual Plan at yesterday’s Council meeting, which will see an average 11.9% general rate revenue increase for 2024/25.

Waikato District Mayor Jacqui Church said the Council faced significant challenges with escalating operational and capital costs while planning projects, activities, and services for the upcoming year.

“Both councillors and staff have worked hard to ensure quality service delivery is maintained, sustainable development of the district continues, and that affordability concerns are addressed,” she said.

Earlier in the year, the Council accepted a one-off government offer to pause work on our 2024-2034 Long Term Plan and focus on an Enhanced 2024/25 Annual Plan instead. Mayor Church said the Council will now resume work on its 2025-2034 Long Term Plan (LTP), and affordability challenges will remain front of mind.

“We know many ratepayers are feeling the financial pinch and are grappling with the cost of living crisis. It was important for us to postpone some non-urgent projects to reduce costs for the next year,” Mayor Church explained.

“At the same time, we can’t kick the can down the road in the hope that the challenges we face will go away or become someone else’s problem in the future. We’ll have some tough decisions ahead of us over coming months, to address affordability issues and ensure our district keeps moving forward, not backwards,” she said.

The Council will be working to gain more certainty around non-ratepayer funding streams for future years of its LTP. This includes central government transportation subsidies, as well as the governments new Water’s Done Well policy.

Mayor Church stated that the Council took into account the community's concerns regarding economic challenges and made efforts wherever possible to minimise the impact of the general rate increase in the revised annual plan.

Through public consultation, Waikato District Council received 227 submissions, with the majority expressing concern over the proposed general rate revenue increase of 13.75%. In response, the Council decided on an 11.9% general rate revenue increase.

“We carefully reviewed feedback and budgets, finding additional savings to lower the rating impact on Waikato property owners for 2024/25 by removing, delaying, or rescheduling some projects.”

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