Waimakariri council ‘financially sound’ after challenging year

Nicole Mathewson Reporter from Northern Outlook

By David Hill, Local Democracy Reporter

The Waimakariri District Council is in ‘‘a financially sound position’’ despite a challenging year, says chief executive Jeff Millward.

Flooding, economic uncertainty and high inflation impacted the council, which still ended the year to June with an operating surplus of $21.7 million.

Councillors adopted the 2022-23 annual report at an extraordinary meeting on Tuesday afternoon.

"We’ve had a fair bit of pressure coming on the budget and other councils are saying the same thing," Millward said.

"By all our performance measures we have done pretty well. Overall it has been a good year."

The operating surplus was $9.7 million less than budgeted due to inflation and developers contributions being less than expected.

Development contributions is what developers pay councils to help with the costs of increased services such as libraries, roads and water infrastructure.

The council also borrowed $8m less than the $188m it had budgeted.

Millward said Audit New Zealand had given its endorsement of the annual report, which took into account the change in government and a potential change in Three Waters policy.

He did not anticipate any immediate impact to the council from the change of government.

"It is very much business as usual until we have [the incoming Government's] 100-day plan to respond to."

National campaigned to reverse a number of reforms for local government, including Three Waters and the Resource Management Act overhaul.

Mayor Dan Gordon said the council was in a strong position but he warned of a challenging year ahead.

"We need to look carefully at our budgets as we go into the Long Term Plan.

"Our neighbours are already talking about significant rate increases unless there are significant cuts to services."

Millward said the council was facing ‘‘significant impacts’’ from climate change as it looked ahead to next year’s 2024-34 long-term plan.

Gordon also thanked staff and volunteers for their efforts in responding to the weekend's damaging winds, which brought down trees and cut power to thousands of homes.

"If we had the Three Waters reforms in place now we wouldn’t have been able to perform as effectively as we did, and that is something we have been concerned about.

"Severe weather events are happening more regularly, and the council is seeking to establish a permanent fund to ensure we have budget to maintain, fix, and improve our stormwater, wastewater and roading networks following extreme weather."

Last month, the council approved a plan to establish an infrastructure resilience team to lead flood recovery efforts.

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