Christchurch City Council and Dunedin City Council chief executives Mary Richardson (L) and Sandy Graham (R). Photo: Adam Burns / Dunedin City Council
Dunedin City Council has decided to team up with the Christchurch City Council for Three Waters work.
It is part of the government's reform programme called "Local Water Done Well" (LWDW) which requires territorial authorities to make decisions in relation to how they deliver water services.
Councillors discussed signing the Memorandum of Understanding [MOU] at a council meeting on Wednesday.
Councillor Jim O'Malley said he was excited to see the 'cross-pollination' effect now that Council had decided to go ahead with signing the MOU.
"It will be interesting to see how another organisation of size is operating around this area and one of the things that will be exciting is what are some of the things that we have in common and what are the things we are doing differently.
"Whether we get efficiencies or not, we will get a better outcome."
Chief executive Sandy Graham said it was a real opportunity for the council to create a new way of working that improved customer service and drove significant cost savings for ratepayers.
"Individually, both councils have a wealth of expertise and working together will give us the ability to attract new talent, as well as the scale needed to truly make a difference," she said.
A joint working group will now be set up to investigate the partnership and how any shared services could be extended to involve other territorial authorities.
The council also decided on it's preferred water services delivery model for consultation on 3 Waters work, and preferred the in-house option.
Dunedin councillors considered whether to vote for an In-house delivery of 3 Waters or an asset owning CCO [Council Controlled Organisation] for 3 Waters, with the Council as the sole Shareholders.
Mayor Jules Radich said the key difference of keeping the services in-house would mean there would be $175m of debt, better off.
The decision comes as Christchurch City Council opted to keep water services under total council control rather than spend millions of dollars on an independent entity, in February.
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