Mayor Gary Kircher. Photo: RNZ / Simon Rogers
A ratepayers group in Waitaki backs its district council's independent water plan - despite the mayor lamenting that he has failed ratepayers.
Mayor Gary Kircher said rates could rise by about 40 percent over the next two years, after the council approved a water services delivery plan on Tuesday, which would be sent to the Department of Internal Affairs for approval.
Earlier, councillors pulled the plug on a joint delivery arrangement with other councils - the Southern Water Done Well model - instead opting for an in-house scheme.
In a speech shared in the council chamber and on Facebook, Kircher warned the plan imposed huge rate increases on the community when there were cheaper options on the table.
He had voted against leaving the Southern Water Done Well model, which he believed "would have created efficiencies".
Kircher said he did not want to consign people to possibly losing their homes because they could not pay their rates, "or all of the other challenges they're going to have around affordability".
"We had the numbers in front of us around what this cost saving was going to be for each house. But for some people, that was like those savings were not worth it."
However Waitaki Ratepayers and Residents Association chair Ray Henderson told RNZ he felt major rates rises were inevitable.
A joint model may have brought some efficiencies, but it also would have added needless administration costs, he said.
"As soon as you start building CCOs [council-controlled organisations] and then even worse than that, combined council CCOs, there's admin costs, there's overheads. As far as I'm concerned, the money that we pay on rates should go towards actually doing things, not paying for administration.
"There'll be meetings… the associated costs of travel, accommodation… so much money will be wasted."
Henderson said the council did not need to formally belong to Southern Water Done Well to share resources, water specialists and machinery with other councils.
"That can still happen. So the efficiency option is still there."
Ultimately, Henderson said the blame for the projected rates rises lay with the government, which he said had burdened councils with Local Water Done Well.
He said it was a "knee-jerk" response by the government to water contamination in Havelock North in 2016.
"It's an overreaction, a massive, massive overreaction, and the whole thing could have been handled a lot better."
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