Hastings District Council's three waters survey to remain open
A survey by Hastings District Council on the Government's initial three waters management reform proposal will remain open for the next few months in order to gather further community feedback.
The initial online survey, which ran from September 3 to 19, had 814 submissions on the proposal to transfer the ownership and management of storm water, drinking water and waste water assets away from councils to four newly created entities across New Zealand.
Hastings mayor Sandra Hazlehurst said the results of the survey showed the overwhelming majority of respondents (nearly 90 per cent) were uncomfortable with the government’s initial proposal and wanted more information, particularly around the costs to individual ratepayers, the governance arrangements of any new entity, and how local voices would be heard.
"Affordability and security/safety of three waters were the primary issues of importance to respondents, followed by local ownership and delivery," she said.
Of the 808 people that answered the question on whether they thought it was important to have formal consultation on the Government's final proposal, 97 per cent considered it to be either "very important" (89.2 per cent) or "important" (7.8 per cent).
The Government gave councils until September 30 to consider the proposal and provide feedback.
Along with Hastings District Council's online survey, a Facebook Live information session was held to harness the community’s views and help inform its submission to the Government, due on October 1.
On September 30, HDC will meet to consider and finalise this submission.
Mayor Hazlehurst thanked those who took the time to complete the survey, and said that this information would be used to help guide council’s submission.
“Although we had to close the survey for the purposes of reporting to council and meeting the submission deadline to government, we have decided to continue to accept responses for the next few months as we think it is important to continue gathering community feedback while the proposal is still being discussed and finalised.
“Water has been our number one priority for several years now and we know the status quo is not an option for managing our three water assets."
She said the region's councils had been working together to find ways to deliver these services together, while at the same time "improving affordability, resilience, capacity and capability".
“We are still committed to pursuing this as we still think there’s a case for a regional model.”
The results of the survey will be included in the public Council Agenda, which will be released prior to the meeting via www.hastingsdc.govt.nz/our-council/meetings/
People can take the survey at www.hastingsdc.govt.nz/services/water/three-waters-reform/
