The Bay of Plenty Regional Council's head office in Tauranga. Photo / Alex Cairns
The Bay of Plenty Regional Council will not be formally consulting on its Annual Plan but will instead run community engagement.
The 2023/2024 Annual Plan will likely come with a 5 per cent general rates increase but this has not been formalised.
At a Bay of Plenty Regional Council meeting on Thursday, councillors agreed to the engagement rather than consultation approach.
The report to the council said there were no matters in the Annual Plan that would “benefit” from consultation.
This was despite costs in the Annual Plan being higher than expected than the 2021–2031 Long-Term Plan (LTP) due to higher inflation and interest rates, the report said.
The work programme was consistent with year three of the LTP, and the budgeted variances were within the thresholds identified in the council’s significance and engagement policy, the report said.
Council corporate performance team lead Olive McVicker told the meeting the council’s communications team had developed an Annual Plan communications and engagement plan.
Speaking about the report, communications and engagement manager Angela Foster said engagement in the sense of formal consultation was not being proposed.
”Then there’s engagement in the sense of having an engaged, informed and aware community that’s on a journey with us, and that’s what this paper is seeking to do,” said Foster.
Ways to engage with the community included social media posts, newsletters, having information resources about the Annual Plan at events, and direct contact with the most affected ratepayers.
Another initiative the team was looking at was community forums so councillors could meet with constituents.
”That will be a big part of pre-engagement for [the] LTP and really getting those conversations going,” said Foster.
”So, I almost see this plan as a precursor to that, of building awareness to start that conversation.
”And we’ve got a lot of ideas circulating with staff on getting councillors in front of ratepayers.”
Councillor Stuart Crosby, also president of Local Government New Zealand, supported the engagement approach.
”I think it’s the right pitch for what may come out of the Annual Plan, which we don’t know yet,” he said.
”I’m comfortable this is a sensible approach to engage the community.”
An Annual Plan workshop held in February provided a financial overview for the 2023/24 plan.
The estimated operating revenue for the period was $176.2 million with operating expenditure at $182.1m leaving a $6m deficit, according to the workshop’s agenda.
The proposed general rates increase would be 5 per cent, which was an average of $38 per household including GST.
The recommended targeted rates increase for things like public transport and Rotorua air quality targeted rate would be 12.3 per cent, which was decreased from 16.3 per cent.
The 2023/24 Annual Plan will be adopted and the rates set at a council meeting on June 29.
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