Auditors give big tick to council's finances

PLEASED: CEO Paul Crimp and Mayor Adrienne Staples at the first South Wairarapa District Council meeting of the new three-year term on Wednesday. PHOTO/ Lynda Feringa

Things are on track in South Wairarapa, according to Audit NZ.

There were no issues with the South Wairarapa District Council's annual report 2012-13, which has been audited by John O'Connell from Audit NZ.

"Things look pretty good in South Wairarapa," he said.

"The level of rates is about right and the debt levels are being well contained."

Mr O'Connell made the comments at the first council meeting of the triennium, where the report was formally adopted by the new council team.

Chief executive officer Paul Crimp said it had been "a pretty good year" despite some challenges.

"It's been a year of change, with some uncertainty with the local governance changes and a little bit of sting in the tail with the June storm.

"But we've also made some really good progress on some key initiatives."

The council was on budget, he said.

The waste water treatment and disposal project is one of the biggest projects for the council by far, Mr Crimp said.

He said the background work had been done on the 30-year plan, freeing them up to find appropriate sites for each of the three towns.

It has bought land in Greytown for treated waste water to go into instead of being pumped into the Waiohine and Ruamahanga rivers.

"The game changed a bit because central Government wants us to get out of rivers, they are making quite clear signals, so getting that Greytown land was just fantastic," said Mr Crimp.

"I think that has really set South Wairarapa up in good stead to meet its aim of not discharging to waterways as soon as possible.

"We're really well placed now to meet that objective."

The council has been looking at Pain Farm in Martinborough and is working on Featherston's pipes in its waste water system.

"There's quite a few hurdles to get over for that," said Mr Crimp.

"We're spending quite a lot of effort on infiltration just seeing where the leaks are and putting flow meter cameras down there.

"We are slowly chipping away at it."

Mr Crimp said roading, one of the council's biggest budget areas, was also performing well.

However, a review of funding assistance rates by the NZ Transport Agency was taking place and could impact on money for road maintenance.

"The initial signals are that the rate will go to 50 per cent, at the moment we get 49 per cent."

He said while there was a 1 per cent gain, it was likely the special purpose road funding would be axed.

"Whilst we gain a bit, we're going to lose a bit.

"We'll need to manage the regular maintenance within a smaller budget.

"There's going to be a bit of work we'll have to do to shuffle things around and minimise the impact of that."

Mayor Adrienne Staples said it should be noted that often work carried out on special purpose roads, such as Cape Palliser Rd, was a result of an emergency, such as a storm.

That attracted subsidies between 80 to 100 per cent, she said.