Waipā District Council's group manager of service delivery Dawn Inglis.
Waipā District Council's group manager of service delivery Dawn Inglis.
Long-term options to deliver water and wastewater services are still being explored in the Waipā District.
Hamilton City and Waikato District councils recently announced an agreement to co-design a potential council-controlled organisation (CCO) to deliver water services together.
The CCO keeps the door open for other councils to join, and is an option being considered by all councils nationwide to help meet Government requirements under the new Local Water Done Well reforms.
The Government requires all councils to submit a long-term water services plan by September 2025.
One option was for Waipā District Council (WDC) chief executive Steph O’Sullivan to negotiate a non-binding agreement to potentially join with other Waikato councils in forming a regional waters organisation.
O’Sullivan said the council was looking at all options for providing three waters to the district, alongside working with Waikato Water Done Well participants to explore what a regional, or sub-regional, CCO could provide.
New Waipā District Council chief executive Steph O’Sullivan. Photo / Mike Walen
“As well as options for Waipā to continue to provide water services to our communities via council, or a stand-alone CCO. This is what most councils across the country are considering.”
She said they were looking at options to get the best outcomes for Waipā, including short-term and long-term benefits.
She said key benefits would include financial sustainability, compliance with legal, economic, and environmental standards, affordable water services, keeping a skilled workforce, reliable suppliers, efficient delivery of the capital works programme, and maintaining high service standards for the community.
The council’s group manager for service delivery, Dawn Inglis, said the CCO wasn’t about the delivery of services, it was about “how we manage debt”.
She said one of the changes if the CCO were to go ahead in Waipā, would be that residents’ water services would no longer be connected to council.
“It will be like paying your power or other utility bills, it will be a completely separate organisation that is sending you that invoice.
“Therefore your relationship with that supplier is quite different rather than part of the council business.”
She said the CCO would be run in terms of “significant efficiency goals”.
“It would have to be more of an efficient service delivered through a CCO so it does bring benefits to the customers.
“That is part of our analysis in terms of how confident are we that that would be the case,” she said.
Inglis emphasised that it was still an option being explored.
Waipā Mayor Susan O’Regan said the Government had made it crystal clear the status quo – with individual councils managing three waters independently – was no longer viable.
Her council has opted into regional negotiations but was also doing an independent assessment to see if Waipā should continue to stand alone or join with others.
At this stage, no decision on the future management of stormwater has been made.
Malisha Kumar is a multimedia journalist based in Hamilton. She joined the Waikato Herald in 2023 after working for Radio 1XX in Whakatāne.
