Ruapehu District Council's Long Term Plan most exciting, ambitious and challenging yet

Ruapehu mayor Don Cameron says the LTP "will set Ruapehu's development agenda for a generation". Photo/ Supplied

Ruapehu District Council's latest Long Term Plan (LTP) is now open for feedback and has generated a lot of interest and discussion.

Ruapehu Mayor Don Cameron said that the 2018-2028 LTP is the most exciting, ambitious and challenging 10 year strategic plan that council had produced.

"This LTP will set Ruapehu's development agenda for a generation," he said.

"People want to see that the momentum they feel around them is maintained, and are impatient for things to happen faster. This LTP is all about how we plan to deliver this."

There were big opportunities in the LTP, alongside some equally big challenges, he said.

"We need to balance community development aspirations against infrastructure development demands, notably in water, to meet legislated compliance requirements.

"Council believes that we are able to achieve both these goals and it is not a matter of choosing one or the other, or dropping levels of service in other areas."

The township revitalisation projects have progressed with relatively small amounts of expenditure.

The council now needs to commit to bigger spending, to deliver the change and development that people want to see, to give the townships a foothold in the future.

Meeting government legislated compliance requirements in drinking water and wastewater will be a big driver of new debt, which is projected to rise to $68.5m over the 10 years of the LTP.

Mr Cameron said that council would work hard with government to obtain funding assistance for water projects to bring the projected debt level down.

"Council has been quite successful in gaining government financial support for projects which now totals over $5.3m over the past three years," he said.

"Ratepayers should have every confidence that if government funding is available we will get our share.

"We are also asking if people would support a move to district wide rate funding for water schemes rather than each township paying for their own scheme as they currently do."

District wide rate funding for water would smooth out the big jumps in rates for individual schemes when the plant is upgraded and help out smaller communities with long term affordability.

Other specific issues the RDC is asking for feedback on include; funding local roads, how to manage solid waste when the landfill closes, fairly sharing the cost of tourism promotion and how best to unlock government's $2m commitment to the Ohakune Mountain Rd cycle trail and what community facilities are needed.

Mr Cameron said that finding out more about the key consultation issues was easy, either through one page fact sheets, attending LTP community meetings, or by seeing the LTP Consultation Document.

"All LTP documents and details can be found on council's website ruapehudc.govt.nz, at your local council office, or give us a call on 07 895 8188 or 06 385 8364 and we will send them out to you."