Then we pay the Uniform Annual General Charge (to use city amenities) which includes toilets.
Now the council would like to bolster their coffers by another payment of $50.
How many times do we have to pay for the privilege of pooping?
The council should have sent a letter to all rural ratepayers advising them of this change. It would have been courteous.
This will be increased yearly just as our rates are.
JENNIFER GRAMMATICOGIANNIS
RD4 Wanganui
A long-term look
Those planning how to deal with flood levels along Anzac Parade and Taupo Quay could well take a long-term look at the likely changes in the climate and society over the lifetime of today's school children.
If existing coal/petrol/diesel consumption isn't stopped, CO2 will reach 500 ppm by 2050, and this will warm the Arctic tundra enough to release unstoppably vast amounts of more and more CO2.
As those levels rise towards 600 ppm, crop plants will become progressively less nutritious (tinyurl.com/matekai), so there would be widespread malnutrition by about 2070, when today's primary school pupils will be approaching retirement. And as CO2 levels rose even further, there will be a rapid meltdown of polar ice caps, causing permanent flooding in major coastal cities, as well as along Anzac Parade and Taupo Quay.
However, there is good news. All this may never happen. A Nasa-funded study (tinyurl.com/iwimate) has indicated that by about 2030, the increasing social inequality caused by the rich 1 per cent hoarding more and more of the world's wealth is very likely to cause the complete collapse of our global technological civilisation. This will make passenger jets, motor cars and huge coal-fired electric distribution grids things of the past.
Life for most people will become nasty, brutish and short, and it is very possible that not many of today's school kids will reach retirement age, but without our massive consumption of oil and coal, the planet, and Kowhai Park, may be saved.
JOHN ARCHER
Ohakune
Fred was right
Deb, go easy on Fred (letters, May 18)! I thought his column (May 16) was right on the money, but it contained only one error (men do make mistakes sometimes).
There is no way that Horizons former deputy river management manager Peter Blackwood could have been responsible for those hideous and ridiculous smashed concrete flood walls at Edgecumbe (I could be proved wrong). Peter Blackwood left Horizons soon after he missed out on the top river management job and moved up to the local regional council up there. I think he must have inherited those concrete slabs.
Deb, those types of staff who don't know what they are doing should be held to account. You underestimate their "power and control" in some cases. Damn right it's dangerous, if not a total waste of ratepayers' money.
Millions were wasted on stopbanks here by a small clique of people. I spent 13 years sitting on both sides of the fence (council management and elected councillor), so I have seen it all.
Plus I was the chairman of Vision, the first political group to enter the local authority domain here. Vision was attacked as a "controlling clique of councillors and mayor" by a group upset that their pet money-wasting projects got chopped. Well, it was only a matter of months after that we had a new mayor and a pile of clones banding together doing "their thing", frequently against the wishes of the ratepayers.
Now we have a group of four newly appointed guys doing similar, but thankfully it's not a case of "follow the leader". They are listening to the community and watching where the dollars are spent. They have my total support.
I hope the above answers your concerns, Deb. A change of government is not going to do anything; it will be more political promises and more political promises.
BOB WALKER
St John's Hill
Duck shooting
Yes, it's a shame on all New Zealand that there are so many birds on the endangered list (Noeline Booker, letters, May 23).
Having said that, I am proud, as a keen duck shooter, that the main species of fowl I hunt are not on that list.
The reason that is so is the time, effort and money we duck hunters spend enhancing and creating wildfowl habitat, which also benefits a lot of endangered birds.
Whether or not these birds were created by Noeline's imaginary friend, the only thing I want more than a good season this year is a better one next. True conservation.
JEFF KING
Castlecliff
Rewa's dog
Re Chronicle, May 17: I am sickened by the continual use, this paper included, of the picture of Malcolm Rewa, the convicted serial rapist, and (I presume) his beautiful, smiling husky dog.
This PR job is obviously designed to soften our attitude towards this scumbag. It's an insult to this beautiful animal and, quiet frankly, they should not appear together in any news media.
If there must be a picture of Mr Rewa in the media, leave this beautiful animal out of it. It's an insult to all animals, especially dogs.
A BARRON
Aramoho
Self-inflicted
Potonga, you have confirmed what was suspected; you are suffering from a "self-inflicted wound".
Your diatribe regarding our early history has become "verbal diarrhoea" and is so not wanted.
Why not concern yourself with current matters such as drug abuse, alcohol abuse, drink-driving and other such matters?
You cannot change the past, but you may influence the present. Keep focused on the now.
Be a good chap, retire your pen.
MICHAEL WILTON
Taihape