Rotoma Sewerage Public Meeting

Meeting On the East Rotoiti Rotoma Sewerage Scheme

The Rotoma Community organised a public meeting on the 27 July 2024 for those interested in discussing the current situation and being part of finding a solution.

Here are the minutes of that meeting:

NOTES TO PUBLIC MEETING OF 27TH JULY.

Held at the Community Hall, Rotoma, 10.30 am

The purpose of this meeting was to inform the community of activities currently being worked on, share any other activities or ideas, listen to feedback and make a resolution to Council. The meeting was attended by 70 ratepayers from East Rotoiti, Rotoehu and Rotoma with a further 35 apologies being received.

Su Cammell addressed the meeting explaining that the structure of this meeting was to hear of three major activities which would impact on all residents within the three communities, together with known independent initiatives. Exploring solution-based outcomes is preferable to aggressive action, but that there is a need to keep some tension on to avoid complacency.

The primary outcomes being sought by the groups driving these activities are:-

1. To reduce the capital charge to ratepayers.

2. To secure a commitment that there will be no further charge for capital costs.

3. To supporting an independent audit to review the processes of the scheme.

Most ratepayers, in Rotoma in particular, also wanted to understand why, despite the fact that the scheme is not completed, they are now being charged when payment was previously refused. A request has been made under the Local Government Official Information Act process to clarify this, but it may take a month for a response. This will be shared when it has been received.

Cammell explained the first of the three initiatives currently in the pipeline

Initiative 1

A solutions-based initiative based on reducing cost.

Currently in discussion with RLC is a request to determine costs based on the maximum number of Household Unit Equivalents (HUE’s) the WWTP can process. This method was agreed prior to 2nd Resource Consent to provide an equitable solution to current users. i.e. if the actual number of installations was used [say] 650 HUE’s, and the capability was 1,000 HUE’s then question of how the revenue from the 350 growth installations could be reimbursed to current users (who of course may not be the ratepayer at the time of reimbursement). This proposal also talks to the inclusion of Rotoehu as per Resource Consent.

If adopted by Council dividing the cost by the capability of the plant (1,000 HUE’s) would reduce the individual charge to $17,314 (incl).

The initiative also speaks to Council “finding” another $3m as per their LTP deliberations.

Should they manage to find $2.5m, and divide the cost by 1,000, then the cost per HUE would be $14,440k (incl) - close to the expected cost.

Outcome potential: Cost to Ratepayers would decrease plus a positive PR opportunity for Council.