News

The afternoon meeting last Tuesday at the NPDC was to put through voting by the Mayor and Councillors so rates bills could be sent out to all the Ratepayers – with the correct information and rates amount on them.

It was great to see many of our supporters at that meeting wearing our T-Shirts – with our “respect my rates” message.

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Over 61% of New Plymouth submitters asked for an in-house company structure for water with their submissions. What will the NPDC decide ?

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The Local Government Minister, Simon Watts, has announced new legislation will be in by the end of the year to refocus Council Spending. This was announced in his speech at the LGNZ conference last week.

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“An internal investigation into how the New Plymouth District Council has improved the way it manages its contractors three years on from a scathing audit report, has found significant shortcomings still exist in the organisation.” (Taranaki Daily News)

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We saw a small piece in a news article that a consulting firm called Martin Jenkins had been working with Councils to prepare their documents to submit to the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) about Local Water Done Well.

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We have written about the Financial Competence at the NPDC a few times.

We have also recently written to a few agencies outside of New Plymouth with questions about competency.

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There is hope - if we get the right Mayor and Councillors sitting around our Council Table after the election - we could be as successful as Whanganui has been in keeping their rates increase down to 2.2%.

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Having just covered a story ourselves the previous day, about LGNZ mounting a campaign to use ratepayer income to counter the Taxpayers Union rates capping campaign, this was an interesting perspective for a candidate looking for our Vote as the next Mayor.

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Local Government NZ (LGNZ) is featuring in a few items of interest of late. Their annual conference is happening on the 16th – 17th July in Christchurch.

Just a refresher – we wrote a story about this group a few months ago. You would be forgiven for thinking something called Local Government NZ would be a government based organisation.

It’s not - it is a Private Business – and they invoice all the NZ Councils who belong every year. NPDC pays $90k per year to belong.

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We knew it cost a fair bit of Ratepayer income for the teams of staff at each Council in NZ to attend the LGNZ annual conference. This is on top of the Annual Fee the Ratepayers are paying.

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For anyone who couldn't be at our T-Shirt Day today, or if you wanted to know more about what we presented, the speeches are attached.

Kevin's Speech is attached with the photos and Sheridan's Speech with the words.

Around 90 people came to the Council meeting to hear what we had to say. The support was fantastic, thank you so much to everyone who managed to make it there today. It was so good to see so many T-Shirts on display.

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This morning we spoke to the Councillors about the submission we sent in about Local Water Done Well, along with 12 other people who wanted Councillors to hear their thoughts.

Our speech is attached for anyone who would like to have a read.

In support of the Devon Street West Cycleway Petition, and to add weight to our story of the Safety Plan prepared by Beca also being audited by Beca at the end of the project, we want to start gathering actual information about injuries and near misses happening on the Barrett Street to Morley Street Cycleway.

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It is news we are happy with and we are thrilled to see so many of our supporters took the time to put in a submission.

The Local Water Done Well Submissions closed on 30th May. On the 1st June we asked for a full copy of the submission results.

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Stratford Councillors voted unanimously yesterday to NOT join a Taranaki Regional CCO for their water services.

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And then there is also the Green Master Plan from the Huatoki Area to Gover Street - all along Devon Street East shopping area. Did you know about all the changes planned for that ?

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We’ve been seeing a number of comments on Facebook that Beca is auditing the Barrett Road to Morley Street Cycleway once it’s completed.

We had asked for a copy of the original Public Health and Safety Plan that was done BEFORE building the cycleway – and the company who prepared that was ALSO Beca.

So we thought we’d better check with the NPDC if the comments on Facebook were true and that Beca - was auditing itself - Beca - on the success of the Cycleway.

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We were so pleased to see yesterday’s story in the Post, with the submissions received for the Local Water Done Well Consultation across Taranaki.

The majority of people in Stratford and South Taranaki said - No to a CCO - for the new Local Water Done Well company structure.

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If you are running for a seat around the Council table to represent your community, surely you need to listen to what your community has to say. Otherwise how will you represent their needs ?

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Have you been watching and listening to the state of what is happening with our Local Council - the NPDC.

Have you been following the issues, and the big numbers for budgets and debt, being tossed around carelessly by some of the current elected officials ?

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So many of our supporters told us it is such a waste of time putting in a submission because the NPDC has already decided what they will be doing, and sadly we thought you were probably right.

We've received a lot of information about the submissions, and we are clarifying some of the detail. When we know we have the full set of results we will also analyse the data and see what we think the results are.

But we found something very concerning with the information we have been sent so far. Something along the lines of what our supporters were already telling us.

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