Rates * Whangarei District Council * Debt * Housing

Can our locals and our land defeat the debt devil? 

There are few strategies to tackle the debt of $2000 per capita in Whangarei. I’m not talking just ratepayers – I’m talking every man, woman and child in Whangarei, where our council owes approximately $160m.

It’s not an un-solvable problem. Our council can be proactive about the problem, rather than just increasing the tax upon us all.  Our Council could follow the suggested line of central government and encourage building and development within the district, this way more houses are being developed and therefore more rates will be coming in.  There is a shortage of houses and properties in Auckland (our closest neighbour), therefore this could help out Whangarei too.

The council could also use the model created by Northable in relation to dealing with customers, and therefore remove the necessary of paper-shufflers within the corporate structure.

The council could also lower the rates differential between residential and commercial properties (at present it is roughly a 5 to 1 ratio against the commercial.) This will mean more people will open shops and people will move back to the CBD.

The council could use only local contractors and change its focus to ‘Use Local Only.’ This means funds are going back into the local community and therefore the local ratepayers’ money will come back to them to reuse.

All of these options are available, however the council needs to be proactive, and want to actually change the way business is done in Whangarei.  Debt is not a good thing, and it is something that we shouldn’t feel comfortable about. Six years ago Whangarei’s debt was $135m now $160m how much more can you handle?

Until next week :o)

Vince