A RATES rise is all but done as Hawkesbury Council voted to ask IPART for a special rate variation for the next three years, that will see rates rise by a total of 9.5 per cent per year.
The chamber was packed at a hostile Hawkesbury Council meeting on November 28, where councillors voted 8-4 to adopt its Draft Supplementary Resourcing Strategy 2017-2027, which includes asking for a rate rise.
The SRV is necessary, according to Mayor Mary Lyons-Buckett, to ensure future and current Council assets can be properly maintained. She said Council’s costs continued to rise, and it risked having to cut services if this rates rise was not adopted.
However, not all were impressed by the Mayor and Council’s planned future.
A number of angry Oakville residents were in the chamber, furious that after many of them received hefty increases when Council rejigged the ratings structure – a separate issue to the special rate variation – they were now being asked to cop another rise.
Oakville’s John Cupit said he was not opposed to a rates rise but said it was not fair that Oakville residents should pay so much more than many other Hawkesbury residents.
“We've got people going broke and losing their property,” he said.
It was not all negative. Peter Nicholson said many Councils across NSW have had SRVs in the past, while Bill Sneddon said rate rises were unpleasant but longer term consequences for not raising them were worse.
The Mayor said the rise was necessary and would be good for the region.
“I firmly believe it is the best investment in the Hawkesbury's future,” she said.
Independent councillors Peter Reynolds and Paul Rasmussen both said constant cost-shifting from the state government had forced Council’s hand in seeking an SRV.
Liberal councillor Patrick Conolly said a lesser rise would have satisfied Council’s financial needs.
The ratings restructure, while a separate matter to the proposed SRV that was actually being debated at Council, has dominated much of the debate.
Liberal councillor Nathan Zamprogno said he did not believe rates were distributed fairly across the Hawkesbury in their current form, and fellow Liberal Sarah Richards echoed his comments.
Deputy Mayor and Labor councillor Barry Calvert said in the previous Council, when the rates were restructured, there were loud and persistent cries to change them then too.
“We were inundated with people complaining about the previous rate structures,” he said.
“I know there are people here who are unhappy, but frankly there were many more people who complained longer and louder about the previous structure.
“Nobody in this Council deliberately set out to make things tougher for the people of Oakville.”
The Mayor said Council had committed to looking at, and potentially changing, the ratings structure for the 2018-19 financial year.
The next move for Council is to prepare a submission to the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal.
That submission will have another Council vote at the first meeting of 2018, on January 30, and then Council will submit it to IPART.
If IPART accepts the submission, in 2018-19, rates will rise by 9.5 per cent – or about 7 per cent above the assumed rate pegging level of 2.5 per cent.
In the 2019-20 and 2020-21 financial years, rates will again rise by 9.5 per cent per year.
Mayor Lyons-Buckett, deputy Mayor Calvert, Cr Ross, Cr Rasmussen, Cr Garrow, Cr Reynolds, Cr Wheeler and Cr Kotlash voted to pursue the SRV.
Cr Conolly, Cr Zamprogno, Cr Tree and Cr Richards voted against it.
