kia ora koutou,

Porirua City council is proposing to increase the rates to a whopping 7.65% on Residential properties. This means an increase of at least $14 a fortnight for a household. Inflation is up 7%, rates up again 7.65%, this means an average household will left out with nothing to spend on even essentials.

PCC states that an average 42% of the proposed rates goes to pay for roading, wastewater, stormwater and water supply. The rest of the money goes on providing services like parks, cemeteries, emergency management, libraries, arts and culture, and recreation. There is no mention on the past or current year spending on a detail basis on the above. 

I feel Government need to interfere in big time to ease the pressure on house hold spending. There is no point hanging in Porirua region with this ridicuolous increase in cost of living.

Requesting your support to at least raise the concern on a channel that someone will hopefully see. Looking forward for your support. Honestly I don't know the outcome of this yet.

I would like to do some fact check here.
As per Stats NZ (2018) PCC has got approximately:
• Population 60K
• Private Dwellings 20K
• Family of 4 with 2 children – roughly 26% of total population
• Employed full time – roughly 52% of total population
• Professionals – roughly 28% of total population
• Income 70K to 100K – roughly 12% total population
• Income 101K to 150K – roughly 8% total population
• Income 151K or more – roughly 4% total population

If you are in the income group of 101K plus the rate increase of 7.65% may not have a big hit on your lifestyle. Note that we are talking about merely 12% of the entire population in Porirua.

Have you ever thought of how much this rates contributes to our total Spending on a month ? For a household of 2 adult and 2 child (26% of population), rates are one of the Top 3 expenses on a family budget ! Every increase in rates is adversely impacting the finances of a family. Its true that rates contributes to the wellbeing of the community at large.

I acknowledge that, but my concern is if we are unable to take advantage of the wellbeing that the rates offer, living on a pay-check to pay-check, struggling to meet end needs, does this makes sense ? PCC would have to find a way to increase the revenue by some other means, rather than squeezing every penny out of rate payers.

With recession around the corner, all of us should try to save something for a rainy day. But it is highly unlikely that we will be left out with anything after all this increases. I would be inclined to support this increase in rates, if New Zealand is running on a Universal Basic Income, adjusted to the current rate of inflation.

Ngā mihi nui