Media Release
15 June 2006

Council Opts for Annual Value Rating
Landmark decision for Manukau City Council

In what was one of Manukau city’s most important policy decisions, Manukau City Councillors last night voted to change the basis of the city’s rating system.

Manukau city rates will, from the 2006/07 year, be based on Annual Value (AV), rather than Land Value, which previously governed the city rates system.

An overwhelming majority of councillors voted to ratify the Plan Committee’s decision from the previous night to adopt Annual Value.

Council believes Annual Value provides the city with a stable platform to minimise rating anomalies, chief financial officer Geoff Foster says.

“It more equitably distributes the rates burden across the city,” he says.

It also puts the city in the best position to deal with the effects of growth.

“Manukau city has evolved from a rural town into New Zealand’s third largest and fastest growing metropolitan centre. As such, with Annual Value as our rating base, we can now capture that growth,” Mr Foster says.

The preferred option put forward in the draft Long Term Council Community Plan, of ARV158 (Annual Value with a targeted refuse charge of $158), was amended to include a Uniform Annual General Charge of $300.

A nine-all vote on the $300 uniform charge was decided with Mayor Sir Barry Curtis’ casting vote.

“What will happen with the adoption of AV300 is that the band of increases or decreases in rates will be narrower,” Mr Foster says.

Last night’s decisions on the Long Term Plan must be audited by Audit New Zealand during the next two weeks, with the final plan then ratified at the Council’s meeting on 29 June.

Further details of the final Long Term Plan will be included in the council’s publication Manukau Matters on 23 July, in advertisements in local newspapers in the first week of July, as well as inclusion on the council’s website, www.manukau.govt.nz.

ENDS

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