Council to forgive past water charges for community groups

Community groups have had a small financial reprieve with Auckland Council ‘forgiving’ outstanding water charges for groups that lease council land or buildings for community activity purposes.

The amounts vary between around 200 groups with an average of about $500 per group being forgiven.

Council has been working with Watercare to reconcile water charges for community groups after the super city amalgamation to align water and wastewater charging for community groups from the various legacy councils. Because of the complexity in determining how much each group used per water meter, Auckland Council became the default payee for water and wastewater.

With a resolution in sight and a more clearly defined billing system scheduled to begin on 1 July, Council is to forgive historic payments required of community groups that have not already had their water charged directly from Watercare.

Ian Wheeler, General Manager Property at Auckland Council, said with the vast range of community facilities, the task of attributing each community user group’s meter usage for water and wastewater is a time-consuming task.

“It is more cost-efficient in terms of staff time and resources to forgive the charges and start with a fresh slate in July,” he said.

Mr Wheeler said it was important that community groups understood they would be responsible for the payment of their water accounts to Watercare from July and he urged groups to contact the Council if they have any concerns about their future metering charges.

He said Council’s Property Lease Advisors are available to work closely with and support community lease tenants as they transition through this new invoicing process and to answer any queries.

ENDS

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