RATING PROPOSALS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 65, Issue 205, 12 June 1945, Page 2

RATING PROPOSALS.

Sir,—lt is time someone called the attention of the ratepayers of the old Borough and those of Ashburton East to what the Mayor and Councillors are doing with the rates collected! I would like to ask the Mayor, for instance, what is being done with the surplus money collected each year on the high pressure water loan, also the drainage loan. I notice the rates on these loans were reduced steadily until 1940. Since then no reduction in the rate struck has been made. Yet the loans ai*e being reduced by the sinking fund. Surely the ratepayers are entitled to have these rates reduced as they were prior to 1940. I doubt if any moneys so collected could legally be transferred to say the general fund. Another item which needs explaining is that the Hospital rate has been taken out of the general rate and shown as a separate rate. The reason is, of course, to disguise the fact that the general rate has gone up by 6£d. Now, seeing that the Mayor intimated, when addressing ratepayers before the recent poll, that the rates would not advance more than 9d and indeed might be as low as 3d in the £, how does he explain the present rise of 6£d without the loan being carried? The Mayor is determined to have certain work done and such work must be paid for out of the general rates, and it is safe to say nearly all of this work must and will be done in Alienton, despite the fact that the Mayor has said the work will be spread evenly over the Borough. . . The Council therefore are working on an inflated general account by virtue of high pressure alid drainage rates and by the present rise in file general rate. I would suggest that an association be formed to watch the interests of ratepayers, especially those on fixed incomes, on whom at this time of general inflation any rise in rates must weigh heavily. BE CAREFUL. [This letter has been somewhat curtailed to conform to our space limit. When this letter was referred to the Mayor (Mr E. C. Bathurst) lie said he would not take notice of anonymous correspondence, in addition to which the letter contained a number of mis-statements.—Ed. “Guardian.”]