AUCKLAND RATES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 192, 16 August 1938, Page 11

AUCKLAND RATES.

£604,525 DEMANDED.

LATE ISSUE OF NOTICES.

PUBLIC UTIUTIES' POSITION.

Rate demands calling upon city ratepayers to pay a sum of £604,525 during the next six months are now being issued by the Auckland City Council. The earliest demands were sent out on July 19 and the task of issuing the 30,000 notices, covering every rateable property in the city, should be completed by the end of the present week. Besides the rates, water charges involving a total of £88,250 are being demanded.

Schools, churches, departmental buildings and charitable institutions enjoy complete exemption. Private schools and colleges are exempt up to four acres of property, after which the liability for rates is the same as that of ordinary ratepayers. The Auckland Public Hospital, which strangely is not included in the area of any local authority, is entirely outside the reach of the rate collector's net.

Largest of all ratepayers is the Auckland Electric Power Board, which controls and administers a huge system of supply services. The most raluaLle portion of its property consists of overhead and underground mains and service equipment. Next the Auckland Harbour Hoard and the Auckland Transport Board rank almost equal, with a rate liability considerably less than half that of the Power Board*. At least one third of the total amount collected iu rates is obtained within a radius of half a m:le of the Chief Post Office, and a substantial sum is also paid by business firms in Karangahape Road and Symonds Street and in the industrial area of Freeman's Bav.

This year the rate notices have born dated about a fortnight later than in recent years, due to some delay in the passing of the necessary resolution by the City Council. The earliest penalty date, instead of being in January, will be at the beginning of February and the latest date will be early in March.

Already several thousand pounds in rates for the year have been paid, end it is expected there will be a steady rlow of payments as the year advances.