PAYMENT OF CITY RATES

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21986, 9 January 1937, Page 12

PAYMENT OF CITY RATES

—♦ - . n £45,000 RECEIVED BY ' COUNCIL ■*: ' • IMPROVEMENT ON YEAR’S FIGURES With less than two months to go IE before the imposition of the 10 cent, penalty, about £45,000 haj been received by the Christchuith= City Council of the current year’s rates, the total levy being of which £110,676 is the general rate. Arrears amounting to £26,273 have been received since April I e| last year. Although the proportieii ; of the current year’s rates received seems small, it is substantially larger than that received up to the same date last year, and the working days of the last fortnight have been busy ones for the staff of the rate collector’s department. On the two days before Christmas Day 190 ratepayers met the mands made on them for the car-: rent year’s rates, and on the three 1 days on which the council’s offices' were open between Christmas 'and the New Year there were 220 pay. ments. Since then the average his been about 125 a day, and the re-‘ ceipts about £IOOO a day, a better response than that of the same-' period a year before. On the two days before Christmas Day of 1935 there were 150 payments, and on the three days between Christmas and the New Year on which the office was open 100 rate demands were paid. -* 3' Rate demands for the current ‘ year were dispatched by the council on August 17, about a-month earlier " than the date for sending-out the demands for the previous yeai’i rates, and this accounts to some extent for the improvement in the receipts to date. . Up to January 8, 1935, the council had received £36,051 of the total levy, approximately £9OOO less than the amount that has been received up to the same day of this year. Arrears received to January 8, 1935, totalled £24,225, about £2OOO less than the. arrears received by the council this year. Sickness and annual holidays have reduced the staff of the rate collet tor’s department at present by four, and the increase in payments has added to the difficulties of the re-' maining members of the staff. How- 1 ever, the rush of ratepayers does not - come until the last few days before the imposition of the penalty—this year it will be on March 4—and by that time the staff will be-atsS - usual strength. •