Catchment Board Election Doubt

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31753, 9 August 1968, Page 12

Catchment Board Election Doubt

Prospects are almost nil for the North Canterbury Catchment Board to hold elections over its enlarged district on October 12, the day of the local body polls. The National Water and Soil Conservation Authority has agreed that Cheviot, Amuri and Waipara counties ■ should come into the board's ! district The authority has also approved the exclusion I of Akaroa and Mount Herbert 'counties and the Lyttelton | borough, which it sanctions as water authorities.

This arrangement involves the reallocation of the board's 10 elective seats among the 19 councils in the enlarged district. But there are problems as to grouping for Oxford county and the Local Government Commission will have to adjudicate. Although the board has asked for urgency, in the faint hope of finality by October 12, the commission has not made a date for its visit. With the formalities the commission has to observe, it would be impossible to get a final decision before nomin- > ations close, in the general way, on September 13. From the start of discussions to finality could take four months. This time lag poses problems for the board, which wishes to avoid holding two elections, one on its present basis, and the other when the new seating basis is settled.

The alternative, which may be adopted, would be the

postponing of the board elections until the decision. The commission will not be concerned with the authority’s decision appointing Lyttelton, Mount Herbert and Akaroa as water authorities, because these councils will not be represented on the board. In their status as watei authorities, the three councils will not have to pay the board’s administrative rate, but they will remain under the over-all control of the board on policy matters. An argument used by the three councils against joining the board was that they would be paying the administrative rate for nothing. This appeared to be based on the misconception that administrative meant secretarial services.

The rate, in fact, pays not only for running the board, but for engineering and soil conservation advice and estimates, which are provided as of right for individuals and councils in the board’s area, at no cost up to the point where work is started.

If the three councils, or their ratepayers, want the board’s services on these matters, the work involved will be charged to them. Another difference is that when a scheme is adopted in the board’s district, it qualifies for subsidy. While jobs done outside the board’s district can get subsidy, they could not be expected to take precedence for board subsidy money over jobs in the board’s district