HUTT COUNTY COUNCIL

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 121, 24 May 1928, Page 8

HUTT COUNTY COUNCIL

:' THIS YEAE'S PEOGEAMME Mr. D. E. Hoggard, the new chairman, made a short reference to the council's proposed activities for the ensuing year. The county, he said, had come through a very strenuous time. The most important matter which would claim the council's attention :was tbe securing of some measure of relief to ratepayers against.the intolerable burden which was being imposed upon them by foreign traffic. The burden was pressing heavily on both the residential and the rural areas of the county. Mr. Hoggard said that efforts should be made to readjust the distribution of the heavy traffic fees. For the No. 9 district the total heavy traffic fees collected last year amounted to £25,716 10s. This sum was distributed between the eight local authorities included in the No. 9 district. The basis of distribution which had prevailed in the past was grossly unfair to the Hutt County. The amount the Hutt County received by way of heavy traffic fees worked out at only £7 8s per mile of road in the county, whilst Petone's share worked out at £218 12s per mile per annum. The Lower Hutt received £67 14s per mile on its road mileage, and Wellington City £65 18s per mile. Wellington City, however, gave certain services in the collection of the fees, which were a partial set-off against: its amount.: The Makara County's share worked out at £35. 4s per mile on its road mileage. Councillors would see from these figures how unjustly the Hutt County was being treated in connection with the distribution of heavy traffic fees.