King Country Chronicle Saturday, September 1, 1923. LAND DRAINAGE AMENDMENT.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XVIII, Issue 1856, 1 September 1923, Page 4

King Country Chronicle Saturday, September 1, 1923. LAND DRAINAGE AMENDMENT.

Word has been received by the local Chamber of Commerce from Mr J. C. Rolleston, M.P., that amendments have been made to the Land Drainage Act, which are of considerable interest to this district. The original Act has two methods of dealing with the formation of drainage boards or districts. The first is the formation of drainage districts under the jurisdiction of a local authority. This method has quite sufficient authority, but the local bodies in this district have quite enough to look after at present without taking any further responsibility, and it was felt that the formation of a drainage board should be on similar lines to that of a drainage district under a county council. A drainage district can be formed on a requisition signed by 50 per ‘’cent of those ratepayers in the area affected who are not in arrears with their rates for a longer period than 12 months. In other words, it is only those who have paid their rates who are eligible to sign such a requisition. Under the Land Drainage Act 50 per cent of the total ratepayers in the district affected must sign a petition for the formation of a drainage board, whether they are defaulters or not, which makes it impossible in certain instances to form such a board. In many cases the land is in small holdings, some of them being a quarter acre, and owned by absentees.

The amendment to the Act now provides that 50 per cent of the financial ratepayers are sufficient to sign a requisition to form a drainage board, thus placing it on the same footing as when forming a drainage district under the wing of a county council. The amending Act will find general favour in this district, as there are several tracts of country which only require a proper system of drainage to make them reproductive, and thus add to the prosperity of the country. The settlers in the Mangaokewa and Oparure have for a long, time past been endeavouring to form a drainage board, but owing to the old legislature this was impossible. If, under the new order of things a drainage board can be formed to drain these districts, it will have the effect of bringing into cultivation some 6000 to 8000 acres of very rich land.