LOAN OF £130,000

Waikato Times, Volume 106, Issue 22730, 4 October 1945, Page 4

LOAN OF £130,000

COUNCIL’S PROPOSALS APPLICATION TO LOANS BOARD On the motion of Mr H. D. Caro the Hamilton Borough Council last night decided to make application to the Local Government Loans Board for its sanction to the borrowing of the sum of £130,000 for the purposes of providing concrete kerbing and channelling and bituminous footpaths throughout the borough, including the cost of fixing permanent levels and any necessary regrading and resurfacing of the streets, for labour, cartage, material and tools, and the sum of £3OOO for plant. The loan will be for a period of 20 years, the expenditure to be limited to a maximum of £30,000 in any one year and £25,000 in any other year. The security will be a special rate of 1 5-10 d in the pound on the rateable unimproved value of all rateable property within the borough. “It is intended, if the proposals are approved by the Loans Board and the ratepayers, that the expenditure will be spread over a period of not less than five y~ars, and the voting paper will be so drawn as to enforce this limitation,” said the Mayor. “ The money for each year’s expenditure will be treated as a separate loan and will be raised only as and when it is required with the object of keeping the annual charges for interest and repayment of principle to the minimum and spreading the increase over the maximum period. Increase in Rates “ If the loan is approved the rates as a result will increase at the rate of about 3-10 d in the pound each year over the next six years,” Mr Caro said. “We might expect this increase to be absorbed without creating any undue hardship as by this method the people who would be hurt by an additional lid in one year will have time to adjust their affairs to meet the position. If it is not approved, then I think the council will have to take steps to raise its revenue materially next year and carry out the work over a longer period. “In dealing with a streets loan proposal at the end of 1938, which owing to the war got no further than the Loans Board, I said that I was surprised that the people of Hamilton had for so long put up with the conditions. Some of the roads and footpaths were no better than were to be found in the backblocks. There had been no street loan moneys available for 10 years past. “ All that could be said then is more than ever true of conditions today,” Mr Caro concluded. “ The present proposals differ from those of 1938 in that today we are seeking authority to concentrate on kerbing and footpaths, as these works are deemed the most urgent.”