Ashburton has adopted a plan for managing drinking water, wastewater and stormwater services in-house. 

The stand-alone business model plan, adopted on Wednesday, will be submitted to the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) before September 3 as part of the Government’s Water Done Well reforms. 

In a workshop earlier this month, figures showed the average household cost for water services will double from $1441 in 2024 to $2948 in 2034 due to increasing compliance and maintenance requirements. 

The DIA is expected to make a decision on all the water plans by the end of the year.

If any are rejected, work on a suitable solution may go into the new year. 

So far, only three plans have been signed off – Selwyn (Single-Council CCO), Waimakariri (in-house business unit) and the Hamilton/Waikato joint-CCO. 

The plan locks in how the district's waters service will be delivered in the future, projecting maintenance and investment plans for the next 10 years – with a strong focus on financial sustainability. 

Democracy and engagement group manager Toni Durham informed councillors that the final piece of legislation to implement 'Local Water Done Well, which passed its third reading in parliament on Wednesday, would require a repeat of the process. 

“Because we have chosen a stand-alone business unit, we are going to be required to repeat this process every five years to ensure that we can demonstrate financial sustainability to both our community and to Government.” 

That will mean community consultation, which costs around $20,000, and will need to consider three delivery models, as opposed to the two models the council had to present earlier this year, Durham said. 

Ashburton had consulted on an in-house model as its preferred option and a single-council CCO, with 88% of submissions supporting the stand-alone business unit model. 

-LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.

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