12 November 2009

Council Seeks Government Funding For Social Housing

The Christchurch City Council is seeking $84.175 million from the Government to help fund the accelerated replacement of its social housing.

Today Councillors signed off on a submission to go to Central Government via the Minister of Housing.

If the submission is successful, rental increases already agreed for 2010-2014 will be able to be reduced. If it is not successful, then the rental increases agreed by the Council in April of this year will remain in force.

“The Council has repeatedly stressed our commitment to being an active provider of social housing in the city, but we can only do this without it being a burden on ratepayers. This means that the costs we will soon face for replacement of housing must be met by tenants, by Central Government or from some other source. Consultation we have had with social housing stakeholders has not revealed any other sources of funding that lessen the impact on tenants – leaving only the options of the work being funded by tenants or by Central Government,” says Mayor Bob Parker.

“The Christchurch City Council is a major provider of social housing in New Zealand – second only to Housing New Zealand. Our involvement means we can offer safe and affordable accommodation to a wide range of people in the city’s lower socio economic sector. We would welcome support from Central Government which would enable us to continue in this role and keep rents for our tenants as low as possible.”

The Council needs to know the outcome of its funding appeal by April of next year for it to make any changes to planned rent increases for mid 2010.

“Our submission is the first step of that process and we look forward to working closely with the Government as they consider and analyse our submission,” says Mr Parker.

ENDS

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