Quality of DAP submissions praised

SUBMISSIONS to the Manawatu District Council’s 2008/09 Draft Annual Plan are of a good quality and were well presented at this week’s public hearings, says Manawatu District Mayor, Ian McKelvie.

Eighty submissions were received for the DAP and 33 individuals, businesses and organisations took the opportunity to speak to their submission in the council chamber on Monday and Tuesday.

Mr McKelvie said the number of submissions received was as expected, but the diverse range of topics was not so predictable.

“You would think that rates may have been the major topic, but it’s probably not, which is a little surprising,” he said.

“A lot of the submissions are more related to the Long Term Council Community Plan (LTCCP) process and will lead into next year’s development of that plan. There’s some quite good stuff in respect to that, which is encouraging.”

Mr McKelvie said the proposed Leisureville project in Makino Park attracted a lot of interest, most of it positive.

“It does show that there is an opportunity in this community to put something together that will be unique. I think the community can see that and is probably why there has been such good support for it from many different quarters.”

He said there might be nervousness in some areas of the district about money spent in Feilding, but those who used Leisureville would mostly carry the cost and it was not council’s intention to put significant funds into the concept.

Mr McKelvie said it was interesting to find multi-unit rating a leading issue this year, especially when the newly-established Manawatu Community Wellbeing and Housing Trust was about to become the biggest multi-unit owner in the district by taking over the council’s 208 Housing for the Elderly and Disabled flats.

“Our difficulty, as always, will be in balancing the large number of submissions requesting more money against the community’s view that council tidy up its spending a bit. That will be the challenge for us.”