March 4, 2014
The South Burnett Regional Council has no plans to introduce any new levies in this year’s Budget, Mayor Wayne Kratzmann said today.
He said any claims the SBRC was thinking of introducing new levies were “simply wrong”.
“Last Friday in my State Of The Region speech at a charity breakfast in Kingaroy, I briefly mentioned that sewerage charges will probably be rising in this year’s budget,” he said.
“This is because Council needs to replace the Kingaroy Waste Water Treatment Plant soon.
“Depending on what the final cost is, we’ll be borrowing between $8 million and $16 million to complete this project. And the cost of repaying that loan will be included in Council’s sewerage charges.”
The Mayor said the South Burnett currently has five separate schemes – in Murgon, Wondai, Kingaroy, Nanango and Blackbutt – and when amalgamation occurred it was decided they’d all be put into a single pool for ratings purposes to ensure uniform charging across the region.
The effect of this “pooling” was that smaller towns – like Blackbutt, Wondai and Murgon – have had the cost of their sewerage schemes subsidised by Kingaroy and Nanango since 2008.
“I can understand that some residents in our smaller towns may feel they shouldn’t be paying for the Kingaroy Waste Water Treatment Plant to be replaced,” Mayor Kratzmann said.
“But they’re forgetting that Kingaroy and Nanango residents have been paying for the smaller towns for the last six years.
“And if they hadn’t, sewerage costs for our smaller towns would be a lot higher than they currently are.”
The size of the rise in sewerage charges won’t be known until a tender for the work is obtained.
At last month’s Council meeting the SBRC short-listed four companies to tender for the project (Aquatec Maxcon Pty Ltd, John Holland Queensland Pty Ltd, Transfield Services Australia Pty Ltd / Sinclair Knight Merz Pty Ltd and Tenix Australia Pty Ltd).
A final tender is expected to be let before June 30.
However, on Friday the Mayor speculated the rise could be “about $100”.
“Something that’s also been overlooked in all of this is that residents who aren’t connected to any of these sewerage schemes won’t be paying anything,” he said.
“That includes just about all our smaller towns and villages and nearly all our rural residents.”
[UPDATED with correction]
