23 April 2018

Media: Rotorua Daily Post

Topic: RLC submission to Waikato Regional Council

Enquiry

The reporter sought copy of the RLC submission to the Waikato Regional Council's Long-term Plan with particular interest in the RLC submission point re regional theatre, following submission on same from Rotorua Rural Community Board

Response

The submission was provided to the reporter. See the submission HERE.

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Media: Rotorua Review

Topic: Inner-city parking changes

Enquiry

The reporter asked the following questions regarding the annoucement made that Council work be working with a partner on changes to the inner city parking services:

• Henry Weston mentioned in the release one of the drivers for the proposed change was modernising equipment - might people be surprised to hear this just over two years after the sensors were installed?
• What was the full cost of the parking sensor installation?
• Will the successful contractor be obliged to continue with things like the hour free parking on certain CBD streets, or will they have a free reign to change things as they see fit?
• Given the Aquatic Centre issues, is there an expectation further privatisation may be resisted?

Response

From Rotorua Lakes Council's Operations Group Manager, Henry Weston:

This is not privatisation, it is contracting of services. This is about modernising and improving outdated parking services to ensure we meet our responsibility to provide an effective (including cost-effective) and efficient service.

We are partnering with a contractor to provide a service on Council's behalf, as we do with other services such as rubbish and recycling collection and management of road clearing after storms.

Council will continue to set the parking policy and maintains control of and decision-making on parking fees, what type of parking goes where, ie free or paid, and what time limits will be imposed where.

Parking sensors were installed in 2013 in 1550 city parks. There are a total of 3550 parks in the inner city. The cost of installing the sensors was $508,500 with an annual maintenance contract of $60,000 (both figures are +GST)

We are still talking with our contractor about the use of parking sensors.

No decision on their ongoing use has been made yet because we want to review the city's parking to find a solution that provides the most effective and efficient method of monitoring and managing parking.