FAQs

It’s an important document that outlines our services, how we maintain our district’s infrastructure, our budgets and projects to make our district an even better place to live.

Over the past two years, the South Wairarapa District Council has gathered community feedback that has supported the development of the 2025/34 Long Term Plan (LTP), an important document that reflects our community’s needs and aspirations. This plan isn’t just about numbers - it’s a roadmap for the next nine years.

Every three years councils must adopt a Long-Term Plan. In the years between we adopt Annual Plans. Last year, because of uncertainty around new government reforms, we took the option to push back the 2024/34 Long-Term Plan to 2025 to make sure we could plan with confidence. This means we our next LTP will be in two years' time, instead of the usual three-year cycle. 

Under legislation we cannot provide you with the actual Long-Term Plan.  The Long-Term Plan will be developed after we have heard from our community on what matters to them. The consultation for the Long-Term Plan is designed to inform our community on what significant decisions SWDC are considering and our preferred options (which are the budgeted options).

Yes, the consultation document asks for any other feedback and has space to provide written feedback about what is important to you.  Please make sure you include your name and email address in your submission. 

Your feedback is given to the elected members as part of the Hearings Report. All submissions are provided for them to read and consider. Then during the Deliberations, thematical analysis is undertaken to see what the common themes are from all the submissions. This information is provided in the Deliberations Report. During Deliberations the Councillors may ask the CE to prepare additional information before the final decisions are made at the Long-Term Plan adoptions end of June 2025.   

It’s important that we hear from you about decisions that directly impact you.

In recent years, Council made deliberate and necessary rate increases to address historic underfunding of core infrastructure, particularly in water and roading services.These increases—peaking at nearly 20% in some years—were essential to catch up on past underinvestment and build a more sustainable funding base. 
 
Now that these critical funding levels have been reached, the projected rate increases are significantly lower than in previous years. Moving forward, rates will increase in line with the Local Government Cost Index (LGCI) plus an additional margin (ranging from 2% to 9%), ensuring that future increases remain steady and predictable. This shift demonstrates a transition from catch-up funding to long-term financial prudence, balancing affordability for ratepayers while maintaining necessary investment in infrastructure. 
 

Use this tool here.

No, we are keen to hear your feedback about all the questions or only those that matter to you.  

Once the Local Water Done Well consultation is complete, Councillors will then decide on either a new water services Council-Controlled Organisation (CCO) or continue with the existing approach for delivering water services (Wellington Water). If option 1, a water services CCO is to be established, all related revenue, investment and expenses related to water service delivery will be removed, effective from the proposed start date of the new entity. If option 2 (continue with existing approach) is chosen, water services revenue, investment and expenses will remain in the nine-year plan. See the Local Water Done Well consultation for more details on that consultation.

The proposed form of the new entity would be an asset owning CCO, so all debt, assets, and equity identifiable as belonging to the transferred activities would also transfer to the new entity.

Council was very clear that the water investment programme needed to be included in the underlying documents so that anyone who wishes to see the capital investment needed could do so. It is clear from the underlying documents that Council can't afford this level of investment under its current operating model.

Our revenue and financing policy explains how we fund activities using fees, charges, and rates. If a service mainly benefits an individual, we try to cover costs with fees and charges. However, some services, like dog control, benefit both the individual and the public, so fees don't cover all costs, and rates help out. For services we want the community to use more, like hall hire for community groups, we keep charges low. There’s no one set ratio, each activity is taken on its own merits and fees set accordingly.

• Council rates are typically a mix of fixed (uniform) charges and variable charges based on Capital Value (the total value of the property).
• The fixed charges (e.g., UAGC) are the same for all properties, regardless of their CV.
• The variable portion is based on the property’s CV, meaning higher-value properties pay more, and lower-value properties pay less.

• When uniform charges increase from 21% to 28%, a greater proportion of total rates is shifted to a fixed amount per property.
• This reduces the proportion of rates based on CV, which benefits higher-value properties because they pay less in CV-based rates.
• However, for lower-value properties, fixed charges make up a larger share of total rates, increasing their overall rates bill.

There are a couple of reasons why comments can't count as formal submissions. 

1. Submissions need to include your full name, email address and where you live. This ensures we know who is contributing, what their services levels are and where they are from to help us understand the issues for our community.  
2. It's not feasible for us to sift through every Facebook comment to determine if it's a submission, verify identities, and check residency.
3. Many people don't use their real names on Facebook and/or do not want to share personal contact details for privacy reasons. 

However - there is more than one way that you can make a submission and that includes:

1. Fill out an online form
2. Email your details and thoughts through to haveyoursay@swdc.govt.nz
3. Pick up a form from any of our libraries or the Council office or write a note with your name and contact details included and and drop it back there. You can also bring it along to any of our drop-in session happening across the district.
   
   💡If you've already made a submission, and you have an additional idea or something else comes up - you can make another. Email your details and additional thoughts to haveyoursay@swdc.govt.nz and we'll add it to your original submission

The LTP considers infrastructure provisioning over nine years for each of our towns to meet sustainable operational needs. This is balanced alongside efforts to minimise the impact upon rates.

There are capacity issues for both towns, which are currently being investigated and until these issues are resolved, growth will be limited in Martinborough and Greytown. As part of this consultation, we are keen to hear from our community about the level of infrastructure investment over the coming years. 

Also see the South Wairarapa Spatial Plan of 2021 which outlines and addresses residential growth for the district over 30 years.   

The Featherston Masterplan and Implementation Plan was adopted by the Council in June 2024. During the process for the Long-Term Plan, Council considered timings and priorities for the Featherston Masterplan and overall needs of the district. These have been included in the LTP alongside efforts to minimise the impact of rates across the nine-year period.

No