FOOTING THE BILL

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIV, Issue 10287, 23 May 1919, Page 5

FOOTING THE BILL

COST OF TOWN-PLANNING,

ARGUMENTS FOR AND AGAINST UNIMPROVED VALUES.

A committee report was received at the Town-planning Conference last evening on thjb financial’- aspect of .townplanning, recommending (1) that the total cost of the, proposed , Town-plan-ning Department, including the salary of the expert should be paid by the General Government; (2) that the cost of carrying on local schemes should be ‘borne by the districts affected, but the money required should ,be, found by the General Government at the lowest rate of interest, the local authorities being only called on. to pay interest and sinking fund; (3) assistance should be provided from the Consolidated Fund for the smaller bodies in exceptional circumstances ; (4) that clause 24, subsection 2 (d) of the Town-planning Bill ho amended to provide for the assessment of all rates required for the payment of inetrest and sinking fund on the cost of town-planning schemes on the unimproved value of the land. The Hon. G. W, Russell said that clause 4 would give rise to an insuperable difficulty unless the committee first of all proposed that-there should be only one system of rating, and that that should be the unimproved value system. Since it had come in, the system of rating on unimproved value hail done more to destroy the beauty of our cities than anything else had. It had compelled everyone who could do so to build on his land, and through it some beauty spots had been done away with. Also, it lea the rich ratepayer off at the expense of the poor one. ' Mr John Stead (Invercargill) and Mr E. Dixon (Hawera) said that rating on unimproved value had had the opposite effect in their towns. Mr J. McCombs said tho small ratepayers of Christchurch were satisfied with tho unimproved value system. The Hon. George Fowlds, chairman of tho committee, said that tho suggestion that tho unimproved value system let the rich man off was absurd. “You will make yourselves ridiculous as a town-planning conference if you don’t affirm the principle that tho coat should be paid out., of . .the increased values of the land/’ ■ ■■■-• Clause 4 was deleted and the remainder of the report was adopted.