LAND FOR SETTLEMENT

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 831, 27 November 1929, Page 10

LAND FOR SETTLEMENT

KEREPEEHI BLOCK READY From Our Oicn Correspondent KGATEA, Tuesday. Advice that the land on the Kerepeehi Block, which is recognised as the pick of Hauraki Plains, was to be opened for settlement before March 31 next, was contained in a communication from the Chief Drainage Engineer, which came before the Hauraki Plains County Council at its last meeting. Certain further roading was necessary before the sections could be made available, and as the Lands Drainage Department is treated as a local bodyin regard to its subsidies from the Public Works Department, it was required to give an undertaking to adequately maintain the roads if a subsidy was to be received for construction. This it sought to obtain from the county council. The council decided to ascertain under what tenure the land had been held, up to the preset, for if it had been leased from month to month it would not become liable for general rates for five years from the date of settlement. The matter was governed by the Hauraki Plains Settlement Acts, and it appeared that the department could not hand over a road for maintenance by the council where the Act prohibited a charge for such maintenance by way of a general rate. The opening of the land is not being held up, for the department has let a contract for its roading.