The Queenstown Lakes District Council will be asked to contribute to and work with other councils on sharing services across Otago at an extraordinary meeting tomorrow.
The report by corporate services general manager Meaghan Miller asks the council to note a further report will be presented when more complete financial implications of the cost of larger collaborative service reviews are known and said ‘‘no shared service arrangements'' would be entered without the approval of the council.
Under the Local Government Act 2002, all councils were required to undertake service reviews by August 2017. Additionally, the Government had set an agenda which included greater collaboration and sharing of services to encourage greater efficiency and effectiveness within the local government sector.
Ms Miller's report said a ‘‘sensible shared understanding'' between Otago councils had been established to address the issue. The reviews, jointly led and funded by the councils, would include all areas of service provision and priorities, with timing and costs to be established by April.
Councils would deal with the shared funding implications in May through internal submissions to the annual plan.
While the primary principles for shared service delivery were that the delivery was more efficient and effective than that being provided by an individual council, chief executives from Otago councils were also conscious of other principles, Ms Miller said.
They included support for growth across the region; sensitivity around public assets remaining in public hands; and control of the outcomes by ‘‘driving our own future, working with our own communities rather than passively waiting for change to be put upon us from central government''.
