The Waitaki District Council is facing a $3 million cut in its roading budget over the next three years, because of a reduction in subsidies by the New Zealand Transport Agency.
But the council is not taking that lying down and plans to lobby Minister of Transport Steve Joyce about the reduction.
As with other provincial local authorities, the reduction will have a major effect on the council's roading network and on its ratepayers.
Policy adviser Ben Hopkins said it cost $267 a year per person in the Waitaki district to maintain roads, compared with $70 to $80 per person a year in cities and other urban areas.
"Already, we pay a lot more," Mr Hopkins said.
The major reason was the Waitaki district had a large roading network and a small population.
He said pressure on the district's roads had mostly come from the growth in dairying and the Macraes gold mine.
It was generally agreed that heavy trucks, rather than cars and light vehicles, did the most damage to roads.
"There has been a dramatic increase in heavy vehicle usage [of Waitaki roads] in the last three to four years," he said.
The council had proposed to spend $32.163 million on its roading programme over the next three years. Instead, it would spend $27.3 million.
The reduction was due to the $3 million loss in subsidies, although the $1.8 million input from the council was still available.
Of the $27.3 million available, $15.75 million was funded by subsidies from the agency.
Cr Jim Hopkins said districts like Waitaki could never win when roading funding was based on population.
Instead, a new paradigm was needed.
Central government needed to identify areas of economic and export importance as factors which determined roading subsidies.
He also suggested the Waitaki council should link with other groups, including Federated Farmers and "stroppy mayors like Tim [Shadbolt, Mayor of Invercargill]", to pressure the Government to change the way roading subsidies were determined.
