{"id":371691,"date":"2026-04-09T19:20:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T19:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/371691\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T19:20:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T19:20:12","slug":"ashburton-dog-fees-to-rise-7-percent-after-freeze-bid-fails","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/371691\/","title":{"rendered":"Ashburton dog fees to rise 7 percent after freeze bid fails"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ashburton<\/p>\n

\nAshburton District Council rejected a bid to freeze dog registration fees, keeping 7 percent annual increases in place as the savings for dog owners would have transferred to all ratepayers to fund the consultation process it triggered.
\nPhoto: SUPPLIED \/ LDR\n<\/p>\n

An attempt to save Ashburton dog owners a 7 percent hike in registration fees has failed because the effort would have been cancelled out by consultation costs.<\/p>\n

As part of the long-term plan 2024-34, the Ashburton District Council agreed to increase its dog control fees by 7 percent annually for five years from 2024\/25.<\/p>\n

It aimed to ensure enough revenue was being collected from the fees to keep the general rate input below 15 percent.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/<\/p>\n

At a council meeting on Wednesday, first-term councillor Julie Moffett proposed deferring the 7 percent increase in registration fees, but retaining the 7 percent increase for dog control fees “for non-compliance”.<\/p>\n

Moffet said the deferral was an attempt to ease the risk of increasing non-compliance<\/a> from the rising costs.<\/p>\n

She said that with the cost of living going up, the registration fee increase was “yet another thing to squeeze people financially<\/a>“.<\/p>\n

Her proposed amendment was initially seconded by Cr Russel Ellis.<\/p>\n

Chief executive Hamish Riach quickly interjected to advise the councillors that the implications of the amendment would force a consultation on the revenue and finance policy.<\/p>\n

Riach explained that with the operating budget going up, without the fee going up, the revenue would be below the required level (75 percent) in the policy.<\/p>\n

Ellis calculated the “dollar value” of deferring the 7 percent increase was around $5 per dog, or $34,000 in total for the around 6700 registered dogs in the district, but would be cancelled out by the cost of a consultation process of around $20,000.<\/p>\n

He then withdrew his support.<\/p>\n

“Times are tough out there, but if we are just going to rob Peter to pay Paul, it does seem a bit pointless.”<\/p>\n

Mayor Liz McMillan said that while the amendment had good intentions, without a seconder, it lapsed.<\/p>\n

Councillor Phill Everest had offered a tongue-in-cheek solution around cost recovery for impounding, suggesting “those that don’t behave, should pay more”.<\/p>\n

Deputy Mayor Richard Wilson supported the user-pays reasoning behind the 7 percent increase.<\/p>\n

“If we don’t charge enough to cover our costs, the money doesn’t disappear; it’s just charged to the general rate.<\/p>\n

“The general rate is paid by everyone regardless if you have a dog or not.”<\/p>\n

Cr Carolyn Cameron also agreed with the increase to cover the overheads of dog control and management rather than it going on the general rate.<\/p>\n

The increased fees will come into effect from 1 July.<\/p>\n

Examples of the 7 percent registrations increase:<\/p>\n

Urban de-sexed dog: $112 to $120
\nUrban un-neutered: $112 to $120
\nUrban Menacing: $112 to $120
\nUrban Dangerous: $169 to $181
\nRural ( first and second): $75 to $80
\nRural (after first two): $35 to $38<\/p>\n

LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ashburton District Council rejected a bid to freeze dog registration fees, keeping 7 percent annual increases in place…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":371692,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48,47,111,43,139,69,49,46,44,45],"class_list":["post-371691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-audio","tag-current-affairs","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=371691"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371691\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/371692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=371691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=371691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=371691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}