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Community assets that require funds for renewal may not be receiving all of the money they could due to confusion between Auckland Council and the Rodney Local Board.
Since the amalgamation of Council during the Supercity transition, depreciation has been built into the cost of all assets, so funds are always available when renewal of those assets is required.
Rodney Local Board chair Beth Houlbrooke says depreciation funds cannot be reallocated to other assets.
“Two years ago, when we decided to renew Kowhai Park, a number of people wanted us to spend the money elsewhere, but we were informed we couldn’t spend the park’s depreciation fund on any other assets,” Ms Houlbrooke says.
Because of this the board looked at implementing more flexibility into the way it can manage funds during its governance structure process this year.
However, Council general manager of corporate finance and property Kevin Ramsay says that depreciation funds can be moved between assets.
“The depreciation funds are not held on individual assets and can be used where they are most needed,” he maintains.
Ms Houlbrooke says a number of council financial systems are difficult to understand and interpretation can vary between staff.
“I meet with all of the other local board chairs and often we have different understandings around what can and can’t be done,” she says.
Ms Houlbrooke would also like to see money saved during asset renewal work to go back into local facilities.
Currently, any money saved on asset renewal is fed back into the fund for the whole Auckland region, not just Rodney.
“This means we have no incentive to cut costs or employ community help because we won’t necessarily save any money for Rodney itself,” she says.
Mr Ramsay confirmed that money saved is put back into a wider Auckland depreciation fund.
