A shared organisation to deliver water services, meet new government requirements and reduce future cost increases for Hamilton City Council and Waikato District Council is a step closer today.

Waikato District Council has unanimously agreed to co-designing an asset-owning council-controlled organisation - CCO - with Hamilton City Council to manage water and wastewater.

The co-design would enable consideration of a CCO as one future option as both councils respond to the challenges of growth, maintenance and the increasing costs of new infrastructure.

The Government requires councils to deliver a long-term plan for water services by September next year. Today’s decision by Waikato comes less than two weeks after Hamilton confirmed a multi-council waters CCO was its preferred solution and paves the way for the two councils to potentially develop a joint plan for the Government.

Hamilton Mayor Paula Southgate said today’s decision is welcome and means elected members from both councils have unanimously agreed on the way forward for their respective organisations.

“As a region, we know there are benefits in working together to find efficiencies and get the best results for our communities,” Southgate said.

“Hamilton and Waikato’s decisions provide confidence that we can look at the benefits of scale for the future of our water services. Working together lets us address priority issues for both councils in a timely way and means we can prepare plans to consult with our community.

“Our decisions don’t lock either council into a particular solution, and we remain free to consider other options. But given our communities live, work and play across territorial boundaries, it just makes sense to think the same way as we deliver services.”

The decisions by both councils also provide for a potential interim step of Hamilton providing water services to Waikato by separate agreement, ensuring continuity of service at the conclusion of Waikato’s existing contract with Watercare on June 30, 2026.

Development of a CCO would eventually see waters costs charged separately, while spreading costs of major infrastructure investment across the future generations that will benefit. The decisions mean options for a new, council-owned water services company will be developed over the next six months ahead of full public consultation early next year.

More information and the full resolutions from today’s meeting are available here.

- SunLive