$5m road damage bill: Long road back for Ashburton council
Ashburton District Council staff have admitted it's struggling to keep up with the increasing needs of the district's damaged roading network.
A multitude of potholes and crumbled roads on top of regular maintenance obligations are keeping council roading contractors up to their ears with site visits and essential repair work.
Council roading manager Brian Fauth told councillors at last week's activity briefings meeting that the damage bill to the district's network was about $5 million.
Mayor Neil Brown asked how roading staff were going to get its regular maintenance programme back on track after fielding numerous complaints around the state of the roads.
Fauth told the mayor it would not be a quick fix.
"We're trying to get the roads back to the standard they were prior to the flood. At this stage we're well behind."
The majority of council's gravel stockpile, which was originally set aside for planned winter gravelling, has also been used to fill in holes to make roads usable following the May 30-31 flood event.
"A lot of them still require metal to bring them up to the state they were prior to the flooding."
Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency has not provided council an indication of budget to help repair flood-damaged roads, Fauth said.
He hoped the cleanup could be debt-funded rather than omitting something from council's budget.
Reporting by local democracy reporter Adam Burns
We're talking new year resolutions...
Tidying the house before going to bed each night, meditating upon waking or taking the stairs at work.
What’s something quick, or easy, that you started doing that made a major positive change in your life?
New Year, Same Brain Teasers!
A man was found dead with a cassette recorder in one hand and a gun in the other.
When the police pressed “play,” the tape said, “I can’t go on,” and then there was a gunshot.
Yet, the police knew it was a murder.
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⚠️ DOGS DIE IN HOT CARS. If you love them, don't leave them. ⚠️
It's a message we share time and time again, and this year, we're calling on you to help us spread that message further.
Did you know that calls to SPCA about dogs left inside hot cars made up a whopping 11% of all welfare calls last summer? This is a completely preventable issue, and one which is causing hundreds of dogs (often loved pets) to suffer.
Here are some quick facts to share with the dog owners in your life:
👉 The temperature inside a car can heat to over 50°C in less than 15 minutes.
👉 Parking in the shade and cracking windows does little to help on a warm day. Dogs rely on panting to keep cool, which they can't do in a hot car.
👉 This puts dogs at a high risk of heatstroke - a serious condition for dogs, with a mortality rate between 39%-50%.
👉 It is an offence under the Animal Welfare Act to leave a dog in a hot vehicle if they are showing signs of heat stress. You can be fined, and prosecuted.
SPCA has created downloadable resources to help you spread the message even further. Posters, a flyer, and a social media tile can be downloaded from our website here: www.spca.nz...
We encourage you to use these - and ask your local businesses to display the posters if they can. Flyers can be kept in your car and handed out as needed.
This is a community problem, and one we cannot solve alone. Help us to prevent more tragedies this summer by sharing this post.
On behalf of the animals - thank you ❤️
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