Development charges lowered by almost 14 per cent

Jun 30, 2022

Riverina Water has lowered the cost of development by almost 14 per cent across the supply area.

The change is part of the local water utility's new Development Servicing Plan for Water Supply 2022 (DSP).

Following on from the adoption of Riverina Water’s award-winning Integrated Water Cycle Management (IWCM) strategy, the DSP has been developed based on the predicted water supply infrastructure needed to meet growth across the region.

“About $79M of new water supply infrastructure will be required to meet increased demand in the next 30 years,” Riverina Water’s Director Engineering Bede Spannagle said.

“Another $14M would be needed to recover the cost of existing infrastructure that will meet future demand that Riverina Water has already constructed.

“This means the development servicing charge will be reducing from $5053 in 2021-22 to $4348 in 2022-23, and will then typically increase in line with CPI moving forward.

“This is a great outcome thanks to a significant amount of long-term planning by our staff to not only ensure our supply network meets the demands of our population through to 2050, but to enable growth and development.”

The development servicing charge is per equivalent tenement, which is a measure of the load a property places on the water supply system.

The charge is a flat rate across the four Local Government Areas in Riverina Water’s service area as 96 per cent of new connections in the past six years have been within Wagga Wagga.

Read the plan