Development contributions

If you are subdividing, building, connecting to our services, or otherwise undertaking development in the district, you may have to pay development contributions.

Development contributions may be required for a development as part of:

• A building consent, with payment due prior to issue of the building consent.
• Certificate of acceptance, with payment due prior to issue of the certificate of acceptance.
• A resource consent for subdivision, with payment due prior to release of the certificate under section 224(c) of the RMA.
• A resource consent (other than subdivision), with payment due prior to issue of the resource consent.
• An authorisation for a service connection, with payment due prior to issue of the connection approval.

Development contributions will generally be required at the earliest possible point, i.e. whichever consent, certificate or authorisation listed above is granted first.

The location of your development will determine what development contributions you may be required to pay.

There are multiple catchments and development areas where development contributions apply. You may be required to pay development contributions for each catchment your development is located within. It is likely that most developments will be located within several catchments with development contributions payable for each catchment.

The catchments are mapped in Part 3 of the Policy p24-005-development-and-financial-contributions-policy.pdf (npdc.govt.nz) and are listed below:

• Transportation – district-wide catchment.

- All development in the district pays this catchment charge.

• Community infrastructure – district-wide catchment.

- All development in the district pays this catchment charge.

• Parks and Open Spaces – district-wide catchment.

- All development in the district pays this catchment charge.

• Stormwater – district-wide catchment, an urban area catchment and individual catchments for Waitara and Inglewood.

- All development in the district pays the district-wide catchment charge.

- Any development in urban areas pays the urban area catchment charge in addition to the district-wide catchment charge.

- Any development within the Waitara catchment or Inglewood catchment pays that relevant catchment charge in addition to paying the charges for the district-wide catchment and urban area catchment.

• Wastewater – network-wide catchment and individual catchments for Waimea sewer.

- Any development within the network-wide catchment pays the network-wide charge.

- Any development within the Waimea sewer catchment pays that relevant catchment charge in addition to paying the charge for the network-wide catchment.

• Water – network-wide catchment and an individual catchment for New Plymouth.

- Any development within the network-wide catchment pays the network-wide charge.

- Any development within the individual catchment of New Plymouth pays that relevant catchment charge in addition to paying the charge for the network-wide catchment.

• Development areas for the specific structure plan development areas in the district including Puketapu, Carrington, Junction, Patterson and Sutherland/Patterson.

- Any development within a development area pays the relevant development area charges.

- Any development in a development area will also be liable for a catchment contribution (if connecting in relation to water and wastewater) and for district-wide catchment contributions.

Table 1 (below) shows the development contributions charge per Household Unit Equivalent (HUE) for each catchment.

Table 2 (below) shows the indicative aggregated catchment charges for a development in different areas of the District per HUE.

The amount payable is determined by an assessment of the demand your development generates on council infrastructure and reserves. This assessment is undertaken by comparing your development against the following demand measures of a HUE and the demands they typically place on infrastructure and reserves:

For residential development, the number of HUEs is based on the number and nature of the residential units being created. A standard residential unit (3 bedrooms) is 1 HUE, with proportions or multiples of that HUE used for smaller or larger residential units based on the number of bedrooms.    

For non-residential developments, development contributions can be converted to HUEs based on an assessment of information provided by the developer on the demand they expect to generate in comparison to residential HUE demand measures. 

What are my non-residential development contributions?

Table 1 shows the development contribution charge per HUE. You may be required to pay development contributions for each catchment your development is located within.

The development contributions payable are calculated by multiplying the number of HUE generated by your development by the charge for that catchment.

Table 2 shows the indicative aggregated catchment charges for a development in different areas of the District per HUE. It highlights the different catchment charges you are likely to be required to pay depending on the location of your development.