Following consultation, Council adopted an updated Water Supply Bylaw on 4 October 2023. The new bylaw comes into effect on 1 February 2024.
The Water Supply Bylaw protects our water and those drinking it
The purpose of the Water Supply Bylaw is to ensure the efficient and sustainable use of our water resources. It is also intended to protect public health and safety in regard to the supply of drinking water and to protect our water supply infrastructure from misuse, damage, nuisance or interference.
While the scope of the new bylaw hasn’t changed much since the adoption of the 2015 bylaw, improvements have been made to its structure and wording to improve clarity and implementation.
We made these changes
- Acknowledging that tangata whenua are kaitiaki of water, and particularly Rangitāne o Manawatū’s role as mana whenua
- Drafting backflow provisions into the bylaw itself, instead of having them in a separate appendix
- Clarifying our ability to review extraordinary and restricted flow supply connections, to ensure the safety and integrity of the network
- Improving cross reference between the bylaw and administration manual
- Updating our water supply area maps
- Removing related forms from sitting within the bylaw itself so that these can be updated more efficiently
- Removing some duplicated appendices.