West Dorset District Council is to freeze its share of the council tax for the second year in a row.
Residents will be asked to pay the same amount of council tax as they did last year.
Despite significant cuts to its funding from central government, the district council has worked to maintain frontline services and not pass on any additional costs to council tax payers.
West Dorset District Council faces a reduction in its government grant for 2012/13 of £842,200 reducing it down to £5.755m. To put this into context, the district council received £8.256m in government grant in 2010/11 and £6.6m in 2011/12, although £526,113 of the reduction in 2011 related to concessionary travel which was transferred to Dorset County Council.
Leader of West Dorset District Council, Councillor Robert Gould said:
“Despite the challenge of reduced financial resources, Members and Officers at West Dorset District Council have striven to ensure essential frontline services for the local community are protected and at no extra cost to council tax payers.
“Through forward planning and effective partnership work we have been able to manage further cuts to our funding from central Government and once again freeze our share of the council tax.”
The district council has been able to off-set some of the reductions in its funding from central government with the decision to share a workforce with Weymouth and Portland Borough Council, which has already delivered over £1.1million in savings. This programme is expected to be completed in April 2012 and is on track to deliver £1.7million in savings once all services have been converged.
As a result, the district council’s council tax for a Band D property in West Dorset will remain at £124.80 and continues to be among the very lowest in England.
West Dorset District Council collects the whole bill but only keeps eight per cent of the total, with the rest going to Dorset County Council, the Police and Fire & Rescue Authorities and local town and parish councils.
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