Sewer rates to increase, meter service charge added
The City Council gave final approval Monday night to a rate increase for customers of the Hudson sewer utility. Beginning with the first-quarter meter reading of 2009, customers will pay $2.40 per 100 cubic feet of wastewater put into the sewer system.By: Randy Hanson, Hudson Star-Observer
The City Council gave final approval Monday night to a rate increase for customers of the Hudson sewer utility.
The utility serves residences, businesses and institutional customers in the city and the village of North Hudson.
Beginning with the first-quarter meter reading of 2009, customers will pay $2.40 per 100 cubic feet of wastewater put into the sewer system. That is a 16-cent increase from the old rate that had been in effect since 2003.
In addition, customers will pay a new annual meter service charge of $21 to $40.
According to Wastewater Director Jim Schreiber, the meter service charge for the average residential customer will be $21 a year, or $5.25 per quarter.
Approximately 14 percent of the utility’s 6,696 residential customers will pay an annual service charge of $24, or $6 per quarter.
The amount of the meter charge will depend upon the size of the meter.
The city expects to increase sewer revenue by a total of 20 percent as a result of the rate increase and addition of the meter service charge.
The impact to the typical residential customer will be about $8.45 per quarter, according to information that Schreiber and City Finance Officer Betty Caruso presented to the City Council last month.
Schreiber and Caruso reported at the City Council’s Feb. 18 meeting that the sewer utility operated at a loss in 2008. They said it would continue to do so in the future unless revenue was increased.
Schreiber said one of the reasons the utility had an operating deficit last year was that more households have installed a second water meter to measure the water they use for lawn irrigating.
Since sewer bills are based on water usage, taking the water used for lawn irrigation out of the mix has reduced the sewer utility’s income, Schreiber reported.
The annual meter service charge was incorporated to make up for that lost revenue.
The sewer utility still has healthy fund balance.
Tags: news, hudson, sewer, rate, increase, meter, service, charge
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