ASHLAND — The price of water in Ashland will likely go up in the early months of 2022 as Ashland works to “modernize” its old water infrastructure, officials said Tuesday.
Mayor Matt Miller said a rate hike of water and sewage is on the horizon, as well as a surcharge on monthly water bills.
Miller did not say how much of a rate hike will likely appear on water bills, but said the surcharge will be $3 to $3.50.
The move is part of an overarching strategy aimed at improving the city’s “aging” water infrastructure, Miller said. The plan started about a year ago when the city determined to tackle debt refinancing.
“I think it’s been eight or nine months ago, we refinanced all of the debt and we were able to experience a significant amount of savings, which, in essence, freed up more money to put into the improvements that we want to make in the city when it comes to the water lines,” Miller said.
The second part of the strategy was to implement a surcharge on water bills.
The funds collected — which the mayor said in an interview would not amount to “a whole lot of money” — would be earmarked for capital improvements, or repairs, to water infrastructure.
The surcharge would be part of ratepayers’ monthly water bills, Miller said.
The third part of the strategy is the “one we all like the least and we dread,” Miller said — raising the water rate.
Miller said cities nearby have increased water rates by double digits in recent years, while Ashland’s rate has remained untouched for 13 years.
“As you might imagine, the cost of chemicals goes up, the cost of staffing goes up, the cost of the maintenance of the plant goes up — all the expenses rose and continue to rise now more than ever,” Miller said.
Another component to the whole strategy was introduced Tuesday by Larry Paxton, the city’s finance director. Paxton passed around a digital, hydrostatic water meter, featuring a small antenna — capable of freeing up in-person meter readings.
Ashland installed some water meters — at the price of $110 a pop — capable of transmitting a signal with a reading to a utility worker who simply drives by recently. But these newfangled meters wouldn’t even require a drive by, Paxton said. Instead, the meters will send the reading directly to utility collections.
The batteries inside the hydrostatic water meter last up to a decade, Paxton said. However, he does not know how much a replacement battery might cost.
The water meters come at a high premium, $130 apiece.
“It’s a new technology and it is something that we have been exploring, trying to improve our system,” he said, adding the city has committed to purchasing the water meters for all 45 homes in the new development dubbed Arrows Landing off Mifflin Avenue.
Paxton expects the new water meters to save the city money in the long run because they will measure water usage more accurately and eliminate the cost associated with having someone go out and retrieve meter readings.
Paxton and Miller hope using the new water meters at Arrows Landing will serve as a way to test them out before installing them at the city’s thousands of homes and businesses.
Water bills, Miller said, are supposed to pay for the cost of delivering and treating water. But they don’t.
“When we all pay our water bills, we don’t raise enough money to cover the cost of delivering that water or operating the water department,” Miller said.
Councilman Bob Valentine pointed to Norwalk, which implemented a built-in inflation rate hike system. Instead of raising the rate dramatically all at once, the city increases it by small increments each year.
“It builds it over time and it keeps building in a little bit of an increase so it doesn’t hurt the seniors and lower-income people as much,” Valentine said, adding he appreciates that approach to a rate hike.
Miller said he agrees, but that officials are still examining the numbers. He said a “significant increase” — at least compared to what Ashland is used to — will likely happen in the first year, with increases of around 1% happening in years to come.
Whatever that number may be, the mayor said he hopes people see an increase of less than $10 a month on their water bills in 2022.
