2019-03-26_PWETC_Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Acting Chair Wozniak stated Member Misra's idea to move multi -unit families from commercial to residential rates, but he was not sure if Member Misra was suggesting installing an irrigation meter as part of that or would that be an incentive for them to move over to the residential rate. Member Misra thought that option was there. Acting Chair Wozniak stated the option is there, but it could also be made a requirement to install an irrigation meter if moving to residential rates. He wondered if the Commission was close to making some recommendations about rates or does the Commission need another meeting to talk about this with other members. Member Joyce thought more members should give their input. Mr. Culver suggested maybe the Commission should hire a consultant who has a lot of expertise in setting water rates. He noted other cities have done this. The consultant could come back with recommendations and what has been done effectively in other communities nationally. He indicated he did not know what the cost of the study would be, there is not anything in budget for this, but it could be looked at to see about budgeting for it and recommending to the City Council. That could potentially be a much more intense approach. Member Misra thought the Commission had a pretty good idea of Roseville and what it is as a community. She stated Roseville is mostly residential and a lot of the commercial is not highly industrial. Where she was having trouble is that it was pretty easy to figure out the tiers for the residential usage but does not feel as clear to figure it out for the commercial usage. She guessed if the City took all of the residential water use out of commercial and look at what is left, it is probably a pretty small number of users that use a lot of water either for irrigation or whatever the industrial use is. One of the things the City could do is once all of the residential users are taken out, increase the tiered rate, not by adding tiers but by going from 295 and 315 to 315 and 325 for example. Then the City is not looking at residential use and she thought it was fair to say that people who are using water as a source for promoting their business have a reason to pay for it in a different way. Acting Chair Wozniak asked staff if that made sense and something the City could do. He stated in terms of making multi -units a residence, he would be interested in making that decision based on more than four randomly selected examples out of the hundred or so the City has. Mr. Freihammer stated staff could come back with some language to define the properties as something different and try to look a little more at the data. Page 11 of 13