2019_06-25_PWETCpacket - Laserfiche WebLink

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Water j See Table Above 2.95 3.15 *per quarter standard service charge **Summer consists of June, July, August ***Consumption fee is billed per thousand gallons Residential Water Rates In 2018 the commission discussed residential water rate tiers extensively (Attachment B). After much discussion and analysis the commission looked at establishing a third tier to the residential rates for summer water consumption. The theory behind this third tier was setting a higher rate for water users in the summer who use over 50,000 gallons per quarter would encourage these users to conserve water. The 50,000 gallon per quarter threshold was determined to be a usage level that would typically only get triggered by residents who irrigate and would most likely not impact larger families. It was estimated about 4% of water user would be affected in the summer by this rate. In September 2018 (Attachment A) the commission recommended approval of establishing a third summer tier rate at 50,000 gallons per quarter and would propose setting the rate at twice the rate of the Tier 1 rate. For 2019 the tier 1 rate is $2.25/1,000 gallons so the Tier 3 rate would be $4.50/1,000 gallons. Commercial Water Rates Over the past few months, staff presented information on commercial water rates to the Public Works, Environment and Transportation Commission. Staff included information on commercial water use in Roseville and commercial rate structures in other cities. This information is included in the attachments. The discussion on commercial water has identified that commercial water accounts are much different than residential and that establishing tiers can be much more difficult based on different water needs and size of properties. As attachment E shows, there is a variety of different rate structures cities use for rates. These vary significantly. Some of the differences van be related to how base verse consumption rates are established and also due to funding of the water utility as a whole. To date the discussion of creating different tiers has not lead to a consensus so staff would recommend moving forward with no changes to the rate system on commercial rates. One item of discussion that the commission could still consider is if multi -family housing should be considered residential or commercial. Currently multi -family housing buildings are charged the commercial water rate for consumption. The table below gives a summary of apartment accounts over the last two years.