By: Lydia Crawley, The Parsons Advocate
The Blackwater Public Service District will not agree to any rate change. That was the takeaway from the April 21st meeting. The PSD rejected two proposals by accountants that would substantially raise rates for sewage customers for the new entity.
“We are trying to understand if we consolidate and bring the Davis and the Thomas sewer treatment plants into one entity and do sort of a paper exercise, why the accountants think the rates would increase dramatically,” Blackwater PSD Board Member Alan Tomson said. “It doesn’t make sense to us right now because all we would be changing is paperwork.”
The issue was going to be revisited by accountants for clarification. Tomson said figures from accountants were showing rate increases for the new Public Service District of as much as over $100 per month, per customer. Rates, Tomson and fellow Board Member Judy Cronauer said were unacceptable.
Tomson speculated that the accountants may be looking at the maintenance costs of operating two new facilities operating separately under the PSD in the future. However, Tomson and Cronauer said if they were to combine current facilities and kept them as they are currently, nothing should change fiscally.
“The position of the PSD is that we will not accept, approve or agree to any rate changes like the accountants are speculating,” Tomson said.
The accountants said should the PSD build one facility, the rate changes would be less, but still a significant increase to customers, Tomson said. The PSD is exploring the construction of two smaller plants due to financial reasons.
“What we are looking at now from a construction standpoint, it may be cheaper to build two smaller entities then it is to build one large one,” Tomson said.
However, both proposals are currently rejected due to the significant rate increases. Tomson said that more work is being conducted “behind the scenes” on rates. There have been significant delays on any new reviewing of rates by the accountants due to tax season.
“What we have said to both proposals is they are dead on arrival,” Tomson said. “We will not increase the rates like that. We won’t do it if that is what it would entail.”
