A motion to spend $7500 for an outside consultant to perform a study for the purpose of a new sewer rate being pondered by Council failed to pass last Monday evening. The motion to hire the consultant failed in a voice vote of 2-4 (James, Lewis affirming – Dees, Breidinger, Mammana, Bolash dissenting).
Currently, the sewer rate for residential users is a “flat fee” rate, wherein everyone pays the same sewer fee, whether they use 1 unit, or 100 units of potable water from the water company. A “unit” is based on each 750 gallons of potable water used.
What Council knows is that total units of potable water used by the borough and then divided equally among residents is not equitable for about two-thirds of the residents who would save money by implementing a system of billing that would only charge for the actual water they use, based on a prior calculation using numbers crunched last year.
The remaining one-third of residents would either see a moderate increase in their sewer bill, or for the biggest water users, an appropriately higher sewer bill.
These percentage calculations were based on a sewer billing rate of $5.60/unit, that I wrote about last year and can be viewed HERE.
Disclaimer: On January 4, 2016, the owner of WestEastonPA.com began serving on the West Easton Council following an election. Postings and all content found on this website are the opinions of Matthew A. Dees and may not necessarily represent the opinion of the governing body for The Borough of West Easton.
