Lake City utility accessibility fees
Going the way of the dodo bird
Columbia County, FL (posted
November 17,
2009)
By Stew Lilker
Monday night's City Council meeting began at 6:15
with a short workshop and a few words from the city's
utility consultants,
Tetra Tech, regarding the proposed elimination of
the city's utility accessibility fees.
Eric VanMalssen from Tetra Tech presented three rate
scenarios to the City Council and answered questions
from them. City Administrator Grayson Cason is in the
background.
The city's utility accessibility fees have been
unpopular, controversial, and confusing for some time.
After Wendell Johnson the new City Manager came on
board, a new ear was listening. The public hearings to
adopt the new utility rates and eliminate the
accessibility fees should be held in December.
Some folks are paying up to $60,000 in fees
The accessibility fees are fees that the city charges
everyone to keep the pipes in the street and pay for the
infrastructure of the city utility facilities. If a
customer turns off his water and shuts down his house or
apartment, they still pay a fee. These fees amount to
about forty dollars a month for a residence. Some
apartment owners are paying up to sixty thousand dollars
a year in accessibility fees for vacant apartments.
Tetra Tech's studies found that approximately 2% of
the revenues of the city utility come from accessibility
fees. After the fee is eliminated, the fee will be
absorbed into the rate structure for active customers.
Utility director, Dave Clanton, is running the
numbers to determine the turn-off-on charges for water
meters.
According to the City, utility customers will see a
notice about the new rates and times for the public
hearing in their bills.
Columbia County residents who would like to see the
city's way of doing things may wish to attend those
hearings. It will be a refreshing experience from the
way things are done across the street at the forever
homeless County Commission.
Relevant Links for this story.
• The
memo from Tetra Tech to utility director, Dave Clanton
is here. The rate scenarios follow on the pages after
the memo.
• For the curious and the policy wonks, the Tetra
Tech power point
presentation of the November 2, 2009 city utility rate
study is available here.
