06/12/1985 Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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'. May 30, 1985 e TO: Mayor and City Council FROM: Mike Gleason, City Manager SUBJECT: REVISED PROPOSAL ON SEWER USER RATES On May 20th, the City Council held a hearing on proposed revisions to the regional and local elements of sewer user rates. Based on concerns expressed during the hearing, Council' requested that the staff evaluate three issues. The first issue concerns the regional sewer rate as it is applies to industrial customers on the basis of monthly monitoring of effluent. As a regional rate issue this is one that must be resolved in conjunction with Springfield. The second and third issues concern the relationship between street sweeping and customer water usage and possible alternatives for calculating storm sewer portions of sewer user rates. These last two issues relate to only the local rate and may be resolved without concurrence from Springfield. Issue 1 The metropolitan area has only eight customers that are required to sample their effluent monthly so they can be sent a supplemental bill for extra strength sewage cost. If they were placed in the most appropriate General Customer group, what would be the revenue loss? e Could customers be contacted to determine whether the change was acceptable? Staff should coordinate with Springfield staff to deter- mine whether the change would be acceptable to Springfield. The staff of the wastewater plant monitors approximately 50 customers to ensure that their discharges do not exceed the levels permitted in the City Code concerning pretreatment requirements. This process assures that the wastewater flow does not damage pipes or disrupt the treatment process. Additionally, eight industrial customers sample their own flows and report . results to City staff. These data are used for hand billing by City staff (rather than EWES) for extra strength charges. By placing these customers in the group with general customers, the projected income would drop $30,000 a year. This would reduce the reserve at the end of the two-year period. We have contacted the industrial customers and have found that they would concur with the decision to assign them to this customer group. The Environ- mental Protection Agency (EPA) has regulations that generally prohibit a class-to-class subsidy. EPA does not, however, require that cities specifically sample customers in order to charge them equitably. The staff has found that some cities group customers without sampling, while other cities charge large customers for extra strength based upon regularly sampled and tested effluent. Roughly speaking, it costs the City Sl,200/mo. to collect data and bill these customers. Additionally, these businesses invest considerable capital in equipment that lowers effluent strength. Moreover, the notion that these customers were each a special class, originated when there,were no other "mediumll or "highll strength customer designations. e It is felt that the cities now have justification to incorporate the industrial customers into the general customer groupings based upon extra- ordinary high cost of administration. '