06/12/1985 Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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Ms. Schue said the administrative costs have been a concern of the Community e Development Committee and the staff has been instructed to reduce the costs. Ms. Wooten moved, seconded by Mr. Hansen, to approve the FY85-86 Community Development Block Grant Final Statement of Objectives. Roll call vote; the motion carried unanimously, 8:0. VII. REVISED PROPOSAL ON SEWER USER RATES (memo distributed) City Manager Micheal Gleason introduced the agenda item. Bill Guenzler of the Public Works Department gave the staff report. He asked the council to direct the staff to prepare an ordinance to promulgate the sewer user rates. Mr. Guenzler discussed three issues councilors had raised in previous discus- sions. The first issue was a regional one involving eight industrial customers whose sewer bills have been prepared individually. The Weyerhaeuser Company in Springfield may become the ninth customer in the group. Mr. Guenzler discussed the consequences if the eight or nine customers were placed in the most appropriate general category. He said the change is reasonable. He thought the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would approve the change if the City continues to monitor the effluent of the customers to be sure they do not dump material into the system that will damage it. e Discussing the second issue which concerned the inclusion of street sweeping charges in sewer bills, Mr. Guenzler reviewed the components of the recom- mended charge. They included $.57 for street sweeping, $.45 for new capital sanitary sewer projects, $.22 for the operation and maintenance of sanitary and storm sewers, and $.26 for inflation. Mr. Guenzler discussed an L-COG report that concluded that street sweeping is a water quality issue. He said the council had justified sewage rates long ago with concern for water quality. Discussing the third issue, Mr. Guenzler said $2,542,880 is the annual cost for the Eugene sanitary sewer system and $2,145,562 is the annual cost for the Eugene storm sewer system. It is appropriate to charge the sanitary sewer cost on a flow basis which will result in a local charge of 54t per 1000 gallons. To devise another method of charging storm sewer costs, the staff used generalized data from land use studies to predict runoff for residential customers and non-residential customers. The studies indicated that a flat $2.41 charge for each residential customer and charges based on the size of the water meters of non-residential customers would be appropriate. Statistics indicate that runoff is related to the water meter size of non-residential customers. Mr. Guenzler said the new method of charging for storm sewers is better than the old method. It corrects the large inequities, but some customers were under-charged in the old method and they will be charged more in the new method. e MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 12, 1985 Page 9