Pasadena is expected to change how water bills are calculated, leading to higher bills for some customers. The new rate structure and rates to be determined soon will allow the utility to meet its revenue requirement.
From $800 to $1,000, and even $5,000, some Valley cities are dangling money incentives to residents, in the hope they will cut their water use amid the state’s ongoing crisis.
The programs are a direct result of cities grappling with a future of less water from the Colorado River.
As Angelenos wither under another hot summer, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power is shrinking a discount program that helped low-income families pay their bills.
The utility has no choice; the subsidies that funded the DWP’s discounted water rates were declared illegal by a Superior Court judge in May. That discount will disappear Thursday, although others will remain in place, the DWP said in a letter to customers.
The latest water bill came as a shock to Yvette Williams.
Williams, who has lived in her Spring Valley home for more than two decades, had worked to reduce her water use in recent months. But her June water bill still came in at over $800.
The Pleasanton City Council is set for an initial discussion on proposed increases to the city’s water rates, starting at 30% on Nov. 1, during a special meeting Tuesday night.
The public meeting will be held at the city’s Operations Services Center on Busch Road instead of the usual council chambers at the Pleasanton Civic Center.
The Board of Directors of Humboldt County Services District voted Tuesday for water and sewer rate increases, with two of five directors dissenting. Rates would eventually increase over the next five years by a total of 88% and start increasing Aug. 1.
In 1991, during a lengthy drought, the giant Metropolitan Water District of Southern California ordered huge cuts in supplies to the San Diego County Water Authority, which relied on MWD for 95 percent of its water. The authority resolved back then to steadily and sharply diversify its supplies, and it did with great success.
The communities of Fallbrook and Rainbow are requesting to join a water district based in Riverside, saying water in San Diego is too expensive.
However, those who oppose the move say it will leave others paying $200 million more for water over the next decade.
A vote is expected at the County Administration Center on Monday that would address the request from Fallbrook and Rainbow to get their water from an agency in Riverside County.
Ahead of next week’s controversial vote on the detachment of two North County water districts from the San Diego County Water Authority, several local leaders voiced their concern for how the proposed divorce could impact water rates.
Updated figures released July 3 show that disadvantaged communities, working families, farmers, and others across San Diego County will be forced to pay nearly $200 million more over the next decade for water service unless agencies seeking to leave the San Diego County Water Authority are required to fully cover their costs.
On July 10, the San Diego Local Agency Formation Commission’s board is expected to vote on a plan for the Fallbrook and Rainbow water agencies to leave the Water Authority, possibly with the inclusion of an “exit fee.” However, LAFCO’s figures are based on years-old data and flawed projections that understate the annual costs of detachment by at least 50%. Like everything else, costs related to water supplies have inflated significantly over the past three years.
LAFCO’s data don’t reflect the inflationary realities or the fact that the financial impacts of detachment will continue far beyond LAFCO’s five-year horizon, which does not reflect the actual lifespan of water infrastructure or the debt used to finance it. The LAFCO staff report acknowledges impacts will continue far longer than five years, suggesting that the rest of the county should pay for benefits to Rainbow and Fallbrook.
“From the start of this process, one of our top priorities was making sure that residents across the region aren’t harmed financially. It’s critical that ratepayers who are struggling to make ends meet, independent farmers, and small businesses aren’t forced to subsidize Fallbrook and Rainbow for years to come,” said Water Authority Board Chair Mel Katz. “We encourage the LAFCO Commissioners to require Fallbrook and Rainbow to fully cover their costs.”
LAFCO’s staff recommendation to approve the detachment proposals by the Fallbrook and Rainbow water agencies does not include substantive analysis of impacts to disadvantaged communities, or to agriculture in the Water Authority service area. Nor does it include environmental analysis required by law.
The LAFCO staff recommendation includes an exit fee of about $4.8 million a year for five years, which isn’t close to covering the actual costs that will be shifted to residents elsewhere in the county.
Here’s how much retail water agencies in the region may have to pay each year to cover the projected $18.9 million bill from Fallbrook and Rainbow leaving:
(Editor’s Note: The San Diego County Water Authority response to the proposals by the Fallbrook and Rainbow water districts to leave the Water Authority and annex into the Eastern Municipal Water District in Riverside County addressed the wholesale water agency’s concerns in September 2020. San Diego LAFCO’s website provides addtional details on the detachment process.)
