Water rates are going up across the board. Although the Santa
Clara County Board of Supervisors technically has the power to
reject a spending plan that would require a 25 percent water rate
hike, Supervisor Don Gage said he couldn
’t imagine doing so and, in the end, they did not. Reviewing the
Santa Clara Valley Water District’s annual budget was a mere
formality, Gage said.
Water rates are going up across the board.
Although the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors technically has the power to reject a spending plan that would require a 25 percent water rate hike, Supervisor Don Gage said he couldn’t imagine doing so and, in the end, they did not.
Reviewing the Santa Clara Valley Water District’s annual budget was a mere formality, Gage said.
“Why would we want to get into their business when they are elected by the public?” the South Valley supervisor and Gilroy resident said of the Water District board, which approved the rate hike on May 25.
“I don’t even know what would happen if we disapproved their budget,” Gage added. “There would be some ripple effect. … We would be basically managing their budget for them.
Supervisors last week put the finishing touches on the county’s 2004-05 budget, which requires massive cutbacks. The SCVWD board already has approved the increase in water rates.
The Water District is in charge of all ground water in the county from farm wells to municipal wells. Whenever cities tap into these sources, the Water District charges an extraction fee, previously called a pump tax. As their expenses have increases, they have had to adjust their fees accordingly.
In Morgan Hill residential water rates were raised 2 percent Jan. 1, an amount that includes half of the water district’s 25 percent increase. The average residential customer pays about $31 a month, per parcel.
City Finance Director Jack Dilles said Morgan Hill water rates are scheduled to rise again January 2005, ‘06 and ‘07 if his review each September of the water fund shows an increase is needed – and as long as the City Council approves.
“September is when I have to decide if the current rates are working,” Dilles said. “Are they too little, too much?”
Dilles said the city has not made a decision on what to do about the second half of the 25 percent, not passed on to consumers.
Water customers are also charged, since April 1, a $5 a month surcharge to cover the $3.2 million the city expects to pay treating the water for perchlorate by June 2007. To date the city has spend $400,000.
The Council has promised to return the money in rebates when, and if, its costs are covered by Olin Corp., the source of perchlorate in the groundwater.
The water rate hike will raise the water cost for an average Gilroy residential customer by $15 to $16 a year.
For farmers, however, the water district’s big increase could mean a jump of thousands of dollars.
“We very rarely get anybody protesting” water rate hikes, Gage said.
Nevertheless, he added, “I agree with the farmers. The one thing that will kill them is if they can’t afford to irrigate their crops … (but) disapproving (the Water District’s) budget is not going to solve that problem.”
Instead, he said, it would result in an unproductive battle between two public agencies.
Gage said the Water District is “like a utility company” in that its budget increases stem from the rising cost of operations.
“That’s just how it is,” he said.
