Water users tapped to cover rising costs

Jennifer Kho

COSTA MESA -- The Mesa Consolidated Water District board on Thursday

approved an energy surcharge of 10 cents per unit for city residents, the

first rate increase in more than five years.

“I think we all agree on the surcharge,” board President Trudy

Ohlig-Hall said at the meeting. “We didn’t do that; that came to us.

Staff has worked hard on this budget and there’s no doubt we are long

overdue for a rate increase, but we’re hurting right now and it’s a bad

time. I would not like to see a rate increase [other than] the energy

surcharge. Maybe by next year things will be better and we will do what

we need to do and what we have to do.”

The district found itself an estimated $868,600 short this year

because of increased electricity rates, according to a staff report, and

needed to find a way to pay its bills.

The board had been considering several options, including combinations

of adding an energy surcharge, increasing the rates on top of the energy

cost to compensate for inflation since its last hike in 1995, cutting

other parts of the budget and using the district’s reserves.

The decision was to add an energy surcharge, which will pay for only

the raised cost for electricity and will fluctuate directly in relation

to energy prices, to cut parts of the proposed budget and to use reserves

to pay for other expenses not covered by the current rates.

Parts of the proposed budget that the board cut include reducing the

amount set aside for part of the colored-water treatment facility and

holding off on purchasing some new equipment until next year.

The board is now expected not to raise rates to replace equipment

until after electricity prices stabilize.

Board member Fred Bockmiller expressed concern about the district’s

reserve.

“It would be akin to someone with a $129,000 home having $9,000 in the

bank,” he said. “It is out of proportion in that person’s ability to

replace the home. Our reserves are small in relation to our capital

assets.”

The district’s reserve is $9.1 million, 47.9% of its $19-million

budget but only a small percentage of the value of its water lines and

other equipment that the district maintains and replaces.

The board approved the energy surcharge in a vote that included the

district’s annual budget.

Bockmiller, the single dissenting vote, said he opposed part of the

budget that he thinks does not allow enough money for capital expenses,

which would include replacing water lines.

His dissenting vote did not have anything to do with the energy

surcharge, he said.

The average Costa Mesa resident’s bill, now $54.56 every two months,

will rise to about $60.76 starting July 1 because of the energy surcharge

of 10 cents per unit.

No residents spoke at the meeting. At a previous workshop, Costa Mesa

resident Ernie Feeney asked the board to approve only the energy

surcharge and no additional rate increase.

The surcharge will appear as a separate line item on the water bill.