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Lynden wants water billing change

Fredonia Trustee James Lynden has proposed changes to water and sewer rates that would result in large users paying more, and smaller, residential customers paying less.

“What I would like to propose is that we remove the base fee, so we can have a more equitable shared costing of the water rates,” he said at this week’s Board of Trustees meeting.

Under the current rules, Lynden said, a resident that uses 5,000 gallons of water in a quarter will pay the $25 base fee and $4.80 for each 1,000 gallons, for a total bill of $49. That represents a final cost of $9.80 per 1,000 gallons used.

A larger user, with 27,000 gallons, would get a bill for $154.60, or $5.73 per 1,000 gallons used with the base fee added in.

“I don’t think that’s quite equitable,” Lynden said. He said calculating the rate purely through usage, rather than charging a base fee, would save money for most of Fredonia’s water customers.

Proposing a rate of $5.75 per 1,000 gallons, he said a 5,000-gallon use would cost $28.75, a savings of $20.25. The 27,000-gallon usage, at that rate, would cost $155.25. That’s a hike of 65 cents.

“We wouldn’t be losing any revenues, according to the examples,” Lynden said. “It would just be a much more equitable sharing of costs because it’s a true price per thousand for a user fee, but it also gives us the ability to have 100% cost recovery based specifically on our usage, which would then work more effectively with our contracts for sale outside of the town.”

Mayor Douglas Essek said it could harm commercial users and offered his own breakdown: Some 281 of the village’s 3,101 billed customers use 50,000 gallons of water or more per quarter.

“It would create more revenue, which we are looking for, but it would also put a burden on the commercial users who use a lot,” he said.

“The commercial users are the ones who have the ability for recovery of costs,” Lynden replied.

Essek warned the plan could encourage businesses to shut down or pick up and leave. It might also cause the town of Pomfret to rethink its agreements with the village.

Lynden said Fredonia has lower rates than Pomfret’s other alternative, the North County Water District. “It may be a minor adjustment, but it’s still below what they were paying and still below what the North County Water District is going to be charging them. So, I don’t feel fearful in any way, but it also makes clear to them how they will be charged and what we will receive.”

Essek continued to express concerns about commercial users.

“You are penalizing people who have laundromats, car washes in the village. What they do is, they don’t absorb the costs. They pass those costs on to the consumers,” he said.

Lynden replied that small, residential users have been taking on a disproportionate burden for too long. He went on to say that, under his plan, a user of 50,000 gallons per quarter would pay just an additional $22.50 on each quarterly bill.

While the trustees sounded receptive to considering the change, Essek asked toward the end of the discussion how it would affect SUNY Fredonia. He looked at Lynden and said, “There’s a big question for ya. It probably would hit them pretty heavily.”

The trustees wondered how heavily. Treasurer Erlyssa LeBeau calculated it would cost SUNY Fredonia roughly $2,300 more per quarter for water.

Trustees Jon Espersen and Nicole Siracuse expressed interest in negotiating separate water and sewer rates with the university.

“While I would agree that I like Jim’s proposal, I would not be able to support it without a separate agreement with the (university),” Espersen said.

“I don’t think this would be a very prudent thing to impose on them at this point in time,” Essek said. Nevertheless, he suggested that trustees on the water and sewer committees talk to university officials about the changes.

The discussion ended with no further action taken on Lynden’s proposal.

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