Tiny Township is asking residents to turn off their taps as it turns up the water fees.
Council committee on Monday approved a recommendation from staff to increase water rates from $790 per year to $930 in 2021 and $1070 in 2022. The move came after a council member asked staff to review watering-ban and water-use policies a couple of months ago.
Jamie Witherspoon, president of WT Infrastructure Solutions Inc., was brought on a consultant to present to council an overview of where the township stands in terms of its costs and revenue around water usage and what it can do to help balance the two. According to his report, the township's infrastructure cost per account is $425 and its operational cost per account is $670, while its operational revenue per account is $200 and operational cost per account is $590.
Witherspoon suggested the township is charging less than most of its comparable neighbouring municipalities, and has been doing so for more than a decade, and that it should consider moving to a metered billing system for non-seasonal residents to balance revenues and costs, encourage water conservation, and save up to support expansions and water capacity.
"The goal of the metered structure is your operational and infrastructure repair costs are covered," he said. "You want as many people to connect because the more people that connect, the lower the cost is to run the system."
Witherspoon suggested Tiny begin by running a pilot project in Wyevale and take the data from that to expand to the rest of the township. He also suggested staff could start sending mock bills to residents to familiarize them with what to expect when the entire system finally moves to metered billing.
Coun. Tony Mintoff suggested the trial include industrial commercial and institutional properties, as well as the few apartment buildings in the area.
"I'm not sure we should wait for another phase; we should target them in conjunction with Wyevale," he said, adding he was surprised to see the township hadn't increased water fees for 11 years.
"We need to distance ourselves from that," said Mintoff. "We need to be able to adjust the cost much more frequently to make sure we're generating (enough) to sustain our operational costs."
Deputy Mayor Steffen Walma agreed.
"The rates haven't changed in over 10 years," he said. "If you look at our comparables, we have been extremely low for that time and, even with the rate adjustment, we're still on the low side of our neighbours.
"Our water systems ... were designed when we had a higher population base of cottagers than we do now," added Walma. "As people transition their cottages into full-time homes, which is a great thing for the municipality, it taxes the system that wasn't designed for that."
To make improvement to infrastructure, the township needs to adjust its water fees, he said.
"On top of that, for instance, in Wyevale, the reservoir is getting towards capacity," said Walma. "During the dry season, we have to have watering restrictions in place. We err on the side of caution because we want to maintain adequate water supply for fire-mitigation flows. It could get so low that people may not be able to do their domestic chores."
Coun. Gibb Wishart asked about the households that draw water from wells.
"There will be people in Wyevale who have wells," he said. "Were I to live in Wyevale and have a well, I would not wish to give it up. I would think those people would be permitted to continue with their well.
"If they were forced by the bylaw to hook up, then a plumber or a person with the township could certify that the well would not provide water to the potable system in the house," Wishart added. "I would be happy with that, especially if I were trying to control my water usage and be able to water my garden with my well."
Unfortunately, said Witherspoon, that may not be an option.
"It is problematic," he said. "You wouldn't want any cross-connections so the water comes into the house but goes into a completely separate system, just to an outside tap. You would have to have some management methods. I have seen many municipalities that have typically required the wells be abandoned if they are connected to municipal water supply."
Tiny also hopes to achieve is water conservation, which, according to Witherspoon's report, could go up due to a 10 to 20 per cent reduction in water usage.
Mintoff said he could get behind that.
"All we know right now is how much water is leaving the buildings," he said. "We don't know how much is being sold. Without knowing that, we can't determine how much leakage we have (in buildings). If you look at the potential of us identifying the leakages, I think you'll see a number of these smaller things will add up to savings of what we anticipate."
In addition, Walma said, when the metered billing system is implemented, it could lead to savings for smaller households that do not use as much water as larger ones.
"I think, if anything, if you're going to be upset with council on our water rates, it should be because we didn't start phasing this in earlier," he said. "At the end of the day, if we don't start doing this now, it's going to cost later."
Council has been conscious of financial pressues on residents this year, said Walma.
"In the township, we didn't have any interests on taxes," he added. "At the end of the day, water is a primary resoucre we need to make sure is working efficiently, so we need to make this investment."
Also part of the motion, to be ratified by council at a later date, were these minor changes to water-use restrictions already in place:
- Reducing the restricted period to the months of May to September
- Increased fines for infractions during watering bans
- Clarification on usage types, such as garden watering, car/house/trailer cleaning, pool filling, pool top-ups, various exterior cleaning (siding, driveways, windows, fencing, decks, etc.), kids' water toys, etc., and what constitutes “excessive use"
- Odd-numbered houses can use exterior water during the morning period and even numbered houses during the evening period on the 31st day of May, July and August.
