One more word on water rates

Over the years I discussed water rates through articles I posted on this blog. Among others I advanced the financing of Master Water Plan infrastructure borrowing through property taxation similar to financing of other infrastructure borrowings. As an example I used the $35 million approved borrowing for the MWP in the 2004 referendum. Had we used taxation the annual cost of borrowing $35 M would have been about 0.25 mill rate or $100 for a property worth $400,000, a lot less than the current annual tax of $399.20

So far this proposal was rejected at GVAC with the argument that all costs should be recovered through water user fees.

The currently proposed $407.20 base fee, which is actually a very high tax and not based on consumption, would cover the annual general tax of a property worth of about $170,000 in Coldstream using the above 0.25 mill rate. I believe taxation would be a more fair way of financing water infrastructure that is directly connected to each customer's home infrastructure.

You can check out my earlier discussions by searching on the blog with the search words "water rates" entered into the search request area as indicated on the attached snip and click on "enter".

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