NORTHAMPTON — After hearing concerns from the business community and some fixed-income residents, Mayor David J. Narkewicz will ask the City Council next week to approve revised water rates that are lower than councilors approved last month.
In a Friday memo to councilors, Narkewicz said the new rates would still operate on a two-tiered system benefiting smaller, mainly residential, users. Along with the two-tiered system comes a higher fee for wasteful water use.
“We are pretty confident we can lower these rates and still cover operational and capital costs projected for FY 2017,” which begins July 1. Narkewicz said Friday. “Our plan is to still spend the same amount.”
The overall plan proposed by Narkewicz would increase fixed fees and distinguish between smaller and larger consumers. The City Council is scheduled to take a final vote on the plan Thursday.
If city council approves the new rate, residents with meters that are 1 inch or smaller can expect to pay between $4.36 and $5.82 per 100 cubic feet, depending on consumption rates, according to the Narkewicz’s revised proposal. Those numbers are down from $4.73 to $6.21 under the mayor’s original plan.
And the revised plan would set a water rate of $5.72 per 100 cubic feet for consumers with meters larger than 1 inch. That is a 6 percent reduction from the originally proposed $6.09.
Narkewicz said in the memo that the lower rates are made possible by shifting about $420,000 within the budget and delaying issuing a bond for a capital expense.
The City Council approved the new structure and corresponding rates during a first reading March 17.
The original proposed sewer rate of $7.52 per 100 cubic feet remains unchanged, according to the memo.
Since the first council vote, large commercial users and some residents with fixed or low incomes raised concerns that they would be disproportionately affected by the proposed rates.
City Council President William H. Dwight said Friday he is hopeful about the new plan, but that time will tell when it comes to gauging its effectiveness.
“I think the ethos of this is to offset the bigger pressures on people who are experiencing financial duress,” Dwight added. “If you want to maintain the ability for people to live here, it’s incumbent upon us to reduce those pressures.”
The original proposed rate saw an increase for the largest commercial users as high as $4,500, while the average residential user would see an overall increase of 67 cents per quarter.
Narkewicz’s amendment to the original plan comes days after Coca-Cola, which has a plant based in Northampton employing 290 people, wrote to the mayor suggesting a change that would allow commercial users to earn regular rebates based on conservation benchmarks.
“Coca-Cola is proud of our conservation and water stewardship efforts and are encouraged by Mayor Narkewicz’s willingness to revisit the proposed volumetric water rate changes,” Coca-Cola spokeswoman Jennifer Cruickshank said in an email Friday. “We look forward to continuing to work with the Mayor and City Council to ensure Northampton businesses are not disproportionately impacted by these combined water and sewer ratechanges.”
Michael Majchrowicz can be reached at mmajchrowicz@gazettenet.com.