The Oswego Village Board is looking to raise water and sewer rates in 2024 as a way to fund the village’s transition to Lake Michigan water with a connection through the DuPage Water Commission.
“Thanks to numerous actions over the last several years including passage of a real estate transfer tax referendum that pledges all revenues to the water fund, significant water connection fees paid by developers and investment in our water infrastructure resulting in very low water loss, we are fortunate that the necessary rate increases are much less than first expected when we began studying the switch to Lake Michigan,” Oswego Village Administrator Dan Di Santo said in response to questions via email from The Beacon-News.
Oswego decided in 2021 to move from relying on well water to Lake Michigan water via a connection through the DuPage Water Commission. The Illinois State Water Survey has used projections showing the region could run out of ground water from the aquifer it currently uses in the next 20 to 40 years.
The village’s consultants Baxter & Woodman recently presented a second round of results of a water rate analysis to the village board.
Staff was seeking direction on an ordinance for a rate increase effective Jan 1. The previous analysis had projected water and sewer rates going up beginning May 1, 2023, village officials said.
However, the village is looking to “coincide” the rate hike with the village changing the beginning of its fiscal year from May 1 to Jan. 1, Di Santo said.
The village’s goal is to minimize rate increases to customers, have water customers pay their fair share in rates and have the funds necessary to connect to Lake Michigan water and properly maintain the existing water and sewer system, Di Santo said.
Trustees had discussions on Oct. 17 on four water rate hike scenarios to generate “the required revenue” to support the system.
All of the scenarios anticipate rate increases beginning Jan. 1, 2024, village officials said.
The board appeared to favor a scenario based on what is called a “fixed scaled meter.”
“We believe it to be the scenario that best distributes the rates to be sure that all customers pay their fair share. This scenario introduces the concept of a fixed scaled meter, which charges a fixed fee based on the meter size, as well as a … rate based on usage categories,” Di Santo said.
The rates under this system would be based on the size of the water meter and the amount of usage by the customer, he said.
“Smaller users like residents have less impact on the overall water system, so in this scenario they pay less,” he said. “Likewise, larger users have more impact on the overall system so they would pay more. This is in contrast to our current rate structure where every customer no matter their meter size and usage pays the same rate.”
According to Di Santo, of the four scenarios reviewed, this scenario “results in the smallest bill for typical residential customers and seniors.”
For the average residential user, the rate hike under the scenario in 2024 would be 5.8% on the bimonthly bill.
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Village trustees are scheduled to vote on the water rate ordinance Nov. 7.
The village is also looking at going to a monthly bill payment system versus the existing bimonthly billing.
“The monthly billing will have little to no impact on rates themselves, but will be easier for customers to process with their other monthly bills, will make the bills themselves less expensive and allow customers to better monitor their water usage by seeing the bills more frequently,” Di Santo said.
“If you are irrigating your lawn a lot one month, you may notice the impact on your bill quicker, which will allow you to adjust your watering as opposed to not finding out for two months,” he said.
Linda Girardi is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.