In light of the recently approved 15 per cent water and sewer utility rate increase, some residents have been taking a closer look at the District of Squamish water rates and questioning the logic behind them.
At the March 1 council meeting, Coun. Corinne Lonsdale wondered aloud "how it makes sense that the owners of public houses (bars) pay more for utilities than car washes."
Joanne Greenlees, financial services general manager, said Lonsdale had a good point and staff recently realized the rate structure was problematic.
"This is an urgent issue and the structure hasn't been changed in years," she said. "The engineering department is looking to revise the bylaws this year."
Greenlees explained the rate system during an interview with The Chief on Wednesday (March 9).
"The structure of the water- and the sewer-rates bylaws has not has any kind of attention for many, many years," she said.
"Suffice to say, in the last several years there has been little attention paid to whether or not our bylaws reflect the current configuration of types of users out there and whether or not the rates are correlated with the amount of water they might use."
Under the district water rates bylaw any residential dwelling, whether it's a mansion or a townhouse, pays $252.29 per year. Cafés, restaurants, coffee shops and dining rooms pay $326.54 per year, with an extra $8.80 per seat.
Bars pay $411.35 per year while car washes, pools and hot tubs pay $410.77 per year.
Greenlees acknowledged some of the rates made no sense.
"We don't know whether these relationships of rates are fair, whether they would promote water conservation or anything," she said.
"We don't even know the basis on which they were established in the first place - that information is long since gone."
Greenlees said there have been numerous changes in recent years to help municipalities determine rates relative to use.
"The simplest strategy is to introduce universal metering where everyone has the same base rate and it goes up incrementally with their water use," she said.
"If you have a beauty parlour where you use a lot of water you'll pay more than a resident who is frugal with their water."
However, she said a universal metering system isn't in the works because of the expense associated with the installation of such a system and more pressing needs.
Engineering manager Brian Barnett acknowledged the benefits of water metering, but said it isn't a district priority at the moment.
"Water metering is a very established tool to manage a water utility and to charge people for consumption," he said. "However, water metering typically reduces water consumption by about 10 per cent but costs a few million dollars to implement.
"Right now it's more cost and water effective to focus on fixing the leaks in the water mains and reservoirs, not on water metering."
Greenlees agreed.
"We'd rather fix the infrastructure problems we have than spend a whole bunch of money to give people an incentive to conserve water when we're losing it all in the ground," she said.
"It's a great concept, just not right now."
That doesn't mean water meters are out of the question - in fact, Greenlees said the district's goal is to implement water metering in the future and developers are already being asked to include water meters in new developments.
Until then, Greenlees said the next challenge is to determine what a good flat rate would be.
She said by next year, staff will come up with a "more fair" flat-rate system based on other municipalities rates and information.
"We'll come up with a system that's more relevant to today's standards," she said.
