CWA sets June 28 hearing for rate increase

The San Diego County Water Authority set a June 28 hearing date for its Calendar Year 2008 rates, which are expected to increase from the 2007 costs.

The public hearing will take place at 1:00 p.m. that afternoon in the San Diego County Water Authority board room on Overland Avenue in San Diego. The May 24 board vote establishing the hearing date also included the proposed rates and charges for Calendar Year 2008.

The proposed rates would increase the charge per acre-foot for untreated water from $365 to $390 and would increase the treatment surcharge from $147 to $164 per acre-foot. Those rates are the cost the member agency would pay the CWA for supply; the local agency board would choose to absorb the increase or pass it on to customers. The CWA’s customer service charge and its storage charge, both of which are allocated among member agencies, are also scheduled to increase, as is the Infrastructure Access Charge levied on each retail water meter.

The rates for untreated and treated water are based on a melded rate reflecting costs of water both from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and from the Imperial Irrigation District. The rates also include an Interim Agricultural Water Program option, in which farmers receive a lower rate but will be the first customers subject to cuts in the event of a shortage. The IAWP rate per acre-foot, which is directly passed on from the Metropolitan Water District, will increase from $241 to $261.

The customer service charge recovers costs necessary to support the functions of the County Water Authority and to develop policies or implement programs which benefit the region as a whole. That charge is allocated among each member agency based on each agency’s three-year average of all deliveries. The customer service charge total is scheduled to increase from $14,200,000 to $15,200,000.

The storage charge, which is designed to recover costs associated with the CWA’s emergency storage program, will increase from $17,700,000 to $22,200,000. Allocation of that charge is based on all non-agricultural water deliveries (because the agricultural customers are subject to cuts and do not benefit from the emergency storage supply, they are not subject to the charge) and is allocated among member agencies based on the three-year rolling average of non-agricultural water deliveries.

The CWA also has a transportation rate to recover capital, operating, and maintenance costs of the aqueduct system (turnouts on the Metropolitan Water District system rather than along the CWA aqueduct are not subject to that charge) which is levied on each acre-foot of water delivered by the CWA through those facilities. The $60 per acre-foot transportation rate is not expected to change for 2008.

The Infrastructure Access Charge is levied to maintain a minimum ratio of fixed revenues to projected fixed expenditures. That charge will increase from $1.56 to $1.70 per meter equivalent.

The CWA also has a Standby Availability Charge of $10 per acre or per parcel, whichever is greater, although that charge has not changed since its creation in 1996 and is not scheduled to change. The Standby Availability Charge is assessed on property tax bills rather than on water bills.