NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
SOUTH HUTCHINSON, Kan. — The South Hutchinson City Council will look at an ordinance at their next meeting to restructure the way the city's water rates are interpreted.
"When you look at the code, I think it's clear that it should be a base rate plus a monthly usage charge for the gallons that you consume," Joseph Turner said. "For 20 years or so, we have not been billing that way. At some point, you can say, your interpretation of the ordinance is correct or not, but since we've been billing a certain way for 20 plus years, I think it makes sense for us to be very clear in updating the code on that."
Water wise, residential customers have been getting a great deal to this point.
"Over 800 residences are on our standard 5/8 inch line," Turner said. "One third of those customers, 34%, pay $6.56 a month for water service. That's all they pay for water."
Turner said about another third of residential customers are somewhere between $6.56 and a little more than $13 a month for water. The amount for the minimum monthly charge is still to be decided by the governing body at their meeting on September 19.
"Most of the customers that are paying $6.56 a month or less, one third of our lowest volume users, they might go from $6.56 to $6.76 or $6.56 to $8.50. They're not going to feel the full brunt of the increase."
Even larger commercial customers should see relatively nominal increases.