Last modified: Wednesday, June 11, 2008 9:16 AM EDT Council reluctantly OKs higher city costs for sewer water BY GEORGE W. RHODES SUN CHRONICLE STAFF ATTLEBORO - The city council boosted water rates by 12 percent and sewer rates by 19 percent Tuesday after finding nothing to cut from "bare-bones budgets" for each department. The water rate will jump from $3.42 per 100 cubic feet of water to $3.84 per hundred cubic feet. The new rate will fund a water budget of $6.8 million. The sewer rate will spiral from $7.25 per 100 cubic feet of wastewater to $8.65 per 100 cubic feet. The fee will fund a budget of $9.6 million. Budget and appropriations committee Chairman Bill Bowles said the rate hikes were unavoidable. "This is particularly difficult for me because I've always fought to keep the enterprise rates as low as possible," Bowles said of the water budget, but noted the comments applied equally to the wastewater budget. "But this year I do not see any way possible to do that," he said. "The budget is bare bones. It's made up of mostly personnel." Mayor Kevin Dumas said the hikes are needed to keep up with costs to meet federal and state water quality regulations, increasing chemical prices, skyrocketing heat and electric costs and burgeoning debt service. Bowles said he plans to open a discussion on reducing indirect costs for each department later this year. Indirect costs are the fees the city charges to the water and wastewater departments for various services provided by other city departments. Together, the two departments pay the city more than $1 million in indirect costs. Councilors also may consider requiring residents to tie into sewer lines. Meanwhile, the trash fee went down more than expected. The council voted to drop that fee to $178.32, down from $182.44. The fee was to have gone down about 1 percent, or $2.28, but Bowles said a surplus of about $22,000 allowed officials to bring the rate down more, a total of $4.12, or 2.25 percent. It's the lowest trash fee in three years. Fees have hovered around the $180 mark since the city started the pay-as-you-throw trash program, which encourages residents to recycle by charging them $1.50 for every bag or barrel of trash after the first bag or barrel which is covered by the trash fee. Before that program was started, the fee was $204 per year.