On Council agenda is a Staff recommendation for water and waste water rates for 2019.  The average  blended bill (i.e. water and waste water) for a household using 250 cubic meters of water /year is $158.56, 11.8% .  It is a big increase; logic for such is as follows.  1.  Consistent with previous 4 years the 9% increase in the whole sale rate from York Region is being passed on.   The increase is a direct result of York Region’s Financial Sustainability Plan which includes a 9%  increase annually through 2020.  The latter responds to Provincial legislation that all municipal water and wastewater systems operate on a full-cost recovery rate structure in order to ensure that there is financial capability to properly maintain and ultimately replace infrastructure. 2.  King has its own need to ensure that user rates support operational requirements and that we don’t have an underfunded water and wastewater system.

As indicated in the report our reserves are in a deficit position and it is  forecasted that the annual increases are going to continue to be in the 11% range until  York Region’s 9%/yr increase Plan ends which is 2020.  But what comes after that?  A positive note on how capital is being spent is incluoded in the report:  the automatic/remote meter reading solution has been implemented which enables real-time review and detection of unusual consumption.  I will be asking status of households being able to access data to better enable conservation.