Warsaw City Council Approves Stormwater Utility Rate Change On First Reading
October 20, 2020 at 3:36 a.m.
Warsaw City Council Approves Stormwater Utility Rate Change On First Reading
By David [email protected]
The ordinance for the increase was introduced at the Council’s Oct. 5 meeting, but no action was taken then.
The second reading and a public hearing on the rate increase will be held at a Council meeting in November.
The current residential rate, which was set in 2013, is a flat rate of $2.95 per month. If approved on second reading, that rate would increase to $8 per month by Jan. 1, 2025.
Mayor Joe Thallemer gave a presentation on the history of the stormwater utility rate. He said the Council only established the rate in 2013 and it’s never been adjusted.
He said Warsaw’s stormwater utility is rooted in the federal Clean Water Act of 1972, which gradually worked its way into communities of the city’s size. The Clean Water Act is regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency and enforced in Indiana by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.
Warsaw is a MS4 (Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System) city. The city was given that mandated designation in 1999 from the National Pollutant Discharge Illumination System Phase II Storm Water Program, Thallemer said. The goal is to eliminate pollution. IDEM initiated the Phase II program in 2003, and by virtue of the city’s population, Warsaw was mandated to comply to the rules of an MS4 community.
The Warsaw stormwater utility was established in 2013. As an MS4 community, the city has a number of requirements to meet through the stormwater quality control measures, including: public education and outreach, public participation and involvement; illicit discharge detection and elimination, construction runoff control, post-construction runoff control, and pollution prevention and good housekeeping within the city.
“So those control measures are important in order to comply and be able to operate our utility, maintain our permit as a utility. When we established our utility, we established our fee back in late 2013,” Thallemer said.
The fee helps fund the mandated stormwater control measures and other regulatory requirements. It also helps maintain the city’s infrastructure of pipes, conveyances, swales, ditches and more. Then there’s the “very large and numerous” capital improvement projects. By adjusting the fee, Thallemer said the city hopes to get some of those projects completed.
The current fee has two components. For residential, there’s a base fee of $1.05 per month and an impervious surface charge of $1.90, for a total of a flat rate of $2.95. The same rate is applied to all residential units. That rate structure will not change as the city moves ahead with the rate change, Thallemer said.
The current commercial rate structure is composed of a base rate and number of Equipment Runoff Units (ERU). The base rate is based on the number of buildings. The majority of the commercial rate will come from the ERUs (one ERU is 3,500 square feet); so if a business has 7,000 square feet, it will be charged two ERUs. The current fee per ERU is $1.90. The total commercial monthly fee is the base rate plus the ERUs.
Thallemer said the current state average of 121 Indiana municipalities is $5.62 per month.
Stormwater Coordinator Ryan Workman said the stresses the utility typically receives on its budget are “predominantly on our operations and maintenance, as well as those capital improvement projects.” He said there’s also the unforeseen issues that pop up from out of nowhere.
The utility’s upcoming major projects are addressing three stormwater infrastructures the city will do in tandem with the town of Winona Lake’s roundabout project, Pike Lake shoreline stabilization and Kelly Lake pond restoration project. Those project costs will amount to about $1.4 million.
Workman said the stormwater utility rate needs to be addressed because the rate has been under the state average. “The Water Environment Federation did a study two years ago, and within our region of EPA, Region 5, within municipalities that are close to our population, as well as impact for storm infrastructure, it was determined that $1.5 million of operating budget is what is needed to operate a utility, to operate a program of this magnitude for this population and footprint. We are looking to get to that point, however, we want to make it staggard, but again, we are still under the state average and we do see the stress within our operating budget,” he said.
Councilwoman Diane Quance said, on the upcoming projects Workman mentioned, “It might seem like, ‘Why do we need a fishing pond? Why are we charging people for that? Why do we need to improve the shoreline?’ Those projects are directly the result of the fact that we have a lot of water running into that area, and it’s causing a problem in that area. And as we improve and move that water out of the residential area, that water has got to go somewhere. And we can either create, in Kelly Park, a swamp or get that pond dredged out and get that water held in that area. And then the same with Pike Lake: We have a lot of runoff coming off the older neighborhoods ... running down into that shoreline.” That runoff then makes the shoreline nonusable because of what it carries down to the shoreline with it, like salt.
Utility Superintendent Brian Davison said Warsaw is unique in that it’s the only MS4 in Kosciusko County, while other MS4s are combinations of multiple MS4 cities.
After over an hour of conversation on the rate and need for an increase to it, Quance made a motion to approve the ordinance on first reading, with the second provided by Councilman Jerry Frush. It was approved 6-0, with Councilman Mike Klondaris absent.
The ordinance for the increase was introduced at the Council’s Oct. 5 meeting, but no action was taken then.
The second reading and a public hearing on the rate increase will be held at a Council meeting in November.
The current residential rate, which was set in 2013, is a flat rate of $2.95 per month. If approved on second reading, that rate would increase to $8 per month by Jan. 1, 2025.
Mayor Joe Thallemer gave a presentation on the history of the stormwater utility rate. He said the Council only established the rate in 2013 and it’s never been adjusted.
He said Warsaw’s stormwater utility is rooted in the federal Clean Water Act of 1972, which gradually worked its way into communities of the city’s size. The Clean Water Act is regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency and enforced in Indiana by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.
Warsaw is a MS4 (Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System) city. The city was given that mandated designation in 1999 from the National Pollutant Discharge Illumination System Phase II Storm Water Program, Thallemer said. The goal is to eliminate pollution. IDEM initiated the Phase II program in 2003, and by virtue of the city’s population, Warsaw was mandated to comply to the rules of an MS4 community.
The Warsaw stormwater utility was established in 2013. As an MS4 community, the city has a number of requirements to meet through the stormwater quality control measures, including: public education and outreach, public participation and involvement; illicit discharge detection and elimination, construction runoff control, post-construction runoff control, and pollution prevention and good housekeeping within the city.
“So those control measures are important in order to comply and be able to operate our utility, maintain our permit as a utility. When we established our utility, we established our fee back in late 2013,” Thallemer said.
The fee helps fund the mandated stormwater control measures and other regulatory requirements. It also helps maintain the city’s infrastructure of pipes, conveyances, swales, ditches and more. Then there’s the “very large and numerous” capital improvement projects. By adjusting the fee, Thallemer said the city hopes to get some of those projects completed.
The current fee has two components. For residential, there’s a base fee of $1.05 per month and an impervious surface charge of $1.90, for a total of a flat rate of $2.95. The same rate is applied to all residential units. That rate structure will not change as the city moves ahead with the rate change, Thallemer said.
The current commercial rate structure is composed of a base rate and number of Equipment Runoff Units (ERU). The base rate is based on the number of buildings. The majority of the commercial rate will come from the ERUs (one ERU is 3,500 square feet); so if a business has 7,000 square feet, it will be charged two ERUs. The current fee per ERU is $1.90. The total commercial monthly fee is the base rate plus the ERUs.
Thallemer said the current state average of 121 Indiana municipalities is $5.62 per month.
Stormwater Coordinator Ryan Workman said the stresses the utility typically receives on its budget are “predominantly on our operations and maintenance, as well as those capital improvement projects.” He said there’s also the unforeseen issues that pop up from out of nowhere.
The utility’s upcoming major projects are addressing three stormwater infrastructures the city will do in tandem with the town of Winona Lake’s roundabout project, Pike Lake shoreline stabilization and Kelly Lake pond restoration project. Those project costs will amount to about $1.4 million.
Workman said the stormwater utility rate needs to be addressed because the rate has been under the state average. “The Water Environment Federation did a study two years ago, and within our region of EPA, Region 5, within municipalities that are close to our population, as well as impact for storm infrastructure, it was determined that $1.5 million of operating budget is what is needed to operate a utility, to operate a program of this magnitude for this population and footprint. We are looking to get to that point, however, we want to make it staggard, but again, we are still under the state average and we do see the stress within our operating budget,” he said.
Councilwoman Diane Quance said, on the upcoming projects Workman mentioned, “It might seem like, ‘Why do we need a fishing pond? Why are we charging people for that? Why do we need to improve the shoreline?’ Those projects are directly the result of the fact that we have a lot of water running into that area, and it’s causing a problem in that area. And as we improve and move that water out of the residential area, that water has got to go somewhere. And we can either create, in Kelly Park, a swamp or get that pond dredged out and get that water held in that area. And then the same with Pike Lake: We have a lot of runoff coming off the older neighborhoods ... running down into that shoreline.” That runoff then makes the shoreline nonusable because of what it carries down to the shoreline with it, like salt.
Utility Superintendent Brian Davison said Warsaw is unique in that it’s the only MS4 in Kosciusko County, while other MS4s are combinations of multiple MS4 cities.
After over an hour of conversation on the rate and need for an increase to it, Quance made a motion to approve the ordinance on first reading, with the second provided by Councilman Jerry Frush. It was approved 6-0, with Councilman Mike Klondaris absent.
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