Sewer rates to rise in Trumbull Co.

By Ed Runyan

The average sewer bill will be about $31.60 per month starting in September.

WARREN — The average sewer bill for 10,500 customers in the Metropolitan Sewer District in central and southern Trumbull County will rise about $6.60 per month starting in September and increase an additional 90 cents per month in each of the next four years.

The increase was approved Wednesday by the Trumbull County commissioners, though one of the three commissioners, Dan Polivka, voted against it.

Polivka said he opposed the increase because it involved an 18.3 percent increase in the first year and 3 percent in each of the four years that follow.

Commissioner Paul Heltzel, however, said commissioners spent several weeks examining the numbers presented by Rex Fee, executive director of the county sanitary engineering department, and decided that the increase was necessary.

Commissioner Frank Fuda also voted for the increase.

“We need this to still allow them [sanitary engineer’s department] just to keep things going,” Heltzel said.

The new rates were based in part on a rate study conducted by the company MS Consultants of Youngstown.

Areas served by the Metropolitan Sewer District are neighborhoods with sewers in Newton Township, Brookfield Township, Champion Township, Lordstown Village, Mineral Ridge, Liberty Township, Warren Township, Weathersfield Township and parts of Hubbard and Vienna townships.

The monthly sewer charge is based on water consumption, which averages about 5,000 gallons per month. The new cost of sewers will be $5.92 per month per 1,000 gallons of water used plus another $2-per-month fee. The average sewer bill will be about $31.60 per month starting in September, compared to about $25 per month now.

For those who don’t use county water, their sewer bill will rise by about $7.49 per month in September — from $30 per month to $37.49 — and about $1.10 more per month each September in the next four years.

County officials say the sanitary engineer’s department has no choice but to operate with a balanced budget, and many of the costs associated with its operations have gone up, especially the cost charged to the district to accept waste.

Fee prepared a worksheet showing the increases being charged to the sewer district from waste-treatment plants in Youngstown, Warren and Sharon and said those costs have to be passed on to Trumbull County sewage customers.

The cost for the treatment plant in Mahoning County that accepts sewage from Mineral Ridge customers rose 7 percent in 2008 and 7.8 percent in 2009; the cost for waste treated in Youngstown from Liberty customers rose 1 percent in 2008 and 9.7 percent this year; the cost for treatment by Warren for waste from Lordstown has risen an average of 2.5 percent each of the past six years; and Sharon raised rates last year to $54 per month for waste from Brookfield customers.

Other costs that have to be passed on to customers involve the oversizing of sewage pipes.

For instance, customers to be served by the second phase of the Little Squaw Creek sewer project on state Route 193 in Vienna Township will only pay the cost of an 8-inch sewer pipe, even though most of the project will have 18-inch pipe, said Jim Jones, project engineer with the sanitary engineer’s office.

The department must install the larger pipe for such a project so the sewer can accommodate future growth along the Route 193 corridor, Jones added.

runyan@vindy.com