On Monday the Austin City Council approved the city budget for Fiscal Year 2012, which begins next month. The budget includes continued funding for building WTP4 despite overwhelming data showing we will not need additional treatment capacity before 2025 at the earliest.
The battle, however, is not over. The City’s projected costs for postponing the plant are overstated, and ignore the enormous savings to Austin ratepayers by postponing funding to expand treatment capacity until we need it--and until a time when there are tens of thousands more customers to help pay for it.
The City’s analysis also ignores the high “opportunity costs” of spending limited funds on a project that encourages waste and assumes an endless supply of raw water when our real needs scream out for investing in building a water efficient economy that is protected from drought and climate change. More on this next week.
We won a partial victory on the City’s proposed water rate hikes. The proposed $6.00 month fee for all residential customers was reduced to a temporary $4.40 per month fee that will only be in place for six months. The council instructed the staff to bring back proposals during the six month period that would establish a graduated fee that charged more to those using more water and less or none to those using the least amount of water.
We’ll be working on this with other advocates for affordability and sustainability to make sure the final fee protects water savers and low-income residents and families.