Water rates are closer to going up in North Bay, but not by as much as originally proposed.
Council’s General Government Committee has approved the new rates.
The increase for the average user is now 3.27% instead of the originally proposed 5.98%.
“The monthly increase originally was at $5.23,” says Margaret Karpenko, Chief Financial Officer. “We are now moving forward with a monthly increase for an average residential user, of 14 cubic meters a month, of $2.86.”
She says on annual basis it represents an increase of $34.32 over 2022 final calculated rates.
Council is dipping further into reserves to bring the increase down.
“The recommendation is using $619,600 from reserves on top of the already $205,000 included in the preliminary budget,” says Karpenko.
Staff will also be reviewing the 50% Fixed/50% Variable methodology before next year’s budget process to look at the impact of increasing the variable component and reducing the fixed rate component.
While the rates have been approved at the committee level, full council still has to vote on January 17.
