Chase residents voice their concern about new utility rates

CHASE, B.C. — Many Chase residents are up in arms about water and utility rates that came into effect in October.

Last year, Chase council moved from metered water to a minimum consumption flat rate for all users. Some Chase residents say they saw as much as a 75 per cent increase in their utility bill this last quarter.

“As soon as I opened my new bill, I was shocked. Nobody knew they were going to get this kind of increase,” said Chase resident Alan Couture.

During Wednesday evening’s (March 6) budget information open house, dozens of residents filed into the community hall to make their voices heard and to learn why these utility rates are necessary.

“Many of us feel that they’re quite exorbitant and they’ve been put on us now because of a lack of proper management, money management, maintenance management,” said another resident, Bill Lawson.

The move was partially made because the village has so many broken water meters and doesn’t have the budget to replace them.

“Our water meters are really not giving us very good information,” said Chase CAO Joni Heinrich, “so we instituted a minimum charge based on the average. We took an average of all people’s usage and we said we were going to institute a minimum charge of 60 cubic meters. People pay a certain amount, whether they use 60 cubic meters or not.”

According to the village, residents have been undercharged for utilities over the last few years, leading to the utility reserve drying up. The village says there is no money left for needed maintenance and infrastructure

“Basically, we didn’t raise the rates three-to-four years ago as much as we should have, because we didn’t want to hit people really hard, every single time we raised rates,” Heinrich told CFJC News. “Unfortunately, people feel like they’ve been hit because the consumption rates are not what they are used to.”

Wednesday’s open house was intended to showcase the village’s 2024 budget. Utility rates, though, were the headliner.

“We had a budget open house prepared for this evening to go through all of our budgetary information, what’s proposed for 2024 and including our water and sewer rates, because those have been a hot button issue for some of our residents over the last few weeks,” the Chase CAO explained.

Mayor David Lepsoe believes the water system should be community-funded regardless of usage, like many other municipal services.

“Even if you don’t use the hockey rink, you’re paying $300,” said Lepsoe. “You’re paying $60 a year for the library, whether you use it or not. The water system is like any other system, right? It’s hard to do the one-offs on anything.”

But after hearing the outcry of so many residents, council and staff may be headed back to the drawing board.

“That was the whole idea today,” said Lepsoe. “[It] was to come and listen to the public and see what the public wants. And then we’ll go back and we’ll reevaluate the system and see what we can do.“

Either way the fees are presented, the village feels it needs to increase its utility revenue.

“Our revenue still isn’t capturing all of our costs,” said Heinrich. “We’re going to have to be looking at this again. But it’s one way to do it. It’s one way that we thought was the fairest for everybody.”