City proposes nearly 20% hike to Storm Water budget

The biggest change in Charlotte City Manager Ron Carlee’s proposed budget is a nearly 19 percent increase in the city’s Storm Water Services budget, which would be funded by a fee increase on the largest homes.

The department’s budget this year is $59.7 million, but would jump to $70.9 million if City Council approves the changes.

Under the plan, about 10 percent of city of Charlotte homeowners would pay an additional $11.78 a month, or $141.36 a year.

Another 29 percent of homeowners would pay an additional $3.91 a month.

Other homeowners wouldn’t see their fees increase under the proposal.

Carlee said his new rate structure will fix an inequity, in which people with large amounts of concrete on their property pay a smaller rate than homeowners with small impervious footprints.

But while the city has proposed changing the rate structure, it would not make the changes “revenue neutral” and bring in the same amount money as the previous year.

The City Council will discuss the proposed budget Wednesday at 2 p.m.

The fee is designed to prevent flooding and improve water quality to keep streams from becoming polluted.

The city said Tuesday that it has a large backlog of storm drainage projects.

“City Council asked staff to develop a plan to begin reducing those backlogs and to increase the number of funded projects,” the city said in a statement. “A revenue neutral rate scenario could not generate sufficient revenue to respond to the growing backlog.”

The city said it has 21 large flood control projects scheduled to start construction over the next five years and over 1,100 smaller projects that would impact between one and 10 parcels of land each.

When paying their fees, residents fall into one of four tiers, depending on the amount of impervious surface on their property. That includes the footprint of their house as well as a driveway or any other concrete surface.

The current rate structure gives residents with the most concrete a relative break. A person with 5,000 square feet or more of impervious surface pays the largest fee, but they don’t pay as much on a square-foot basis as someone with 1,500 square feet of concrete.

Carlee said the existing rate structure is an “anomaly.”

“We have recommended a flat rate,” he said.

▪ Charlotte Water has also proposed a rate increase. The department’s budget would increase by 2.1 percent, to $122.5 million. The average user would see their bill go up by $1.55 a month, or 2.7 percent.

Charlotte Water has also proposed ending a subsidy for people who use only a small amount of water. The subsidy – which the city has called a “lifeline rate” – was created to help low-income residents.

But the city said a large number of people who use little water aren’t poor. They said there are many condo dwellers and people who don’t water their lawns who use little water.

▪  A centerpiece of Carlee’s budget is eliminating the $47 garbage fee levied on single-family homes. He wants to fund garbage and recycling collection through property taxes and would raise the property tax rate by 1.25 cents.

That would mean most households would pay less, Carlee said.

The city is also studying a new way to charge people for garbage under a system known as “Pay as You Throw,” which is designed to reduce the amount of trash going into Mecklenburg County’s landfills.

If the city decided to create a Pay as You Throw system, Charlotte could bring back the garbage fee quickly after it was eliminated.

One idea behind system is to charge people a monthly fee based on the size of the rollout trash container they use. The city would offer different-sized containers.

This story was originally published May 5, 2015 at 7:10 PM with the headline "City proposes nearly 20% hike to Storm Water budget."