Coachella Valley Water District Raises Rates

[bc_video video_id="6047161716001″ account_id="5728959025001″ player_id="Hkbio1usDM" embed="in-page" padding_top="56%" autoplay="" min_width="0px" max_width="640px" width="100%" height="100%"] Coachella Valley Water District customers will now be seeing more expensive water bills but the district wants to be clear the changes are profitable for their customers and not them. It’s the district’s budget year which means they had to take a step back and reassess what they need. In this case, it was how much they needed. "The fixed fee went up by one dollar and the consumption charge went up about 3.5 percent," CVWD spokesperson, Katie Evans, said. While it can be frustrating, Evans said that extra buck or so for customers is necessary to sustain their customer’s water. "There were three primary drivers for the rate: increase capital improvement, which is the need to invest in infrastructure, repair pipes, improve the system; the need for fiscal stability and then general increases in any operating costs that we experience," Evans said. According to Evans, that revenue is not for profit for the district. The district can only charge customers for the cost of their service. "We want to proactively replace pipelines that we know are starting to deteriorate before they break and we need to do emergency repairs." For customers with financial burdens, Evans said CVWD has a number of programs in place. To see a list of those programs and see the specifics for the rate hikes, visit http://www.cvwd.org/.