City likely to raise charges for sewer service in 2006

By Johnny Brannon
Advertiser Staff Writer

The city does not plan to increase charges for sewer service next year, but they are expected to rise by 75 percent over the following five years as debt repayments skyrocket.

Charges will have to start going up in 2006, and the average home's monthly bill will likely rise from $33 in 2005 to $58 in 2010, sewer officials say.

Wastewater bond payments will more than double by 2010, going from less than $40 million per year to more than $100 million.

The projections — coupled with a series of major sewage spills — have some City Council members questioning whether Mayor Jeremy Harris' administration delayed badly needed repairs to keep sewer bills artificially low while debt piled up.

"Is this gamesmanship on the part of the administration not to raise sewer fees, even though we heard in past years that you were thinking of raising the sewer fees quite a bit?" Councilman Romy Cachola asked during a budget hearing.

Tim Houghton, deputy director of the city Department of Environmental Services, said $800 million has been spent over the past 10 years to upgrade or replace sewer pipes, pump stations and wastewater treatment plants.

Additional work will cost $900 million over 20 years, and projects have been ranked by priority, he said.

"We continue to be on schedule with that work," he said. "The rates are currently able to support that level of investment and the timeliness of the work."

Houghton said the project schedule is speeded up when necessary. But since many sewer components are linked and interdependent, they must be addressed in sequence rather than all at once, he said.

Council budget chairwoman Ann Kobayashi said it appeared that rates had been kept low so any cash-flow problems would be the responsibility of the mayor who replaces Harris when he leaves office at the end of the year.

Houghton said fees and debt payments have been set by good financial planning, but acknowledged that "we certainly have a defined increase in debt service that comes into play next year."

Bond payments are expected to rise from less than $40 million in 2005 to $60 million the next year, an increase of more than one-third, according to a report prepared by his department.

Harris' administration transferred $122 million in sewer service revenue from the sewer fund to the general treasury over the past three years to pay for other city projects and services.

Some council members call those shifts short-sighted in light of the major spending planned. Harris has defended the practice as simply paying back the general fund for sewer costs from years before a special fund was created to handle sewer-related money.

Reach Johnny Brannon at jbrannon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8070.