The rates for water and garbage pickup in the City of Yorkton are increasing.
The water rate will be increasing by 3.50 per cent, while the base rate will also increase by $3.50.
Aron Hershmiller Assistant Director of Environmental Services explained that the need for an increased rate comes down to the infrastructure gap that they are facing. Water mains are aging, and they need to increase the budget to the replacement program in order to keep on top of the problem.
Why does the city need to step up in replacing water mains? The city is facing a large quantity of breaks, and it’s increasing. In 2018, the city had to make 57 repairs, divided between water main breaks and service connection leaks. In ten and a half months of 2019, the city has already had to repair 56 breaks and service connection leaks – and that doesn’t include the two that occurred on the weekend. This is a dramatic increase from even 2015, where there were a total of 16 leaks repaired
Hershmiller noted that replacing water mains was cheaper than repairing leaking ones. As a result, they are going to use the increase in water bills to allow them to increase the budget for water main replacement to $700,000 from $550,000. The replacement schedule for water mains is currently on a 110 year turnover, the increase in budget will reduce that rate to an 85 year schedule. Hershmiller noted that their eventual goal is to have the water main replacement on a 55 year schedule.
The increases to the water bill will make the average bill for a household in the City of Yorkton $123.18. While not the lowest cost municipality in the province – that’s Weyburn, which has an average bill of $92.66 – it’s on the low end of municipalities in the province. It’s significantly lower than Humboldt, which has an average bill of $261.24, Warman, with an average bill of $232.56, and Melville, with an average bill of $215.35.
Councillor Randy Goulden noted that some of the municipalities with higher rates had contracted their water to SaskWater, and said that it has proven to be a smart move for Yorkton to keep it in-house to keep costs low.
Also going up is the rate for garbage pickup. The monthly rate will go from $10.65/month to $12.15/month for single family dwellings, and from $8.50/month to $9.75/month for multi-family dwellings. This will be the first increase in the garbage pickup rate since 2014.
While the environmental committee considered moving to a bi-weekly schedule for garbage pickup, they found this would not result in a significant saving for residents, explained Hershmiller, because many of the costs associated with garbage pickup are fixed costs and would not be reduced by a less frequent schedule. Many municipalities with a higher cost per pickup were the ones with bi-weekly garbage pickup, he explained.
