Park Falls paper mill. Image courtesy: WAOW TV
PARK FALLS, WI (WSAU-WAOW) – Residents in Park Falls could face a big water rate hike because of the closure of the paper mill.
Thursday, citing the state’s Public Service Commission which determines what a municipality must charge for its water utility rates, a press release says water rates would go up by 74.33% – almost entirely due to the loss of the paper milll as a customer.
Now the Mayor of Park Falls is speaking out. ‘We have tried to push the rates as low as we could with the PSC, initially they were talking about a 96% increase,” said Michael Bablick. “Now they’re proposing a 74% increase, that doesn’t sound like a win, but we are desperately trying to get this even lower.”
The proposed increase would only apply for the water portion of resident’s quarterly utility bill, which would equal roughly $75 per quarter for an average household.
When it was active, the Paper Mill used anywhere from 500,000-1.5 million gallons per day.
The cost to run the Utility plant remains the same, but without the largest customer, different sources of funding must be found.
“It seems sort of illogical because we are pumping less water, so there should be less cost,” Bablick said. “We would hope that if there’s a way to tier rates in over a 3-to-5-year period, that way there’s, not this massive change at once.”
There’s a city council meetings on July 5th at 6pm to discuss the utility increase. The Public Service Commission will hold their public hearing July 7.
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