An out-of-state utility who recently acquired wastewater customers scattered throughout Lowndes County is asking the Public Service Commission to allow them to more than double the average monthly sewer bill.
Great River Utility Operating Company is a subsidiary of St. Louis-based Central States Water Resources. CSWR bought out Wilco Sewer and Water, which formerly served sewer customers in Lowndes, Oktibbeha and Desoto counties, on Dec. 31, 2021.
A letter, dated July 25, told Great River customers in Lowndes County that the utility is asking the Mississippi Public Service Commission to approve an increase in rates that would see the average bill go from $24.10 to $53.75.
According to the letter, the hike would hit customers in areas including Beersheba, First Colony, Thornton Estates, Labelle Estates, New Hope Gardens, New Hope Park, Lakeover, Sherwood Forest and Roanoke Estates in Lowndes County.
Because Great River is a rural water association, it falls under the purview of the PSC, which must review and approve its request to increase rates. Municipal water providers do not go through that process.
Great River spokesperson Aaron Perlut said the proposed rate increase would affect about 1,500 households in Lowndes County. The PSC required Great River to send out the notification letter to those customers.
“(The notification) represents the initial request made by Great River to the PSC,” Perlut wrote in an email to The Dispatch. “(The PSC) has a detailed and thorough auditing process to verify every component of Great River’s request, and then will make its independent finding at the conclusion of the process.”
The process includes an independent review of Great River’s request, said Northern District Public Service Commissioner Brandon Presley in a Facebook post.
“We intend on a full review before any decision is made,” he said. “We have also engaged an independent, third-party consultant to review financials and overall rates and revenues. The bottom line is that these rates cannot go into effect until the PSC rules on them, and that’s a ways off after much due diligence and investigation.”
That process will likely take at least 120 days.
Perlut said the rate hike is due to the cost of modernizing and improving the utilities that Great River has acquired.
“Most of the utilities we purchased were not well managed,” he said. “The prior owners lacked the technical, managerial and financial ability to make necessary plant investments to ensure regulatory compliance and provide safe, efficient and reliable service.”
Great River has hired licensed and experienced personnel to oversee the systems and “made investments necessary to significantly improve service,” Perlut said.
Affected users aren’t happy, starting with the fact that the letter didn’t give them a lot of time to respond to the proposed increase.
“They sent the letter July 25, and it said we had 20 days to petition against it,” said Jesse Lee, who lives in the Sherwood Forest subdivision. “We didn’t get the letter until last Thursday. Some people in our neighborhood are just getting letters now.”
The 20-day period referenced in the letter expired Sunday.
Lee said his family would feel the sting if the full amount requested was approved.
“It would be tremendous, with the price of groceries and everything else going up,” he said. “There are a lot of retirees out here, and that increase would be devastating to them.”
Ed Oakes, who also lives in Sherwood Forest, said he expected rates to go up, but not as much as the letter said.
“Just because they proposed it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen,” he said. “This is a clear case of someone asking for a pony and settling for a dog. I think they’re asking for a whole lot of money just so they can get some money, but not the entire amount.”
Both men said they had filed protests with the PSC, and that many of their neighbors had, too.
The PSC did not respond by press time to a request to provide the number of complaints it had received.
Shane Glasgow, who lives in Lakeover subdivision in New Hope, said he wasn’t going to fight the increase.
“For $600 a year, I’m not going to complain about them taking care of my poop,” he said. “If they stop taking it, then I’m going to be mad. … I’ve been there 19 years, and my toilet has never not flushed. If it doesn’t, I want to be able to call someone and tell them I want it fixed.”
Glasgow said such increases were just part of doing business.
“I’m not going to start no stink about something I don’t have any control over,” he said. “Ten years ago I was selling wallpaper for $20 a gallon, and it’s $39.99 right now. (Price increases) are everywhere. Why should we think sewer’s any different from that?”
Brian Jones is the local government reporter for Columbus and Lowndes County.
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