Pittsfield city council discusses waste water plant, rates
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By BETH ZUMWALT
The Pittsfield waster water plant ran $200,000 in the red last year.
That information was given to Pittsfield city council members at the May 6 meeting.
“A lot of it is maintenance,” Gary Mendenhall, mayor of Pittsfield, said. “Pumps, motors, chemicals, they are all expensive.”
The waste water plant is more than 40 years old. Several years ago, the council, at that time, decided to contract out the running of the plant.
“They thought they were saving money,” Mendenhall said. “But, the company they contracted with did no maintenance. That is costing us now. It needs a lot of TLC (tender, loving care).”
The Pittsfield City Council operates its own gas, water and waste water departments.
“We need to run those like a business,” Mendenhall said. “We should not be using tax dollars to subsidize those departments. They should support themselves.”
Mendenhall said he felt borrowing money to replace the aging plant is out of the question, as the city is still paying on the water plant, constructed a few years ago.
Since a new plant is out of the question, the council is looking for ways to make the current one more profitable. Raising rates was the first option.
“We didn’t want to raise rates,” Mendenhall said. “But we change $7.95 for the first 2,000 gallons. Winchester charges $12.45, Chapin, $25, Rochester, $18.90, White Hall, $34.”
The council voted to raise Pittsfield city rates from $7.95 to $12.50 per month, per 2,000 gallons.
“That is an increase, but, we are still below several in our area,” Mendenhall said.
The council also heard that a new meter reading program is soon to be on-line for the city.
Currently the city has a meter reading system that runs on a radio frequency.
“A city employee has a device and he has to go to different points throughout the city and download the information coming from the meters. Then the employee would have to go to city hall and download all the information,” Mendenhall said. “The new one will transmit the meter information directly to the computers at city hall. The girls will be able to access it from their computers.”
Mendenhall said the gas and water department is down an employee and the city has resisted hiring a replacement right away.
“If this system works the way we think it will, we may not have to replace that employee because we won’t have one tied up several days a week, reading meters,” Mendenhall said.
The council also decided not to renew the contract with MakeMyMove, the company that was hired to attract more residents to Pittsfield.
“We didn’t not renew because it didn’t work,” Mendenhall said. “We got three to move here. Two bought houses and one is renting. But, we have a lot of other stuff we need to spend money on. There are several items of infrastructure we need to address and the streets and sidewalks near the high school need repair.”
Cost of the program was approximately $30,000 per year.
The council also approved the purchase of a new vehicle for the police department. A Dodge Durango has been purchased and should be in the fleet soon. Cost was $40,000.
The council also approved an application for The Dome, formerly Brewed, now under new ownership, for the city’s business incentive program. The program offers discounted utilities to new businesses for the first year of opening.
“We have had really good feedback from the program,” Mendenhall said. “Others who have used the program have said how it really helped them when they were just getting started.”
