Rocky Top raises water, sewer rates 3% as of July 1
Rocky Top water and sewer service customers will see increases of 3% on their bills they receive over the next few days for service in July as the city has raised the rates for the next fiscal year by that much.
The City Council approved increases of at least 2.5% each on water and sewer services as of July 1 during its June meeting, and said the actual amount would depend on the national consumer price index that was released on June 30.
City Manager Mike Ellis said Monday that the official CPI for June was determined to be 3%, which is then what the city used to adjust the water and sewer rates for the new fiscal year. The year began July 1 and runs through next June 30.
The increase was passed by way of an ordinance that was approved on second and final reading on June 20.
The vote was 3-0, with councilmembers Mack Bunch and Jeff Gilliam, along with Mayor Kerry Templin, approving the measure. Councilmembers Stacy Phillips
and Zack Green were absent.
A half-hour before the June 20 council meeting, the council held a public hearing on the proposed increases, but no one showed up to voice any opinions about them.
Ellis said at the time that the actual amount of the increases wouldn’t be determined until the federal government released the June CPI on the final day of the month.
The increases follow similar rises in water and sewer bills that took place last year as the city took steps to raise the rates to account for higher costs of providing water and sewer services that city officials believe are in line with consumer price increases in general.
These new rate increases were approved on first reading of Ordinance 587, passed by the City Council on a 4-1 vote during the council’s May 16 meeting.
Gilliam made the motion to approve the higher rates, and the motion was seconded by Phillips. Bunch and Templin voted “yes,” but Green cast the lone “no” vote.
Green was the only councilmember to vote against bigger water and sewer rate increases last year.
On Aug. 28, 2023, the council voted to raise water and sewer rates on average $30 to $50 a month for most customers beginning Oct. 1, 2023.
As with the first reading of that rate-increase ordinance on Aug. 17, 2023, the council voted 4-1 to raise the rates, after holding a public hearing that was attended by only one person besides the council and city staff.
Green, who was then also the only “no” vote on the ordinance, was also the only person to speak during the hearing in opposition to the rate increases.
“We live in an impoverished community,” he said at the time. “People can’t afford this.”
Templin has said the water and sewer rate increases are necessary to keep up with inflation, which is causing operating expenses to rise.
“This is not a significant increase,” Templin said before last year’s rate hikes. “But it is going to cost people more. It’s something we have to do to maintain the integrity of our
system.”
Green argued at the time that the increases were not based on any professional estimates, but only on the calculations of the city staff.
He had asked that the rate increases be delayed until outside consultants could determine how big they should be to keep the city’s water and sewer systems operating in the black.
“We don’t need to raise the rates more than they need to be,” he said.
Ellis told the council last August that the rates “will have to go up 6% again next year, too,” but with the ordinance passed June 20, the rate increases will actually be half of that.
Rocky Top had already been identified as having the highest water and sewer rates in the region, according to a study by the Clinton Utilities Board that was presented to the Anderson County Commission in 2022.
The city buys its fresh water from the Anderson County Water Authority, but distributes it through its own system to residential and commercial customers.
Rocky Top operates its own wastewater treatment plant and collection system, which is now in the middle of a major upgrade that is costing millions of dollars. Most of that is being paid from grants, however.