Washington’s City Council, during its meeting Monday, revised the fee schedule for the city’s docks along the Stewart Parkway promenade.

The vote to make the change was unanimous, but council members will revisit the issue in January 2016.

“I’m going to give you guys a year,” Councilman Bobby Roberson told Fred Watkins, a member of the city’s Waterfront Docks Advisory Committee, which provided input on the proposed fee changes and recommended the council adopt the new fee schedule. The committee and city’s dockmaster reviewed the fees charged by 10 marinas in eastern North Carolina over several months and compared those charges to Washington’s fees. As part of the management plan for the city docks, the first goal is to make the city docks as self-sustaining as possible.

Councilman Doug Mercer expressed concern that the new fee schedule could result in the city losing revenue.

The city is going, basically, to a per-foot rate when it comes to renting boat slips and docking space to be more competitive with other places that offer those services, Watkins said last month. Also, the city will now charge boaters for the electricity they use.

Under the changes, boaters using the docks pay $20 a month for 30-amp service (single) or $50 a month for 50-amp service (single). Currently, no fee is charged for power usage. Also under the proposal, fees for renting boat slips at the T docks would decrease for some boats (small) but increase for other (large) boats.

“If you’ve got a 26-foot boat, you’re charged the same as if you had a 45-foot boat. So, what we’re trying to do is make it a little more equitable, to try to get some more boats in our docks and see if we can’t make a little more profit,” said John Rodman, the city’s director of community and cultural services.

Mercer said that as he “sees it, it constitutes a decrease in potential revenue from the docks.”

“I understand the rationale that says, well, if we lower the rates we’re going to fill up the docks. We don’t know that’s going to happen. If we keep the same rates, we may fill up the docks anyway,” Mercer said.

“Well, it’s apparent to me, in the past we’ve never had full occupancy of the 36 boat slips. So, what I’m looking for is maybe we need to look at some alternative techniques. … I’m willing to actually take a look at it and see if we can’t get maybe 24 or 25 boat slips. I don’t know until we try it,” Roberson said.

Councilman Richard Brooks asked if the council could revisit the fee schedule should that need arise. City staff assured him that the council could do that.

(Detailed information about the fee changes may be obtained by contacting the city manager’s office or reviewing the agenda for the council’s Jan. 12 meeting. To view that agenda, visit the city’s web­site at www.washingtonnc.gov, click “Government” then “City Council” heading, then click “Meeting Agendas” on the menu to the right. Then click on the date for the appropriate agenda.)