Northgate gets fee increases

Published 9:44 pm Sunday, August 7, 2016

New Northgate subdivision residents can expect increases in fees charged for setting up water and sewer service, including taps, according to a city document.

The issue could be discussed during the Washington City Council’s meeting today.

A review of the city’s fees for water and sewer taps and water and sewer impact fees revealed those fees charged to provide water and sewer service to Northgate residents differ from any other residential development the city has helped develop, according to a memorandum from Frankie Buck, the city’s director of public works, to the mayor and council members. Buck presented the Northgate fees information to City Manager Bobby Roberson.

“Mr. Roberson recommended we inform the City Council that, effective August 09, 2016, that Northgate Subdivision would be charged at the same rate as all other subdivision developments within our jurisdiction,” Buck wrote in the memorandum. Buck wrote no action by the council is needed this time, adding information in the memorandum was provided to council members and the mayor should they receive questions about the increased fees for Northgate residents.

Currently, a residential customer pays a combined $2,720 in water tap, sewer tap, water tap impact and sewer tap impact fees. Impact fees are used to pay for infrastructure improvements, not for operating the water and sewer systems. Residential customers pay $800 for a water tap and $1,000 for a sewer tap. The impact fee for a residential water tap is $332. The impact fee for a residential sewer tap is $588.

The memorandum did not indicate how much the city had been charging Northgate to set up water and sewer service, including taps and impact fees.

In other business, the council could award a $93,001 contract to ACSM Inc. to manufacture and install signs for the first phase of the city’s wayfinding signage project. ACSM submitted a $45,125 bid for the second phase of the project.

The city has been pursuing its wayfinding program for several years. Currently, the city has about $150,000 available for the signs. The project will be done in phases.

The wayfinding strategies designed for Washington would improve traffic circulation (vehicles and pedestrians) in the city and direct visitor dollars to where they would have the most economic impact, according to city officials.

The council meets at 5:30 p.m. today in the Council Chambers in the Municipal Building, 102 E. Second St. To view the council’s agenda for a specific meeting, 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.

 

 

 

About Mike Voss

Mike Voss is the contributing editor at the Washington Daily News. He has a daughter and four grandchildren. Except for nearly six years he worked at the Free Lance-Star in Fredericksburg, Va., in the early to mid-1990s, he has been at the Daily News since April 1986.
Journalism awards:
• Pulitzer Prize for Meritorious Public Service, 1990.
• Society of Professional Journalists: Sigma Delta Chi Award, Bronze Medallion.
• Associated Press Managing Editors’ Public Service Award.
• Investigative Reporters & Editors’ Award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Public Service Award, 1989.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Investigative Reporting, 1990.
All those were for the articles he and Betty Gray wrote about the city’s contaminated water system in 1989-1990.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Investigative Reporting, 1991.
• North Carolina Press Association, Third Place, General News Reporting, 2005.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Lighter Columns, 2006.
Recently learned he will receive another award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Lighter Columns, 2010.
4. Lectured at or served on seminar panels at journalism schools at UNC-Chapel Hill, University of Maryland, Columbia University, Mary Washington University and Francis Marion University.

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