City Adopts Loan Program For Sewer Hook Up In/Around: Airway Heights

Thu., Aug. 20, 1998

By Mike Prager mikeprager15@gmail.com (509) 459-5454

Airway Heights residents who want to hook up to the city’s new sewer system now have a way to finance their initial fees over five years.

The Airway Heights City Council voted unanimously in favor of a financing program for basic hookup fees during a meeting last month.

“I am sure a lot of people will take advantage of it,” said Dale Perry, mayor pro tem on the City Council.

Currently, residents are charged a basic hookup fee of $1,265. Businesses are charged $4,400 for hookup.

Under the city’s old program, those fees had to be paid over two years.

The new program allows sewer users to arrange a five-year loan package at an 8 percent annual interest rate.

Perry said the idea is to spread out payments to make sewer services more affordable. He said a citizens advisory committee recommended the loan program.

Under the five-year loans, monthly payments for hookup would be $25.95 a month for residences, compared with the current charge of $57.89 a month on the two-year repayment schedule.

For businesses, the fees would be $89.52 a month on the five-year loan, compared with $199.68 under the two-year program.

The hookup payments are in addition to monthly service charges, which are now $26.27 a month.

Perry said residents thinking about hooking up to the system would save money by doing it this year. Hookup fees are expected to increase by at least 7 percent to more than $1,300 in 1999 for residential users.

The City Council also has approved a fee designed to spur property owners to have sewers installed.

Residential properties will be charged a sewer availability fee of $10 a month beginning three months after sewers are ready for use near their properties. The fee for businesses will be $15 a month.

After one year, the city will begin collecting the regular monthly sewer charge of $26.27, even if landowners aren’t hooked up to the system.

The sewer trunks and lateral lines are being installed through a $1.7 million bond issue approved by voters in 1996.

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