Homeowners Call Water Tax Increase Hard to Swallow : Revenue: The rate for most homes would jump to $24 a year to help pay for a recycling plant. Critics say business and industry won’t be paying their fair share.

Regional water officials, moving forward with plans to finance a $180-million recycling project, gave tentative approval Wednesday to a tax hike decried by South Bay homeowners as a giveaway to the area’s large commercial and industrial users.

With little discussion, the West Basin Municipal Water District board of directors voted 5-0 to increase the district’s water standby charge, a property levy that affects about 800,000 water users. It will apply to residents and businesses in all South Bay communities but Torrance and Los Angeles, which do not buy water from West Basin.

Under the plan, the charge for most single-family homes and duplexes will jump to $24 annually. Condominiums, apartments, mobile homes, hotels and motels will be assessed $16 per unit each year. And the water district’s commercial and industrial customers will pay $120 per year for every parcel of one acre or less. Rates are now $10-a-year per acre for both residential and non-residential properties, with owners of parcels smaller than one acre paying the full $10.

By one estimate, the district’s largest customer, the huge Chevron USA oil refinery in El Segundo, would pay at least $50,000 a year for its water.

The higher levy, pending a final board vote next month, would take effect in July and be used to help pay off $180 million in bonds for a water recycling project. The project would treat waste water from the Hyperion sewage plant in Playa del Rey so that it can be sold to reclaimed water users ranging from golf courses to industrial plants.

The increase represents a compromise of sorts for West Basin, which in recent weeks has been buffeted by criticism for proposing a two-tiered charge of $30 and $120 for residential and non-residential parcels, respectively. That plan--and the water board’s vague public notice in January that a new tax would be considered--prompted an outcry from homeowner groups and Assemblyman Curtis Tucker Jr. (D-Inglewood), who accused the water district of “highway robbery.”

But after revising that plan, and tentatively adopting a measure Wednesday that lowers the hike for homeowners, the water board continued to face anger from critics who contend that its impact will be insignificant to the district’s largest customers: business and industry.

“It’s a total charade,” said Henry Porter Jr., president of the Southwest Community Assn., a Westmont neighborhood group that has spearheaded opposition to the water hikes.

“We want to pay our fair share for whatever services we get,” Porter said. “But dammit, we don’t want to pay a disproportionate share to protect companies that will benefit from these rates. And that’s the whole issue.”

Added Lee Dorsey, the association’s vice president: “After all the effort we put into this, they (district officials) went ahead and did what they wanted to do. And all they gave us was a $6 cut in the rate (hike). Big deal.”

For their part, water district officials continued to insist that the new property charge was aimed at accommodating residential customers who, even under the higher rate, will pay only 40% of the revenues while consuming 60% of the district’s water.

Indeed, district spokeswoman Sarann Kruse said the water board opted to approve the increase only after concluding that other tax formulas--including one based on water usage--were unworkable. Because water use can vary, she said, it can be an unpredictable revenue source for the district.

And that could increase the cost of the district’s water recycling project because the bond purchaser might charge higher interest rates if the district uses a revenue source that they consider less stable, she said.

“The board,” she said after Wednesday’s vote, “seems to feel comfortable that this (tax increase) is as fair as we can make it.”

But that position was immediately challenged by homeowners and Assemblyman Tucker’s office, which said it will push the water district to continue reviewing other options before its final vote on the hike.

“They are making progress . . . but based upon what we have heard, it is not enough and we are going to push for more,” said George Wiley, an aide to Tucker.

Noting that the district’s large commercial and industrial customers are receiving a “huge and reliable supply of water,” Wiley said he found it “amazing” that Chevron, for example, would not be assessed a much higher cost for its water supply.

“This (tax plan) is just a boon for them. They should be paying significantly more for what they are getting,” Wiley said.

Meantime, the Southwest Community Assn.’s Porter said his group and others from throughout the South Bay intend to move forward with a proposed referendum on the water rates, hoping to get voters to overturn the district’s action.

“These people are totally abusing their authority . . . so we want to take it to the voters,” he said.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------- ‘We want to pay our fair share for whatever services we get. But dammit, we don’t want to pay a disproportionate share to protect companies that will benefit from these rates.’

HENRY PORTER JR.

President, Southwest Community Assn.

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