Countywide : Water District May Add Tax, Hike Fees

Squeezed between a financially strapped Legislature and an ambitious building program of its own, the Calleguas Municipal Water District may impose a $10 parcel tax, increase fees for new construction and raise other levies, officials said Tuesday.

Those higher fees would be in addition to a parcel tax and a water rate increase imposed by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, from which Calleguas buys its water.

Calleguas in turn sells its water to 18 public and private water companies that serve nearly half a million county residents from Simi Valley to Oxnard. The local companies traditionally pass on to their customers rate increases from MWD and Calleguas.

The Calleguas board will consider the district’s bleak financial projections at tonight’s meeting, General Manager Don Kendall said.

Board members are not expected to take action at the meeting, which starts at 7:30 at Calleguas district offices, 2100 Olsen Road in Thousand Oaks.

The state Legislature last year took $1.3 million in property taxes it had previously allocated to Calleguas to help balance the state budget.

Kendall said Calleguas will need to make up that shortfall and more if it is going to proceed with a construction program that envisions spending $176 million by the year 2000.

District Controller Mary Jo Fischer said developer fees are another potential revenue source.

They have not been increased since 1981.

Developers pay Calleguas $940 for every new single-family home.