Glendale City Council postpones water rate discussion

A special meeting on water rates was postponed at the last minute Tuesday after City Council members said they weren’t given enough time to review a 50-page report on the potential changes.

“This is a tremendous amount of information,” said Councilman Frank Quintero. “It would have been nice to have a day or half a day or something to be able to absorb it.”

His sentiments were echoed by others on the council, which chose to reschedule the meeting. The City Council is in the process of reviewing a recommendation from the Glendale Water & Power Commission to adopt one of two options for rate increases that would differ per customer depending on how much water they use. The change could increase a single-family household’s bill by about a dollar or as much as $23, according to a city report.

Glendale Water & Power officials have said if rates are increased, the water side utility would run out of reserves in the next few years as the cost of imported water and operations increase and maintenance delayed by low revenues takes its toll.

The city upped water rates by 3.8% in December.