FAIRFIELD — Town councilors are considering a sewer rate hike next year to overcome a drop in revenue that has left the town enterprise operating at a loss for the last three years.

At its meeting Wednesday, councilors appeared to be leaning toward an 8 percent rate increase, but they intend to hold a public hearing in April to gauge the public’s feeling about the plan.

The sewer enterprise has been losing money for the past three years, and the trend is projected to continue, according to Town Manager Joshua Reny.

Part of the decrease is the result of improvements at the Shawmut Dam that reduced the amount of water flowing into the Fairfield sewers. For several years, the dam, then owned by Nextera Energy, was the largest ratepayer in town, paying close to $40,000 a year in sewer bills, Reny said.

In recent years, however, revenue has decreased. In 2013, the town lost close to $12,600, and last year it was in the red more than $27,000. The projected loss for 2015 is almost $46,000, and almost $67,000 in 2016, according to figures from the Town Office.

“Our trajectory is bad right now,” he told the council.

At the same time, costs continue to increase, Reny noted. This year, the Fairfield sewer is expected to have to pay roughly $18,000 more to the Kennebec Sewage Treatment District in Waterville this year for sewage treatment, although Reny said he hopes that spike proves to be an anomaly.

While the sewer system’s substantial fund balance can cushion the losses for the moment, a rate increase needs to be considered to start recouping some of its revenue losses, he told the council.

An 8 percent increase would get the sewer system about $31,500 more in revenue next year, he told the council. That would still leave the town operating in the red, but it would give it a little more breathing room.

The town charges every one of its customers a quarterly fee of $47.50 for fixed costs and for the first 1,000 cubic feet of sewage they put into the system. After the initial allowance, users are charged $3 per 100 cubic feet used.

With an 8 percent increase, the smallest bills would increase to $51.30 a quarter and the rate above the minimum would increase to $3.80 per 100 cubic feet.

An 8 percent increase was the smallest scenario out of the four presented to the council by Reny. The largest is a proposal for a 15 percent increase.

The increase would be applied to the base rate in order to balance out the cost on the town’s users, Reny explained. There are 382 customers that use the minimum rate compared to 678 that use more than 1,000 cubic feet a quarter, he noted. If the increase were applied only to the per-cubic foot rate, it would cause the larger user’s bills to increase substantially, he said.

Council Chairman Robert Sezak said an 8 percent increase would give the town enough of a revenue boost to get it through, but the council would need to examine the issue again in another year or so to see whether another rate hike is necessary.

The council plans to hold a public hearing on the rate increase at its next meeting, on April 8.

Peter McGuire — 861-9239

pmcguire@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @PeteL_McGuire

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