The fiscal 2008 budget Arlington County Manager Ron Carlee proposed earlier this week contains increases in fees for trash collection and water and sewer service, and has raised question about whether the county will establish a new utility service to deal with storm-water runoff.
These fees are increasing while the amount of real estate tax paid by residents should drop as real estate values deteriorate. Officials estimate the average Arlingtonian will pay about $85 less than he or she did last year in this tax.
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But if the budget goes forward as planned, increases in other fees will offset these savings to the taxpayer. Trash collection fees will likely rise by an average of $35 per house, while water and sewer fees are expected to go up by an average of $84 per house.
If approved, the water and sewer service fee would increase for the third consecutive year. Carlee has proposed a 15 percent jump, from $8 to $9.20 per 1,000 gallons of water used.
Arlington Finance Director Mark Schwartz said this increase will pay for improvements at the county’s sewage treatment plant. He said the increase would pay for needed repairs at the plant without raising money by issuing a bond.
“It’s a way to pay for capital improvements that we’ve started and are going to be doing over the next several years,” he said.
Trash collection fees are expected to go from about $260 to $295 per home. Schwartz attributed this increase to increased cost.
“We went out and rebid the contract and this is the best bid we came back with,” he said.
The budget also recommends an independent fund for storm-water management. In the past, the county had used money from a general fund to pay for improvements to the management system, but will now look into making storm water a utility.
“We need to move toward a system where we’re regularly maintaining storm-water pipes just as we do for water pipes and sewer pipes,” he said. “There are different ways of doing it, but one way is to treat it as a utility fund.”