FORT SMITH – City utility customers who have lost water due to burst pipes in extreme weather conditions last month have the opportunity to lower their water and wastewater bills.
The board of directors unanimously voted Tuesday to authorize the Utilities Department to make one-time leak adjustments to these customers.
Utility company Lance McAvoy wrote in a memo to city administrator Carl Geffken that the temperature in the city was below freezing for several days in the week of February 14th. Customers have had power outages and disruptions in natural gas supplies resulting in some pipes frozen and bursting and some post-freeze leakage.
Customers with burst pipes are already facing repair costs and should not be penalized for a situation beyond their control, McAvoy said Tuesday. Offering leak adjustments helps prevent “double blows” to those already in financial distress.
Ward 3 city manager Lavon Morton said he would like McAvoy to accumulate the dollar amount of leak adjustments the department will be making. He thought it would be useful information for the board.
“And citizens should know that we did the right thing, in this case, that you … proposed to do the right thing, the city administration agreed and put it on the board and as a result people who just suffered from Broken pipes but all related things were done as best as possible by the city, “said Morton.
According to McAvoy, the Utilities division has around 37,000 residential, commercial and industrial customers. Around 27,000 to 30,000 are private customers.
McAvoy previously said the utilities department responded to 15 breaks on one of the city’s main routes from Feb.15-21. During this period, 805 work orders related to frozen pipes in structures were also answered.
Customers who have burst pipes and are seeking leak correction will be required to provide a plumber’s invoice or receipt stating that the leaking pipe has been repaired in accordance with the regulation. The adjustment of the customer bill is based on the average monthly water and wastewater consumption of the last six months compared to the measured water consumption in the billing period from February 11th to 17th.
“What we’re doing is we look at how your historical volume has been used and we will reduce your bill to that historical volume,” said McAvoy. “So let’s say your bill comes out and it’s 25 CCF [centum cubic feet] and in the past they only used 5, we would adjust that to 5 CCF and the 20, we would go with this being part of the result of the leak so they would have 20 CCF water adjustment and 20 CCF on their sewage bill setting . “
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