City of Fennville Utility Service Information
There have been many concerns raised on social media regarding the City of Fennville utility services, mostly regarding billing amounts and water quality. The City would like to provide our customers with a few facts about our services specifically related to many of those comments. Please do not hesitate to contact the City if you ever have any questions or concerns regarding your bill or services.
1. The City of Fennville bills for utilities quarterly. The typical read periods are December-March, March-June, June-September, and September-December. Reads are scheduled to occur around the 15th of the billing month, but can vary slightly due to scheduling.
2. The City bills usage per 1,000 gallons so many of the meters are programmed to read at even 1,000 numbers.
3. With a quarterly bill, it is important to remember that usage can vary significantly due to season. Specifically, summer usages tend to be more than winter usages for a number of factors some of which include watering/sprinkling, increased laundry, increased showers.
4. A meter is a mechanical piece of equipment. Typically when they “go bad” they slow down and stop. Age and wear does not cause a meter to speed up. Spontaneous increases in usage usually reflect an issue on the customer side of the meter such as a leak or faulty equipment.
5. Did you know that the average toilet uses 1.5 gallons of water per flush? Consider how much additional water would be used if it ran constantly or flushed too long for a three month period.
6. A rate increase went into effect on July 1st. The increases were 3% for water and 25% for sewer. The average customer saw an increase in their quarterly billing of approximately $22 or the equivalent of $7.33 month.
7. Water and Sewer rates fund the water and sewer services only including maintenance costs, supplies and infrastructure improvements. Water and sewer funds were not used for the purchase of the former Chemical Bank building.
8. The City of Fennville meets and/or exceeds all Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Michigan Department of Environmental, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE-formerly known as DEQ) requirements consistently. Each year we are required to issue a Water Quality Report to our customers. The 2019 report is available on our website at: http://www.fennville.com/Document%20Center/DPW/2019WaterQuality.pdf
9. Customers are welcome to schedule an appointment to tour our Water Treatment Facility or speak with staff about our water quality and treatment process. Please contact City Hall for more information.
10. The water and sewer rate increases are necessary to fund improvements to the infrastructure. The City is working on securing funding for over $7 Million worth of improvements during the next two years. Further, these rate increases set the foundation needed for further projects. If you are interested in seeing the City’s 10-year Infrastructure Capital Improvement Plan, please contact City Hall for more information.
City of Fennville
Amanda Morgan, City Administrator
amorgan@fennville.com
(269) 561-8321