Sewer Service Rate Hike

Editor,

Looks like the Castro Valley Sanitary District (CVSan) wants to raise our sewer service rates by 14% over the next two years. I guess inflation is affecting our ability to use toilets as well as everything else we do nowadays. CVSan is using the majority of the Sewer Service Rates to fund its new Headquarters Building at Center Street.

CVSan has stated that it “has budgeted funds during the next two-year budget cycle for major wastewater Capital improvement projects to operations, treatment plant, underground pipelines, pump stations, and discharge facilities. CVSan will spend approximately $27 million in this two-year budget cycle. 80 percent ($22 million) of the capital improvement project costs is to fund a new Headquarters building at Center Street.” (Proposition 218 Notice)  Debt service on the 30-year bonds CVSan is contemplating for the Headquarters Building is going to be around $1 million per year. Thus, over the next two years, $4 million of the budget is going to salaries and benefits for its employees, $2 million for bond debt service, which leaves ZERO for capital improvement projects. Instead of replacing its dilapidated sewer system, CVSan seems more focused on preserving its own self-interests instead of those of its ratepayers.   

The 14% rate increases will also apply to all Castro Valley Businesses and Castro Valley Institutions such as Churches, Nursing/Care Homes, Schools, and Eden Hospital (current rate of $82,00 per year going to over $94,000 per year in 2024). Needless to say that the local businesses will raise their prices to cover the added Sewer Service Charge. Inflation can be felt everywhere and CVSan is one of the major reasons for it.

                –Ken Owen, Castro Valley