Newport Water Customers will Get Billed Monthly

Newport Water customers will soon start getting bills monthly instead of quarterly, thanks to a recent change approved by the state Public Utilities Commission.

Earlier this year, the PUC approved Newport Water’s request for a rate increase effective July 1 to pay for debt service to construct the new Lawton Valley Water Treatment Plant and improvements the Station 1 Water Treatment Plant.

That increase, which the Newport Water Division said is the third and final series of increases to pay for debt service, will increase revenues by more than $3 million.

Along with approving the increase, the PUC approved Newport Water’s request to switch to monthly billing.

In a release, Newport Water said the July 2014 quarterly water bill will cover water usage from March through June and will be the last quarterly bill for customers.

The new water rates will be reflected in the bill going out in August. A portion of the bill will be prorated since some of the water usage will be from before the July 1 effective date.

As it stands, the water rate is $10.02 per 1,000 gallons for residential customers and $11.22 for non residential customers.

The wholesale cost charged to the Portsmouth Water and Fire District is $5.1507 per 1,000 gallons and Naval Station Newport will pay $6.5189 per 1,000 gallons.

You can find out more about the rate schedule and meter fees here.

The base charge on a monthly bill will be different than quarterly bills on account of being divided by 12 instead of four. Newport Water officials said the base charge is not being increased as a result of monthly billing.

Before switching to monthly billing for all customers, the water division had billed only 816 of its 14,546 customers monthly, according to a March filing before the PUC.