Baltimore city plans to continue hiking its water and sewer rates for the next three years, while also raising the so-called “rain tax,” in a first, to help pay for ongoing water infrastructure repairs.
According to an announcement today–which precedes a forthcoming unveiling of a bill from Council President Bernard C. “Jack” Young to introduce income-based water billing system–the three-year hike would raise Baltimoreans’ water rates by 9.9 percent annually through June 2022, and their sewer rates by 9 percent each year. The stormwater remediation fee (dubbed by some as the “rain tax”), which has gone unchanged in Baltimore City since its introduction in 2013, would also increase by 9 percent annually.
The increases would would piggyback off of an ongoing 33 percent rate increase from 2016 through next June. Baltimore City Department of Public Works spokesman Jeffrey Raymond said the agency plans to submit its proposed rate hikes to the Board of Estimates when it meets on Jan. 9, 2019.
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