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Monona staff propose 20% sewer rate increase after sharp Madison Metro fee jumps
Summary
City staff recommended a 20% increase to Monona’s sanitary sewer rates, citing large, recent cost increases from the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District and a debt covenant that the utility’s revenues must meet; council heard the first reading and directed staff to return with more data before a vote.
Monona City Council heard a first reading of a resolution proposing a 20% increase in the city’s sanitary sewer rates, city staff said, to maintain required revenue coverage after large fee increases from the regional sewer authority.
Mark (staff member) told council the proposal is driven mainly by higher charges from the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District. “So what I’m recommending is a increase to the sewer rates of 20%,” he said. He added that the city faces a covenant tied to revenue bonds requiring that operating revenues (excluding depreciation) exceed 1.25 times the highest annual debt service.
The increase is intended to keep Monona in compliance with that covenant and to close an operating shortfall created when MMSD charges rose sharply in recent years. “We’ve had changed at basically 72% over those years, you know, average, about 8%,” Mark said, and he flagged a roughly double‑digit jump in one recent year as a concern for the city’s sewer fund.
Council members pressed staff on how MMSD calculates charges. Mark and other staff described MMSD’s billing as a hybrid of monitored flow at a handful of “quads” and customer usage, and said MMSD typically samples one week per quarter and applies that measurement to the quarter. “They take one week out of the quarter... I don’t think that is the whole average for the whole quarter,” Mark said, describing how a wet monitoring week can raise charges for the entire billing period.
Alder Rademacher said she understood the need to raise rates to meet obligations, but asked whether the city would continue to press MMSD for clearer methodology and better communication. Another council member said members of the Dane County Cities and Villages Association have raised the same concerns at that association’s meetings, and staff outlined a proposed two‑track response: a finance‑director workgroup to review MMSD’s financial assumptions and a technical group of public‑works directors to evaluate whether MMSD project claims (for example, that work was required by DNR standards) are valid.
Council did not vote on the rate change at the meeting. Staff said they will return with additional information — including a clearer description of MMSD’s billing formula and city usage data — before council votes on the proposed increase at a subsequent meeting. “The next meeting is to vote on the increase,” the mayor said.
Why it matters: a rate increase would raise household sewer bills and shore up the sewer fund so the city can meet debt covenants and pay MMSD charges; staff emphasized that MMSD charges make up the largest single operating cost in the city’s sewer utility budget.
Council request/direction: staff were asked to get the MMSD formula and more detailed usage figures and to continue coordination through the Dane County Cities and Villages Association. No formal motion or vote on the rate increase occurred at this meeting.
