Hewitt council reviews five-year water and wastewater rate history and options for updating cost-of-service study

At a workshop on Oct. 20, 2025, Hewitt city staff briefed the City Council on five years of water and wastewater rate changes, current utility finances and options for updating the water/wastewater cost-of-service study.

City staff member Thomas told the council the city adopted a multi-year rate plan beginning with a study completed in 2021 by consultant Dan Jackson of Willdan. Thomas said the plan’s incremental increases put the base charge for a 5/8-inch water meter(first 3,000 gallons) at $30 in October 2020 and proposed it be $35.25 by December 2025. He described volumetric increases of roughly $0.20 per 1,000 gallons on water tiers and sewer volumetric increases of about $0.15 to $0.20 per 1,000 gallons over the same period.

The presentation included utility operating results. Thomas said the water/wastewater utility posted net income "just over $617,000" for fiscal 2021, increased to roughly $878,000 after earlier rate increases, and rose to about $1.2 million for fiscal 2023 and to about $1.4 million and $1.5 million in subsequent years as rates continued. He also said the utility's balance sheet as of Sept. 30, 2025, showed roughly $5.5 million in unrestricted funds, but about $3,000,000 of that has already been committed for the Forest/Main lift-station project, reducing available reserves.

Thomas recommended council consider asking Dan Jackson to update the 2020-21 cost-of-service study with current data, observing the city paid roughly $25,000 for the original study and that an update "would not be as expensive." He said the update could re-evaluate the projected number of meters and customers, rates by meter size and whether additional volumetric tiers (for example, tiers above 12,000, 15,000, 20,000 or 30,000 gallons) should be added.

Councilmembers and the mayor asked about customer counts and usage breakdowns. Thomas said the city currently had about 6,471 water accounts and that the community had grown slightly faster than previously projected; he noted that roughly 4,000 of those accounts use more than 12,000 gallons in peak months, a fact several councilmembers said supports evaluating additional tiers. One councilmember asked for a table showing how many accounts fall into specific ranges (13,000–15,000, 15,000–20,000, etc.). Thomas said staff would provide that breakdown and other relevant pages from the 2020 study.

The council discussed wholesale purchases and regional supply. Thomas confirmed Hewitt purchases some water from the city of Waco and from Lorena; he noted the cost of purchased water and fixed contractual charges make purchases from Waco expensive relative to locally produced supply. He also referenced the Southern Trinity Groundwater Conservation District's limits on new allocations and recommended the city participate in regional planning efforts such as the Central Texas Water Alliance to avoid being "planned for" by outside decisions.

No ordinance or rate increase was adopted at the workshop. Thomas said staff could return with a cost estimate to update the study and with the requested account-level breakdowns to help the council decide whether to adopt the proposed December 2025 rate stage and whether to change tier thresholds.

The presentation and discussion were part of the council's workshop session; staff said written copies of the presentation and the prior Willdan study would be provided electronically to councilmembers.

Ending: If the council requests an updated study, staff said they would ask the consultant for a price and return with that estimate for the council to consider at a later meeting.