Audit: Garland’s wholesale wastewater agreements show metering gaps, late-fee losses and missed surcharges

Summary

An internal audit of Garland Water Utilities found unmetered flows, missed surcharges on excess pollutant loads, waived late fees that may have cost about $168,000, and gaps in sampling and calibration across multiple municipal customers; management proposed a mixed schedule of short-term fixes and contract renegotiations through 2027.

Garland’s Audit Committee on April 8 received a comprehensive internal-audit review of the city’s wholesale municipal wastewater agreements that identified multiple compliance and billing gaps, including unmetered flows for Richardson, missed late-payment penalties, missing surcharges for excess biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and total suspended solids (TSS), and inconsistent sampling and meter calibration practices.

Auditor Erin summarized the audit, which covered billing and operational records from October 2022 through November 2024, saying generally that “meter reading data used for billing was found to be accurate and most agreement requirements are being met by the parties with some exceptions described in this report.” The report noted about 9,600,000,000 gallons treated over the audit scope and about $28,000,000 in payments received.

Key findings included: - Richardson point of entry is unmetered. The auditor reported Garland has been using a flow estimate based on studies dating as far back as 1995 and recommended installing meters or commissioning a new flow study. The report noted growth in commercial development in Richardson since the most recent professional flow study in 2009 and warned this could lead to over- or undercharging. Management said Garland Water Utilities (GWU) has evaluated metering locations and is…

Audit: Garland’s wholesale wastewater agreements show metering gaps, late-fee losses and missed surcharges

Summary

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