West Yellowstone staff review SFE calculator, recommend holding sewer connection fee at $33.96 pending more data

Town staff presented an analysis of the town's single-family-equivalent (SFE) methodology at the Nov. 18 West Yellowstone Town Council work session and recommended keeping the current connection-fee schedule in place while gathering additional data.

A presenter explained that the SFE translates commercial water and sewer use into a common residential-equivalent unit. Using two approaches ' metered single-family residential records and dividing total town water production by assigned SFEs ' staff calculated a water-based SFE of about 150 gallons per day. The town's existing SFE calculator, driven by sewer-design assumptions, lists 225 gallons per day. The presenter said water-side measures are more reliable because they come from physical meter readings, while sewer-side figures can be affected by infiltration and inflow.

Staff examined a sample of 13 hotels and 10 restaurants tracked across two fiscal years. Hotels account for a large share of total water use (roughly 20% of town meter usage in the sample), and one hotel in particular showed abnormally high usage that staff said warrants follow-up. The 10 restaurants in the sample collectively used about 120 SFEs more than assigned by the calculator; one hotel accounted for about 60 SFEs of the system's reported overuse.

Finance staff outlined fiscal considerations. Sewer revenue rose from $1,528,486.43 in FY2024 to $1,725,399.73 in FY2025 (the town implemented the new SFE calculator during FY2024). Staff reported $13,437,869 drawn on wastewater-treatment bonds (out of $33,750,000 available) and said an additional $5,319,099 could be drawn soon. Because bond coverage rules (a 110% coverage requirement) and upcoming projects (an 80-acre development and lift-station work) could affect cash flow, staff recommended maintaining the current fee of $33.96 per SFE and performing another evaluation at the end of winter when more treatment-plant data and project numbers are available.

During public comment, a resident who operates a mixed-use building asked the council to consider equity within lodging types, noting that a flat laundry-service charge applied to her 19-bed building feels disproportionate compared with larger hotels. A council member also cited a long-term increase in treatment costs, noting a local per-gallon treatment cost cited in the meeting that rose from about $0.11 to $0.41 over a decade.

Council members asked staff to expand the dataset if feasible (one asked about five-year trends) and to be mindful that the shift to the current SFE calculator at the start of FY2024 complicates simple multi-year comparisons. Staff said they will follow up on the unusually high-using hotel and consider enlarging the sample before proposing any changes. The council did not change the fee schedule at the work session; staff will return with an updated analysis later in the winter.