WORCESTER COUNTY, Md. -- People in the county's north end are worried their quarterly water and sewer bills will skyrocket. Those fears came to a head at Tuesday's commissioner meeting.
One after another, neighbors walked up to the podium, confused at why a dramatic increase in their water and sewer rates was even on the table.
"We have a question in just two words: what happened?" asked Ron Sloan of Glen Riddle.
What happened is Worcester County is staring down a $2 million deficit.
"We have multiple service areas, and they are enterprise funds," said Weston Young, Worcester County's chief administrative officer. "The fees they generate are supposed to pay for the operations and capital improvements and a handful of those service areas are not paying for themselves."
Service Area: Estimated FY25 Operating Shortfall
- Assateague Point: $76,260
- Edgewater Acres: $16,688
- Landings: $278,032
- Lighthouse Sound: $10,744
- Mystic Harbour: $1,156,569
- Newark: $35,858
- Riddle Farm: $384,187
Total: $1,958,338
According to Young, developers built all of those treatment plants, which the county then took over.
The plants serving Glen Riddle and The Landings are two solid examples.
The plant in Glen Riddle has not worked since 2019, meaning that for the past five years, the wastewater has been pumped and then trucked to the Ocean Pines plant. That process can cost the county between $500,000 and $1 million yearly.
At The Landings, the county inherited a working plant, but the injection wells, which allow the plant to dispose of water, can only complete 1/3 of its requirements.
"Inflation has hit the chemical cost that runs things, many of the plants, you may have heard Newark was 50 years old, they're reaching their useful life," said Young.
With those older plants, finding parts when a unit breaks has become a challenge for the county. When it can find parts, supply chain issues have delayed delivery.
"That adds to cost, that adds to issues," said Young.
The county considered increasing rates to compensate for the projected shortfall in all those service areas. Young said the idea was to see how much they would need to raise rates to allow those areas to break even.
Potential Rate Increase: (Current/Proposed/Percent)
*Domestic Rates Only
Assateague Point: $179/$240/34.08%
- Edgewater Acres: $31.20/$61.67/97.66%
- Landings: $318.50/$627/96.86%
- Lighthouse Sound: $242/$268/9.7%
- Mystic Harbour: $243/$320/31.69%
- Newark: $240/$314/30.83%
- Riddle Farm: $288/$443/53.83%
Those increases are why neighbors like Ron Sloan from Glen Riddle attended Tuesday's meeting.
"Particularly people who are relying on social security and you get a couple thousand a month and suddenly, you know, you have another hundred dollars on top of what you're already paying, it's an economic impact," said Sloan. "It's hard to measure but people are expressing that they feel the pain ofthe potential of it."
The county transferred more than $9 million from its reserve fund to avoid increasing rates.
"What we did with the recent surplus from our last fiscal year is put a lot of that towards trying to right the wrongs," said Young.
Part of that money will go towards fixing systems, said Young.
After the lengthy public hearing on Tuesday, commissioners tabled the discussion to a work session.
Commissioners Chip Bertino and Eric Fiori stated before the public hearing that they have no intention of raising rates. Young doubled down on Thursday, telling us rates will not likely increase.
