Frustrated by high water bills, Washougal residents demand action

Randall Crane initially shrugged off warnings from his neighbors about his water bills when he relocated to Washougal from Battle Ground in 2017. “I only moved 15 miles,” he told himself. “It can’t be that bad.”

It was that bad, as things turned out — his first few bills were “noticeably higher” than they were in his previous city. But as the number on his bill continued to steadily increase during the next few years, Crane discovered that he wasn’t dealing with an isolated issue, such as a leak or increased water usage. Almost everyone he talked to was experiencing the same thing.

“My neighbors that just recently moved right behind me literally have ‘supercars’ — a Lamborghini and an Aston Martin,” Crane said. “I was talking to (one of them), and he’s like, ‘I always drive my car over to my shop in (Vancouver) to give it a wash because I can’t afford the water out here.’ I was like, ‘Dude, you drive a $300,000 car, and you can’t wash it at your house because you can’t afford the water?'”

That’s just one of many anecdotes that spurred Crane to launch a community effort that’s demanding “fair” utility rates and billing practices from the city of Washougal, which has received many complaints during the past several years about excessively high bills for water, stormwater and sewer services.

“I don’t know what the answer is, but I feel like (the city) can do something,” Crane said. “I mean, just saying, ‘Your water bill $700, tough luck,’ that’s not realistic. When you go to buy a car, it’s like, ‘Well, I can’t afford the Mercedes, so I’m going to go look at the Kia.’ With water, (there is no other less-expensive option). You either pay (the bill) or they’ll turn your water off.”

Washougal City Manager David Scott admitted that data shows that “our rates for some users are higher than in other (Clark County) communities.”

“This is a very important issue to the Council and me,” Scott said. “We are engaged in a serious and rigorous process to evaluate what our options are because we’re certainly aware of the concerns. We want to mitigate them as best we can, but we also have to make sure that we have viable and functional utility.”

Crane created a Facebook page emphasizing: “Washougal water — We need answers! Stand up and fight,” which quickly drew more than 200 “likes” and a petition that, as of Feb. 6, had 299 signatures.

“I’m going to do a really, really hard push on the Facebook page and the petition and try to get them out to as many people in Washougal as I possibly can,” he said. “Mainly, I want to see where this petition goes, because 300 signatures is cool now, but if it’s at 3,000, that’s a much stronger platform to stand on. The city can’t really say ‘tough luck’ when there’s a force of 3,000 people standing behind you.”

The current utility rates, adopted by the Washougal City Council in 2018, will remain in place through 2023. The average water rate in Washougal is $40.38, according to the city of Vancouver website. Rates for other cities in Clark County are between $23 and $31.

Scott said that in general, a variety of factors, including a city’s topographical dynamics, size and composition of customer base, methods for providing and treating its water, rate policies, and number of federally-funded improvements that a city has to make, can have a significant impact on utility rates.

“It’s very difficult to compare one community’s utility rates to another community’s utility rates because utility services are not cookie-cutter,” Scott said. “There are many, many variables involved that can greatly differ between communities, even those that are right next to each other. It’s difficult to be able to say that one community’s rates are unreasonable versus another community’s rates.”

Scott said that Washougal’s utility rates are primarily impacted by costs associated with the City’s wastewater treatment facility, debt service and bond covenant cash reserves.

“The treatment facility itself is the most significant expense for a sewer system,” he said. “When I showed up here in 2010, I was told at one of the first meetings that we have to make multimillion-dollar upgrades to our treatment plant and that (the upgrades are) going to put pressure on our rates. That process is still in place. In 2012 and 2013, there was a significant project to meet some required mandates to our wastewater treatment plant, and those (upgrades) were accomplished, and we had to issue debt to pay for them. And we have had some projects in water and in stormwater, at a smaller scale, that had some effect on the rates.

“And the debt service, it’s basically like taking out a loan,” he continued. “We issued bonds, and the utility revenue from fees that new development pays, it pays off that debt every year. And when you have that debt, people buy those municipal bonds, and there’s underwriting that happens, so you have to maintain certain cash reserves according to bond covenants so that there’s a guarantee that you’ll be able to make your payments if there’s any issues, and that has an impact on the rate.”

Meanwhile, low-income, unemployed, retired, and middle-class residents “find themselves in a battle between necessities like food, medication and living expenses, or choosing to have running water,” according to Crane’s petition.

“I just got laid off (earlier this month) — completely out of my control,” Crane said. “And to be perfectly honest, I’m not worried about my mortgage. I’m worried about how (I’m going to pay) my water bill. I’m hearing stories from people who say they’re essentially being dehumanized for wanting to take a bath. It’s just crazy to me. I would flush my toilet (only) at the end of the day because I didn’t want my (costs to go up). It sounds stupid, but if you flush the toilet six times a day, the next thing you know, your water bill is $700.”

Residents have also reported that the City refuses to mediate their bills or establish billing practices that allow for multiple payments over time, according to Crane.

“One of my neighbors happened to be out of work (during the pandemic), and she got a $650 water bill,” he said. “She called the City and didn’t even try to contest it. She said, ‘I can’t afford it right now. I just lost my job. Do you have an easy-pay plan? What can we do?’ And she was told, ‘You have 30 days to pay it or we’ll turn your water off.’ They’re screwing people, but they (also) don’t want to work with people.”

Scott said that the City can make “special arrangements” for bill payers in “unique circumstances,” but admitted those circumstances are “few and far between.”

“There is a built-in 30-day period between when a bill prints and when the payment is due, and that is of course available to all customers,” he said. “There is also a universally available ‘payment arrangement’ available to all customers for an additional 30 days to pay. However, we need to hear from a customer that they need the additional 30 days before the routine first 30 days has transpired.

“We will also consider a ‘special payment arrangement’ for unique circumstances. One such scenario is a significant water leak. We do a leak adjustment; however, that could still leave a large balance due if the leak was significant. We will work out an arrangement in such a situation.”

City officials have also repeatedly ignored inquiries and “cries for help,” Crane said.

“I tried to engage with the city of Washougal and got shut down,” he added. “(City employees) just give you their pre-scripted responses that don’t actually answer any questions. I got excuses from (former Mayor Rochelle Ramos) — ‘Well, we can’t (lower rates) because of this and because of that.’ Once Rochelle left, I tried reaching out to the new mayor (David Stuebe), and he wouldn’t respond to emails (until recently). There seems to be a lot of, ‘We know you’re getting screwed on your water bill, but we don’t want to talk about it and we don’t want to argue with you about it.’ It just seems like they’re kicking it down the road and pointing fingers at everybody else.”

In 2021, the City Council approved a contract with FCS Group, a Redmond, Washington-based consulting firm, to analyze the city’s utility rates. The study will evaluate utility revenue requirements; recommend rates necessary to fund the city’s water, wastewater and stormwater systems from 2023 to 2028; provide a comparison of current water, wastewater and stormwater system costs and operations against industry benchmarks; and develop and execute a plan for communicating information about utility costs, financing and funding, operations, rate structure, and rate changes to customers throughout the process.

As part of that effort, the City has put together an eight-member citizens advisory committee “representing a cross-section of customers which will serve as a sounding board throughout the study and be involved in the review and analysis of the options,” according to Scott.

“It includes residents of our community that pay the rates, just like all the rest of us that live here,” he said. “It’s a really great group. They already had their first meeting, and they’re going to meet probably five or six (more) times. We are planning an open house-slash-town hall type (event) in the June-ish timeframe, and we’re hopeful that the committee would have a significant role in that. There’s going to be some significant information being shared, and our citizen advisory committee is going to be doing some really important work in evaluating information and different options and making recommendations to our council later in the year.”

A small group of Washougal residents gathered in front of City Hall in October 2020 to protest the utility rates and demand answers, just like Crane is doing now. Group leaders said at the time that they wanted to let City leaders know that “they (weren’t) just going to roll over,” and hoped to organize additional activities and events to spur change.

Nothing ultimately came from that effort. Crane is approaching the issue differently, however.

“(The previous effort) started out and people were pissed, and then it kind of fizzled out from there,” he said. “I’m trying to kind of do the reverse of that, where I have everybody behind me (from the start), and we can eventually go in there and make all of our voices heard. People remember the 2020 (effort), and they’re like, ‘Nothing happened, so what’s the point?’ I’m trying to beat that fence down and get people motivated. I keep telling people, ‘I don’t have all the answers, but I’m the guy that is bored enough to find the answers.’ I don’t really care who I piss off in the meantime. I’ll either go until I can’t (go anymore) or until I get results.”

The “Washougal water — We need answers! Stand up and fight” Facebook page can be viewed at facebook.com/groups/1267163374128206. Crane’s petition can be viewed at change.org/p/stop-excessive-utility-rates-in-washougal-wa.