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Solvang City Council to study water and sewer rates

By Dave Bemis/Managing Editor

The Solvang City Council has hired a consultant to study the city’s water and sewer fees and recommend any changes necessary to keep both systems financially sound.

NBS, a local-government consulting and engineering company with offices in San Francisco and Temecula, will be paid $40,000 for the study, which is expected to begin March 1 and be finished by mid-August.

The tentative schedule calls for a “kick-off meeting” with the City Council on March 8, a draft report by mid-May, a council workshop June 14 and a final report in the week of Aug. 16.

Bids from seven companies ranged from about $35,000 to $65,000, Public Works Director Tully Clifford said, but NBS was “the most comprehensive for the price.”

The study will not only help the city forecast what revenue will be needed to operate and improve its systems, Clifford said, but also make the language simpler and clarify why the city charges what it does.

The council has been approached by several business people over the last several months who have questioned the justification for sewer-connection fees, for example.

City officials believe the rates are fair but have not commissioned a rate study for nearly 20 years, Clifford added, so the new study seems overdue.

In other business Monday night, the council:

n Accepted the city’s independently audited comprehensive annual financial report for the fiscal year that ended June 30, and adopted mid-year budget revisions for the current year.

n Renewed the contract for independent auditor Terry Krieg, a CPA who has worked with the city for the past four years. The new three-year contract will pay Krieg $29,850 per year for the next three years, which is $2,000 per year less than he has been paid in the past.

n Renewed and amended the annual contract with the Salvador Orona family, which operates the horse-drawn Solvang Trolley, or Honen.

The new contract will allow the operators to sell promotional T-shirts and other commemorative merchandise and carry Danish costumes that tourists can put on over their clothes to have their pictures taken.

Orona told the council that his family needed the extra revenue sources because the fares charged for tourists to ride the trolley are not fully supporting the business.