Undoing bad deal

County pays usurous water rates for Rossmore and Fenwood Gardens

Belleville residents pay between 64 cents and $1.39 for a cubic metre of water from their system. If you drive up with a tanker, you will pay $1.39 per cubic metre for water.

But for Prince Edward County—for the same water, from the same system— Belleville charges $3.30 per cubic metre of water supplied to Rossmore and Fenwood Gardens. They charge their neighbours in the County more than two and half times the rate they do for strangers trucking it who knows where.

Meanwhile, down the road, the County buys water from Quinte West to serve Carrying Place and Consecon at a rate of $1.02 per cubic metre—a third of the cost charged by Belleville.

It is a bad deal. And everyone knows it. Yet it may take a court fight to fix it.

The overcharging has been a sticking point between the two communities since Susan Turnbull took over as finance chief in 2009 and uncovered the outrageous bills the County was receiving from Belleville.

But city officials have been slow to rectify the issue.

Now County council and the mayor’s office are turning up the heat. Mayor Mertens has made a personal appeal to Belleville’s Mayor Neil Ellis. A delegation will speak to Belleville council in the coming weeks, seeking a better deal and greater capacity to serve the growing needs of Rossmore and Fenwood Gardens.

If Council doesn’t get relief there, Mertens hasn’t ruled out legal action against the city. Yet he remains optimistic that a negotiated settlement can and will be reached to end what he describes as basic unfairness.

Water users in Rossmore and Fenwood Gardens are protected, however, from Belleville’s inflated water rate. They pay $1.70 per cubic metre just as other water users in the County do. The overcharge is shared by all those who use municipal water and wastewater services.