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12.28.02 M.U.D. holds the line on rates, trims staff Thanks to the budget passed Friday, customers of the Metropolitan Utilities District will go another year without an increase in water rates or a change in the amount the utility charges them to provide natural gas. The M.U.D. board unanimously approved a $293 million budget for 2003 during a special meeting. The budget holds the line on rates even while the utility's customer base is rising and a number of costly projects require funding. Seven positions are being trimmed, through attrition or consolidation, from the 816-person staff. Spending will be cut or delayed where possible. For example, the utility will buy fewer new vehicles and computers than planned. Board member Mark Doyle complimented M.U.D. management on the work put into the budget. "No rate increases and a staff decrease," he said. "I know this doesn't come easy." The utility is in the midst of several major projects. It is changing the way it stores chlorine, altering the way it treats water, upgrading its customer information system and preparing to build a $300 million treatment plant and well field. The budget assumes that M.U.D. will get a long-awaited federal permit to begin the project -- setting aside about $14 million for it. The money would go toward design work, buying land near 216th and Q Streets for the plant, acquiring easements and laying pipe. The plant is expected to take about five years to bring online. Even though M.U.D.'s natural gas fees are not increasing, customers are paying more this year on their natural gas bills. That's because the weather has been colder than last year. Nationally, natural gas prices have been fluctuating. M.U.D. passes along to customers any increase or decrease in the amount it pays for natural gas. |
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