Johnston, Iowa Discusses Creating Storm Water Utility

Johnston, Iowa City Council members have asked for more information about creating a storm water utility in the city.

According to a report in the Des Moines Register, the utility would allow the city to collect fees from the users of the utility to pay for storm water management. The utility would operate like the current water and sanitary sewer systems.

Currently, storm water management is primarily paid for through property taxes, said City Administrator Jim Sanders, meaning tax-exempt properties don't pay for the services provided.

Consulting engineer Bob Veenstra attended Tuesday's Johnston City Council work session to explain the function of a storm water utility. Veenstra has worked with many communities to explore a storm water utility, and Veenstra said officials in Clive, West Des Moines and Altoona are considering or are in the process of implementing storm water utilities. Cities including Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, Ames and Dubuque already have storm water utilities.

Veenstra said likely the earliest a storm water utility could be established in Johnston would be July 1, 2007. The City Council members at the meeting asked city staff to gather more information on a storm water utility, but said they would have to be convinced of the need before imposing a new fee.

"We've got a ways to go to make a case for the need," Dierenfeld said. A storm water utility would allow the city to collect fees based on storm water runoff rather than taxable value. Tax-exempt properties would then have to start paying a fee for the service.

If the city decides to implement a storm water utility, Veenstra said there are two different ways to set up the fees that would be collected. Veenstra said the city could use flat fees, where every property would be charged the same amount of money, or the city could use fees based on the impervious area of the property, which is the amount of material on the property that water runs off, such as rooftops or paving.

Even with impervious fees, a flat fee would be set for a typical house and then all nonresidential property owners would pay a fee based on the ratio of the impervious area of their property to that of the average house. Veenstra said it's about an equal split in Iowa over which fee structure is used, and although the flat fee hasn't been challenged in Iowa, it has been challenged in other states.

Veenstra said the average fee among cities for a single-family unit is about $2 to $3 per month for the utility and the bill would likely come with the water bill.

Part of the reason Johnston is considering a storm water utility is because the Environmental Protection Agency designated Johnston as a storm water phase II community, meaning the city has to implement a plan for monitoring and addressing storm water issues, a job that was previously done by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.

Source: DR