bkibler@altoonamirror.com
For the second year in a row, the Altoona Water Authority isn’t raising rates after five consecutive years in which costs for authority customers went up.
Last year, the authority avoided a rate hike partly due to the benefits of a rate restructuring in December 2018 that moved the authority away from charges based on amounts of water used toward charges based on fixed costs like wages offsetting a long-term societal trend toward reduced water usage coupled with the imposition of a capital surcharge.
This year, there’s no need for an increase due partly to capital loans having been repaid for the water division and revenue from treating leachate from outside sources this year offsetting a deficit on the sewer side, according to controller Gina DeRubeis.