Oldsmar officials are looking to save money by switching to county water, but worry that taste will be sacrificed.
By CATHERINE E. SHOICHET
Published October 18, 2004
OLDSMAR - Pinellas County's water might not please residents' palates as much as the stuff from St. Petersburg, but the price is right for their pocketbooks, city officials say.
Oldsmar would save more than $1.1-million over three years if it purchased all of its water from Pinellas County and stopped buying from St. Petersburg, according to city estimates. That would help hold down future rate increases for customers, officials say.
At a work session last week, the City Council advised staffers to negotiate the switch.
"It's worth it to go with Pinellas County because our residents are already complaining about high water bills," council member Suzanne Vale said at the meeting.
But several council members worried that water from St. Petersburg tastes better than the county's supply.
"I'm for saving the money, but, doggone, I hate to give up that St. Pete water," council member Janice Miller said.
Oldsmar public works director John Mulvihill said the average person can't tell the difference between water from St. Petersburg and water from the county.
Cost should be a more important factor than taste, he said, since residents drink only 10 percent of the water pumped into their homes. And the county's water quality has significantly improved in the past year, he said.
"If the taste is not what you like, I suggest you go to Publix and buy bottled water," he said.
Oldsmar now buys 70 percent of its water from St. Petersburg at a rate of $2.74 per thousand gallons. That water goes to residents and businesses south of Tampa Road.
Buildings north of Tampa Road receive water from Pinellas County, which the city buys at a rate of $2.09 per thousand gallons.
Currently, Oldsmar residents pay $23.34 per month for 4,000 gallons of water. Under any scenario, the cost of water is expected to go up over the next five years.
If the city continues to purchase the same amount of water from St. Petersburg and Pinellas County, rates are expected to increase about 26 percent by 2009. They likely will increase by 8.8 percent during that time if the city switches to buying water only from the county.
Oldsmar's contract with St. Petersburg ends in May 2005. But the current agreement requires two years' notice for termination, assistant city manager Marnie Burns said, so officials will have to negotiate a new agreement before switching to Pinellas County.
In a few years, city officials hope they won't need to worry about the cost of buying water outside Oldsmar.
At last week's work session, they also discussed plans to spend about $16-million building a reverse-osmosis water supply plant in the city.
Boyle Engineering is working with the city to create a preliminary design for the plant, which would use mesh membranes to filter brackish water pumped from underground. The new plant could be up and running by 2008.
Bryan Veith, an engineer from the company, told council members that plans were in the works to discharge the by-products from filtration into Safety Harbor Bay.
But before proceeding with plans, he said, the city must get approval to discharge there from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
In the meantime, Oldsmar will spend $475,000 in the next year to change its water infrastructure and construct a new pipeline for the water supply from Pinellas County.
Mayor Jerry Beverland said he and City Manager Bruce Haddock are already lobbying federal and state officials for grant money for the water supply project.
Lining up grants will be important. If the city gets grant money to cover half the cost of the project, residents would pay 15.4 percent more for water in 2009 than they do now. That's slightly more than the estimated rate increase they'll see if the city buys its water from Pinellas County.
But without grant money, water rates would be expected to rise by more than 37 percent by 2009.
In the long term, officials hope the plant would save residents money by giving the city more control over water rates. But there's no guarantee, since future water rates are difficult to predict.
"Anything we do is going to be a leap of faith," Beverland said.
* * * City officials expect water rates in Oldsmar to go up no matter where the city gets its water. Residents pay $23.34 cents per 4,000 gallons of water. The projected costs in 2009 under four scenarios:
* $25.38 (an 8.8 percent increase) if the city buys all its water from Pinellas County.* $26.94 (a 15.4 percent increase) if the city builds a water treatment plant and gets state or federal grants to cover half the cost.* $29.44 (a 26.2 percent increase) if the city buys water from Pinellas County and St. Petersburg.* $32.06 (a 37.4 percent increase) if the city builds a water treatment plant and gets no grant money to cover the cost.
