Hoover to hold second public meeting on potential sewer rate increases

The City of Hoover tonight is holding a second public meeting to discuss potential rate increases and long-term needs for the city’s sewer system.

The location of the meeting has been changed to the multipurpose room in the Health Sciences Building at Jefferson State Community College’s Shelby-Hoover campus. The building is on the corner of Valleydale Road and Jaguar Drive. The meeting is scheduled from 6-7:30 p.m.

Hoover’s sewer system, which serves about 4,500 residential customers and 200 commercial customers in the Riverchase, Inverness and Southlake communities, has not been taking in enough revenue to provide long-term support for the system’s future, city officials say.

Sewer rates have not increased since 2004, but need to be raised to keep the system functioning properly, City Administrator Allan Rice said.

Revenues are strong enough to pay for current operations, pay off debt obligations and provide positive cash flows, but the sewer system has had negative retained earnings since 2008, Chief Financial Officer Melinda Lopez said.

City leaders must figure out how they can fund needed capital projects for the sewer system, Mayor Frank Brocato said.

At tonight’s meeting, city officials will present findings from an engineering study by Goodwyn, Mills & Cawood that indicates the Hoover sewer system has $7.23 million in capital projects needed in the next five years.

City officials will also share a rate study done by utility consultant Jackson Thornton, which indicated Hoover’s sewer system needs about $6.5 million in revenue per year to get back on track and is currently $2.3 million short of that.

City leaders want to explain the situation directly to residents, answer questions and take comments about what people believe the city should do, Rice said.

City officials held their first public meeting on the matter at the Riverchase Country Club on June 21. Read more about that meeting here.