Athens City Council is now a step closer to funding improvements to the city’s wastewater treatment plant.
Athens will borrow a total of $19 million from local banks to complete the project, which will cost a total of $22 million, said City Auditor Kathy Hecht.
As a result, residents will see their utilities bills rise by a total of $11 during the next 20 years. These increases will be done incrementally and will be adjusted at the city’s discretion.
This would bring the cost of utilities to $30 a month for local residents.
Council members hope that discussing it before the raises will allow residents to prepare their budgets for the increase in costs.
In addition, city officials are in the process of drafting a letter to send to the city’s independent contractors to ensure that the city completed all their payments.
At a recent meeting of Ohio mayors, Mayor Paul Wiehl was made aware of cities that failed to pay independent contractors and were now facing mounting payments on interest rates.
“These are interests that are snowballing,” Wiehl said.
The inquiry into past payments could go back to 1997.
Hecht described a recent situation in which payments on interest had to be made back to 2005, seven extra years of interest.
Officials said those payments cannot be avoided and the city will have to pay back as far as the contracts go.
Similar to Athens, small cities throughout Ohio are looking back to ensure that there are no missing payments that are building interest.
bm471311@ohiou.edu
