Clean Water Current

PHOENIX – Phoenix residents can expect to pay more for water next year, as the city is seeking a rate increase to prepare for drought conditions and fix old pipes and facilities.

“We’ve been planning for drought for decades, and so this isn’t really ‘Oh my gosh, we’re running out of water,’” Troy Hayes, Phoenix assistant water services director, told KTAR News 92.3 FM on Friday.

“It’s more of we need to put infrastructure in to make sure that we can move it to where we need it to be so that we’re secure for the foreseeable future.”

The city is proposing a 6 percent rate increase in 2019 and another 6 percent in 2020. A notice of intent for the increase will be filed in October, and the City Council is expected to vote on it Dec. 12.