HAMPTON SHALER WATER AUTHORITY RATES – THE BEST DEAL AROUND

SAM SCARFONE, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Recently, there have been quite a few stories in the news and on TV about the rising costs of both

sanitary sewer and drinking water rates. You may have quickly glanced at your own bill from HSWA and

thought that your HSWA water rates have gone up, too. That just is not the case.

As a convenience to our customers, the Authority provides sewer billing services to many of the

municipalities in which we provide public water service. Among those which we provide this service are

Shaler Township, Hampton Township, Etna Borough, Indiana Township, McCandless Township, O’Hara

Township, ALCOSAN and Girty’s Run Sewer Authority. These townships and sanitary authorities control

their own sewer rates and many have had significant rate increases over the past three years. For

example, in the last 3 years ALCOSAN’s sewer rates have increased 37%, O’Hara’s and Indiana’s sewer

rates have increased 29% and McCandless sewer rates increased by 15%. HSWA bills sewer services for

these municipalities and sanitary authorities and remits the revenue back to the respective agency.

Shown below is a sample HSWA bill:

“Water Consumption” billing is calculated in thousands of gallons, in this example this home used 9,000

gallons of water in this 2 month billing period. Their $33.93 is the extension of $3.77/1,000 gallons for

usage of 9,000 gallons. The $15.00 “Water Service Charge” is a base rate applied to each residential

home every 2 months. The “Sewer Consumption” line of $18.00 (at a rate of $2/1,000 gallons) goes to

Shaler Township for their sanitary sewer operations and maintenance, along with a similar base charge

of $6.32. Finally, the “ALCOSAN Consumption” charge of $47.97 is a pass-through rate of $5.33/1,000

gallons that goes directly to ALCOSAN, there is also a charge of $7.47 that is included in the amount

remitted to ALCOSAN.

When the Shaler Water Department and the Hampton Township Municipal Authority merged into the

Hampton Shaler Water Authority on January 1, 2012, the Authority’s Board of Director’s adopted the

Shaler Water rate structure. This rate was established by the Shaler Commissioners on January 1, 2008

and is still the water rate today. How many utilities or places of business can boast that their rates have

not gone up for 7 years? HSWA has the lowest water rates in southwestern Pennsylvania as illustrated

below.

Water Provider Cost for 15,000 gallons

per quarter Equivalent rate per

1,000 gallons

Hampton Shaler Water Authority $79.05 $5.27

Monroeville Water Authority $79.50 $5.30

Harrison Twp Water Authority $103.44 $6.90

Municipal Auth. Of Borough of West View

$104.04 $6.94

Municipal Auth. Of Robinson Twp $114.33 $7.62

Wilkinsburg-Penn Joint Authority $114.65 $7.64

Municipal Auth. Of Borough of Edgeworth

$119.70 $7.98

Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Auth. $121.24 $8.08

Fox Chapel Authority $125.26 $8.35

Municipal Auth. Of Westmoreland County

$131.55 $8.77

Pennsylvania American Water Company

$198.21 $13.21

When the merger occurred, the Authority Board of Director’s worked diligently to eliminate redundant

costs and maximize the efficiency of the organization. The main reason for the success of the Authority

is our excellent group of employees that are strongly dedicated to improving the overall operation of

HSWA – from our distribution crew that repairs water breaks in the dead of winter and replaces 1.25

miles of pipe year-round, to our water plant personnel that pump and treat 5 to 6 million gallons of

water a day from our underground aquifer, to our service crew that reads meters and marks One Calls

for upcoming construction projects, to our attentive and customer-friendly customer service staff at the

office.

Although the Authority will likely have to raise rates sometime in the future, rest assured the Board of

Directors and staff are committed to keeping them as low as possible, while still providing you the same

high level of service that you have come to expect from your water authority!