Colorado Springs residents are still using considerably less water than they did nine years ago, according to statistics that will be presented this afternoon to CSU’s Utilities Board.

Consumers used 31 percent less water this year than they did in 2001. That’s even more significant when you consider the fact that  temperatures in June were slightly higher than normal  and rainfall was only 15 percent of normal.

All told, CSU customers are using 1.9 million gallons less water than they did nine years ago. Recently, though, there has been an uptick in usage. During the month of June, consumers used 36 percent more water than they did last year.

Despite the lower-than-normal precipitation, CSU’s water reservoirs are in good shape and are at 96 percent capacity if firm storage and excess capacity storage are taken into account.

Salvageable material from six houses acquired by Colorado Springs Utilities in Pueblo West are going to be donated to Pueblo Habitat for Humanity.

The utility acquired the houses because of their proximity to the right-of-way  that will be needed for the Southern Delivery System, a 62-mile pipeline that will bring water from Pueblo Reservoir to Colorado Springs.

“We are very appreciative of how cooperative these property owners have been in the land acquisition process. They have all been great to work with. And now it is even more gratifying to see the materials from these homes reused for such a positive purpose,” John Fredell, SDS project director, stated in a press release. ”Habitat for Humanity is a wonderful organization and we view this as a great way to give back to the community.”

As each house is vacated, Pueblo Habitat for Humanity staff and volunteers will remove usable items such as appliances, garage doors, cabinets, light fixtures, sinks, toilets, blinds, curtains, as well as hardware from doors and cabinets.

Leonard Andrews, president of the Pueblo Habitat board of directors, said the arrangement is also a boon for the environment. “Often, materials from homes purchased for municipal construction projects end up in a landfill,” he stated.

According to the press release, construction on the pipeline is scheduled to begin in 2011. Currently, CSU officials and Bureau of Reclamation officials are trying to negotiate a long-term contract that would allow the SDS partners to store non-federal water in Pueblo Reservoir, which is part of a vast water collection system owned by the federal government that brings water from the West Slope to the East Slope.

Colorado Springs Utilities said that it contracted with Sigler Communications, a Denver PR firm, through a no-bid contract to more “efficiently manage the resources and costs required to obtain the final permitting for the project (SDS),  as well as to support land acquisition efforts.”

But it was also tasked to help craft messages, as well as message consistency for the Southern Delivery System, a 62-mile pipeline that will cost ratepayers $4 billion or more in the decades to come. You can read the entire contract here by clicking on the link:Sigler Contract.

Colorado Springs Utilities this week sent out its third notice this year that it’s reducing natural gas rates. But it’s important to point out that those reductions are actually refunds owed customers for the $20.6 million that the utility over-collected last winter.

The City Auditor’s Office noted in a March 17 report that the over-collection was due to colder-than-normal weather during the months of October, November and December. Natural gas prices were also lower than expected, contributing to the over-collection.

(Over-collections and under-collections are quite common in utilities because it’s difficult to forecast in advance the price of commodities, such as natural gas and coal, and it’s also impossible to forecast the weather).

Utility spokesman Dave Grossman said all the money owed customers should be returned by December.

Customers have seen their natural gas bills decline three times this year.  Bills  dropped by $8 on Jan. 1, 2010,  $2 in April, and  $3 in May.

Jerry Forte, chief operating officer for the city-owned Colorado Springs Utilities, has been awarded a total of $71,000 in bonuses.

The City Council, which acts as the utility’s governing board, evaluated his performance last month and in an 8-1 vote, the council concluded that in 2009 he had met or exceeded expectations on a variety of fronts, ranging from competitiveness to customer satisfaction.

Mayor Lionel Rivera cast the lone dissenting vote, arguing that one of the categories that Forte was evaluated upon  – called cash on hand – was higher than normal because of an $18 million stimulus grant that the Air Force Academy had secured to build a solar power facility.

The Air Force subsequently turned the funds over to CSU because it’s going to build the facility, Rivera said. Without the Air Force money, the cash-on-hand would have been less, which in turn would have lowered Forte’s score in that category, he explained.

Forte’s base salary in 2010 in is $276,750, said CSU spokesman Dave Grossman. The bonuses include a one-time annual payment of $31, 411, as well as a long-term incentive award of $39,852 that will be rolled into Forte’s supplemental executive retirement account, Grossman said.

Forte’s performance was evaluated in more than a dozen categories. He received high marks for keeping the utility financially sound, for encouraging volunteerism among employees, as well as maintaining reliable utility services.

But he received a “meet expectations” rating for keeping rates competitive. Residential rates and commercial rates were roughly 3.5 percent above the regional average, while industrial  rates were 11.42 percent below the regional average, the evaluation noted.

Forte, who oversees four separate utility services – electric, gas, water and waster – has an unusually complex job, said Grossman. “Most utility leaders need to be an expert in managing electric service. In Colorado Springs, the CEO needs not only electric expertise, but also needs to effectively run natural gas operations and deal with the complexities of providing water to a large city far from a major water source. Wastewater service provides a fourth level of knowledge and expertise that a Colorado Springs Utilities CEO must possess.”

As Colorado Springs Utilities prepares to embark on the construction of its billion-dollar Southern Delivery Pipeline, it’s worth noting that water usage has declined by nearly a quarter, or 7 billion gallons, from 2001 until 2009.

The reduced demand over the nine-year period is largely a result of customers  using less water on their lawns and gardens, said CSU spokesman Dave Grossman. Rebates on energy-efficient toilets, water restrictions and other factors also played into the tremendous conservation effort,  he said.

In 2001, customers used 30.3 billion gallons; in 2002, 27.4 billion gallons; in 2003, 24.4 gallons; in 2004, 23.5 billion gallons; 2005, 26.1 billion gallons; 2006, 26.2 billion gallons; 2007, 25.4 billion gallons; 2008, 27.5 billion gallons, 2009, 23.6 billion gallons.

The city population grew by roughly 40,000 people during the same period, which suggests that water savings per household was even greater.

Grossman said in the midst of the severe drought in 2002 and 2003, it looked like Utilities needed to bring SDS on as soon as possible and was hoping to have the project completed by 2007.

“However, due to the tremendous conservation efforts by our customers in the years that followed, we’ve been able to delay the need date of the project until 2016,” he said.

“Conservation has enabled us to defer these construction costs (and rate increases) for several years.”

But now the SDS bill is coming due. The muncipally-owned monopoly is set to raise rates by 12 percent annually from 2011 through 2016.

Those hikes will come on top of a nearly 50 percent increase that went into effect in 2009-2010.

Due to an unusually cold winter, Colorado Springs Utilities over-collected $20.6 million from its natural gas customers.

The city-owned utility has already begun refunding customers for that amount by reducing natural gas bills by roughly $2 a month beginning in April 1.

Spokesman David Grossman said the utility occasionally over-collects – and under-collects – on its gas bills  because the price for natural gas is based on some unpredictable factors, including the weather and customer usage.

The $20.6 million, which was described in a March 17 city auditor memo,  was “probably a larger amount that what is typical,” Grossman acknowledged. But on the other hand, natural gas prices were lower than what was typical  and customers were using more natural gas to heat their homes, he pointed out.

Mark Stutz, a spokesman for Xcel Energy, said it is not uncommon for the investor-owned utility to over-collect in the “eight figure range.” 

When that happens, Xcel also makes adjustments to customer accounts. “It’s the nature of the market,” he said. “You can’t predict the future.”

Colorado Springs Utilities is expected to raise water rates by 12 percent annually, beginning in 2011 and running through 2016, to pay for the Southern Delivery System .

But it’s worth pointing out that those hikes will be based on two  increases totaling nearly 50 percent that occurred in 2009 and 2010.

In 2009, Utilities raised water prices by 40.6 percent  to offset the huge drop in revenue that Utilities experienced when development charges paid by home builders and developers plummeted as a result of the economic recession and the slow-down in construction, says CSU spokesman Dave Grossman.

“For every 1,000 homes not built, there’s nearly $10 million in revenue that’s no longer coming in to help pay water expenses,” he said.

A 6.2 increase, which went into effect on Jan. 1 of this year, was needed to begin construction on SDS and for improvements to existing water infrastructure, Grossman added.

One of those improvements includes a new cover for the 50-year old Highline Reservoir on Mesa Road. The storage facilility is larger than a football field and the cover is expected to cost $8.6 million, he said.

The 12-percent annual increases related to SDS will be based on 2010 rates. When the compounding factor is taken into account, rates will double by 2016.

As one reader put it, “It seems to me  it’s a little like placing a lobster in cold water and bringing the water to a boil. We might not notice a doubling of our rate if done slowly.”

Utilities says basically the same thing  in a rate filing earlier this week. “Without a water rate phase-in, customers would see extraordinary rate increases in 2013 through 2015,” it said.

The filing, which is available on CSU’s Web site, goes into more detail about the planned costs for SDS and the rate hikes. According to the document, capitol expenditures on the pipeline will ramp up slowly, with the heaviest spending occurring in 2015 and 2016.

In 2011, Utilities plans to spend $14.7 million on SDS; in 2012, $30.8 million; 2013, $49.3 million; 2014, $70.5 million, 2015, $94.7 million and 2016, $123.5 million.

CSU’s Grossman emphasized the numbers are based on a lot of assumptions, such as inflation, the cost of construction, and regional partners who might help shoulder the load.

Water bills, he acknowledges, could go up or down.

Colorado Springs Utilities, the city-owned monopoly that supplies residents with gas, electricity, water and wastewater services, has told anti-tax advocate Douglas Bruce he’ll have to pay nearly $40,000 if he wants to restart water and wastewater services at seven rental properties.

Contending that the fees were almost tanamount to extortion, Bruce alleged that Utilities was imposing them because he was the proponent of Issue 300, a  measure approved by voters last fall that effectively abolished the city-owned Stormwater Enterprise.

“Just because you don’t like somebody, or he’s your political opponent, or he just beat you on Issue 300, you can’t charge him 400 times the going rate to turn on the valves,” Bruce said at the Utilities’ monthly board meeting last week.

Jerry Forte, the Utilities’ CEO, defended  the fees as reasonable. He said  whenever  owners abandon their property or disconnect from the system for a long period of time, other ratepayers have to pick up the costs.

Bruce said he has not abandoned his property and, in fact, was still paying utility fees on some parcels. “I haven’t left town. My yards are maintained. My property taxes are current.”

The fees, he said, were arbitrary and capricious and would not hold up to a legal challenge. “You’re planning to penalize me $40,000 because I’m your political adversary. There’s no way you can rationalize charging Douglas Bruce 400 times what you charge somebody else for turning on the water.”

Bruce is author of the 1992 Taxpayer Bill of Rights, which was approved by Colorado voters in 1992, and has restrained government growth.

In December, a month after voters approved Issue 300, Bruce sent a letter to Utilities asking to have an immediate turn-on and turn-off of water and wastewater services at seven rental properties in the city. He said he is willing to pay the standard $30 charges for each parcel, but asked Utilities not to actually put water in his lines because they had been blown out and were winterized.

Instead of fulfilling his request, Utilities officials sent him a letter saying his properties would be subject to some hefty reconnection and development charges. They were  as follows:

1)  839 E. Las Animas Street, a multifamily dwelling.  Utilities said the property last had water and wastewater service at that address  in 1998 and was deemed in abandoned in 2003.  The development charge was $26,032, but due to a rate change effective on Jan. 1, 2010, the cost would be $11,896. (Development charges are paid by developers and builders to hook into Utilities).

2) 2107 Preuss Road, a multi-family dwelling, which also had its last date of service in 1998 and was deemed abandoned by Utilities in 2003.  The development fee would also have been  $26,032, but the 2010 rate charge reduced the amount to $11,896.

3) 1326 W. Kiowa Street, a multi-family dwelling, last date of service in 1994 or earlier.  Development charge of $26,032, reduced to $11, 896,

4) 633 ½ Boulder St., cottage. Last date of service 2005, reconnection charge calculated at $752 and scheduled to increase to $783  in January 2010.

5) 2707 Monument St. Last date of service 2005.  Reconnection charge of $752, increasing to $783 in January 2010.

6) 2707 E. Monument St., rear.  Last date of service was 2006.  Reconnection charge calculated at $626 and would increase to $657 in January 2010.

7) 839 ½ E. Las Animas Street, rear.  Last date of service in 2002.  Reconnection charge is $752 and would increase to $783 in January 2010.

Bruce said the development fees amounted to placing  liens on his properties.  “I’m not going to spend $12,000 to rent an apartment for $500 a month. That’s crazy. You can’t let that practice stand and if you think you can, you’re going to find out you’re wrong.”

Patrice Quintero, a spokesperson for Colorado Springs Utilities, says the company’s getting a “high” number of calls from residents about their December gas bills.

Quintero said she, too, was personally caught off guard by her own utility bill and called Utilities to find out why it was so high. Some disbelieving customers have asked that Utilities to come out and take a second reading of their meters.

“We’ve been having extremely cold weather,” she said. “It’s easy to go over to the thermostat and bump it up.”

Colorado Springs Utilities began receiving inquiries from customers in November following October’s cold snap. Those calls, she said, have turned into a “deluge.”

Quintero didn’t have firm figures on the number of calls. CSU employees had the day off and no one was answering their cell phones, she said.

The solution: Turn down the thermostat when you go to work and put on a horse blanket when you come home.