Mount Pleasant Waterworks customers will notice an increase in their monthly water and wastewater bill as the result of a 3.9% rate increase. The new rate will be reflected on monthly bills with water usage after July 1, 2007. The adjustment amounts to about a $1.61 increase for the average household using 5,000 gallons per month.

“The new rate is needed to fund rising energy and fuel costs, increased expense of materials, supplies, manpower and operations, replacement of aging pipes and equipment, and to invest in new technologies that keep drinking water and the environment clean and safe,” stated Commission Chairman Dr. Golightly.

The overall 3.9% rate increase is the result of a 5% rise in water and wastewater volumetric charges, respectively, with no change to the basic facility charge.

Even with the increase, MPW customers still enjoy the second lowest rates among regional water and wastewater utilities.

Impact Fees to increase January 1, 2008

To ensure that “growth pays for growth,” MPW Commissioners also approved raising impact fees charged to developers and builders by up to 37% effective January 1, 2008.

The impact fees will not exceed $2,000 for water and $4,500 for wastewater. The fees are used to fund additional treatment, capacity, storage, and distribution infrastructure. They protect existing MPW customers from the burden of paying for extra capacity demands caused by growth.

The Fiscal Year 2008 Budget was approved at the MPW Commission’s Annual Meeting June 18, 2007 after several months of budget meetings and public hearings.

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Mount Pleasant Waterworks Mission:

To serve our customers with affordable, reliable, safe, and clean water and wastewater, while protecting and preserving our resources.

Mount Pleasant Waterworks (MPW) is a publicly owned water and wastewater utility, governed by a Board of Commissioners that provides water and wastewater service to the Town of Mount Pleasant and area East of the Cooper River in Charleston County South Carolina. MPW’s water source is the Middendorf Aquifer, a large body of groundwater between 1,800 to 2,000 feet deep underneath Charleston, Dorchester and Berkeley counties. MPW treats the raw water using state of the art reverse osmosis (RO) technology. Supplemental water is purchased from Charleston Water System, which treats surface water collected from rivers and reservoirs. Mount Pleasant Waterworks employs 125 people and operates four water treatment plants and two wastewater treatment facilities.