St. Pete residents\u2019 water bills increased 6.25% \u2013 and 7.75% for wastewater \u2013 after City Council voted last September to raise the rates. Under the St. Pete Agile and Resistance (SPAR) program, that difference has been funding upgrades to aged and vulnerable water treatment facilities.<\/p>\n
Those vulnerabilities were underscored last year when 1.5 million gallons of untreated wastewater flooded the streets after Hurricane Helene.<\/p>\n
But even with the approved rate increase, some residents reported bills that far exceeded what the math should allow \u2013 exposing another underlying problem: faulty meters popped up like robbers skimming coin purses.<\/p>\n
To address the issue and create more transparency, the city is exploring advanced metering infrastructure that would automate readings and more accurately track water usage. In tandem, council is entertaining Bryant Miller Olive (BMO) to play a supporting legal role and help streamline the process.<\/p>\n
The reason the city is tapping BMO is that the bid received from Ameresco \u2013 a metering infrastructure company \u2013 was unsolicited, meaning the procurement falls under public-private partnership rules. For a project of this scale \u2013 affecting every public, commercial and residential property in the city \u2013 the statute has never been used before and was described by City Attorney Jacqueline Kovilaritch as \u201ccomplex.\u201d<\/p>\n
During the Feb. 5 council meeting, Mike Harting raised concerns about the statute\u2019s nuances, asking Kovilaritch from the dais: \u201cAre we headed into uncharted territory?\u201d<\/p>\n
The statute has been used in other jurisdictions, Kovilaritch assured, but it is a new process for St. Pete\u2019s law department. She added that \u201ccompeting priorities\u201d may slow the process or force the city to \u201cbump other projects,\u201d which is why bringing in outside expertise could speed things up.<\/p>\n
In a follow-up interview, Councilmember Brandi Gabbard told the Catalyst that working with BMO will \u201chelp us understand how to properly and legally navigate the vendor selection process.\u201d<\/p>\n
And as for replacing the meters, the city has been lagging a little behind. Pinellas County began implementing automated readers in Spring 2023 \u2013 a four-year project \u2013 authorizing Pedal Valves, Inc. as the contractor for both commercial and residential drinking and reclaimed water.<\/p>\n
\u201cAutomated metering has been something permeating our conversations for some time, especially after the hurricanes,\u201d Gabbard said during the Feb. 5 meeting. \u201cWhatever expediency looks like, I support it.\u201d<\/p>\n
And so did the entirety of City Council, who unanimously voted to approve the move.<\/p>\n
Following the vote, Kovilaritch\u2019s office will convene with BMO this week to review best practices and build a timeline for implementation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe city is long overdue for meter upgrades. But it\u2019s costly and time-consuming,\u201d Gabbard told the Catalyst. \u201cSo we\u2019ve been struggling to do this in a comprehensive way \u2013 staffing and budget has only allowed us to do this a little at a time.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter the storms last year,\u201d she added, \u201cit would have been much easier to manage if we had an automated system.\u201d Now, the long-overdue update is progressing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"St. Pete residents\u2019 water bills increased 6.25% \u2013 and 7.75% for wastewater \u2013 after City Council voted last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":149389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":{"0":"post-149388","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-st-petersburg","8":"tag-st-pete","9":"tag-st-pete-headlines","10":"tag-st-pete-news","11":"tag-st-petersburg","12":"tag-st-petersburg-headlines","13":"tag-st-petersburg-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/149389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}