City of Anacortes water bill is wrong

For the past nine years I have complained in writing about the way the City of Anacortes reconciles the amount of money its wholesale (regional) customers owe for water. Last month, Anacortes billed the Town of La Conner $444 for 2021 and $5,540 for 2022. The truth is that the City of Anacortes owes the Town of La Conner a total of $49,631.52 for both years. Counting O&M alone and considering both years, the city made a profit of $8,173,301 on water.

The accountant charged “Taxes and Assessments” to both Regional Expenses (RCC) and Admin Overhead (Per Ser) for both years. This should have been charged to Admin Overhead only, as shown under account 401.711.534.00.44 of the Expenditure Detail Reports.

There are four things wrong with the way Anacortes accounts for water:

Overhead is allocated to Regional at the rate of 81% for 2021 and 84.5% for 2022. It should have been 62.25% for 2021 and 65.67% for 2022.

According to the engineering firm that studied the water system, Customer Records should be allocated based on the number of accounts, not volume of water.

Regional should not be charged 48.8% of Distribution Labor cost. The Water Supply Agreement says that Regional ends at Sharpe’s Corner. Regional cannot be charged for distribution labor performed in Anacortes, where the distribution labor takes place.

Irrigation revenue from interdepartmental sales, contractors and farmers should be offset against the cost of Regional.

I have written to Anacortes’ mayor and city council and to La Conner’s mayor and town council. No one has responded. So, I wrote to the state auditor in Bellingham. It may be time to get an attorney.

Sincerely,

Dan O’Donnell

La Conner