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Necessary city sewer repairs
justify rate increase

THE ISSUE Mayor Hannemann has called for a doubling of sewer fees in the next six years to pay for repairing the system.

MAYOR Hannemann promised during his campaign to focus on the basics, specifically filling potholes and fixing sewer lines. He has been quick to fulfill that promise, convincingly explaining that higher sewer fees will be needed to prevent future breakdowns carrying an even higher price tag. The mayor has properly called for ending city frills to accommodate that pressing need.

The previous city administration is largely responsible for the present problem. In his city-financed vanity book, "The Renaissance of Honolulu," Jeremy Harris wrote that his administration "entered into an agreement" with the Environmental Protection Agency in 1995 "on a 20-year plan for major upgrades to the island's wastewater treatment system," and "is on schedule with the EPA upgrade plan."

That was a nice way of saying that the EPA sued the city for its failure to meet federal sewer standards but agreed to a judicial consent decree for a plan requiring the city to meet those standards by 2015. Sewage spills are continuing at a high rate, and -- contrary to the former mayor's assertion -- the city has failed to meet a number of the decree's deadlines for new facilities. An additional lawsuit against the city because of sewage spills was filed last year by the Sierra Club and other environmental groups.

In his state-of-the-city address last month, Hannemann criticized the Harris administration for failing to raise sewer fees since 1994 to underwrite necessary improvements. "Instead," he said, "they chose to raid the sewer fund and transfer that money to the general fund to avoid having to raise property taxes." That, he added, has forced his administration to "play a frantic game of catch-up."

He proposes to increase sewer fees by 25 percent next year and 10 percent each of the following five years, doubling today's average sewer bill of $33 a month. That will be needed to raise the $231 million that Hannemann wants to spend on sewer upgrades in the fiscal year beginning July 1 and a total of $661 million in the next four years -- a yearly average of $165 million, more than double the annual amount over the past decade.

"If you don't spend money on maintenance, you have to pay money on replacement," Libby Stoddard, an engineer in the state Department of Health's Clean Water Branch, told the Star-Bulletin's Diana Leone. "You've got to pay sooner or later."

A clear picture of what will be needed awaits completion this spring of a comprehensive audit of the city's sewer system by a San Diego-based research and engineering firm. The audit should shed more light on the most economical way to fix the broken system.