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Regular City Council Meeting <br />June 16, 2003 <br />Page 8 <br /> <br />$50,000.00 reduction in cost that may be there or not, it means one cent on the <br />rate. Councilman Guest stated that the city only has 3 million dollars in operating <br />expenses to deal with to begin with, and if you reduce it 20% ,you still have not <br />reduced the water rate that many cents. <br /> <br />Councilwoman Neeley asked Mr. Stowe that when he was here before didn't he <br />tell Council that what was driving the rate increase was debt retirement, franchise <br />and utility cost. Mr. Stowe advised that the main driver is the debt for the <br />system and then the other thing here is the decline in water sales. <br /> <br />Mr. Stowe told the City Council that there is a project that is on the drawing <br />board for East Texas to West Texas. It is a pipeline that is going to run close to <br />here and as it develops and becomes public knowledge, he will be contacting the <br />City of Paris to see if there is an interest in selling raw water into that pipeline. <br /> <br />Councilman Bell asked if the city can live with what we have, with what the city <br />has going on, such as the water tower and the water lines, and if Mr. Stowe was <br />talking about doing it with more borrowed debt he was not for that at this point. <br />Manager Malone said there is a production study underway and part of that is to <br />identify any effect that mandates that the city has already received and know <br />what effect they will have on the city. He said when the city receives that data <br />they will be able to determine what the city's production capacity is, and will <br />know what they are already obligated to do under the existing contracts along <br />with knowing what people are asking for currently. The City Manger said the <br />City Council will have a decision to make. It may be that our capacity is <br />adequate for the present time and the city can expand these contracts and obligate <br />ourselves to sell more water. But if the study comes back that additions to the <br />plant have to be made in order to meet the mandates and to get the capacity at the <br />level that is needed to meet the obligations of the city, then council will need to <br />decide if they want to expend funds to increase the levels so the city can sell <br />water to Lamar County Water Supply. If you want to reduce the lost water <br />situation by replacing lines, the Council might want to issue debt. Those are <br />decisions that the Council has to make as staff furnishes them the data. City <br />Manager Malone said they have an up to date water master plan, but the <br /> <br /> <br />