At the April 1st Mayor & Council meeting (on April Fool’s Day, I know), we voted unanimously to establish a $50 system improvement fee for funding water and sewer infrastructure and sidewalks. It’s a direct cost for all of us, but it’s needed. I’ll explain my reasoning.
First, what it is: It’s a $50 fee that will show up as a line item on our property tax bill once a year. But it’s a flat fee that isn’t tied to property value, so it won’t shoot up if the value of our homes goes up. That’s important, since the rising tax that has come with rising property values has been difficult for some in Brunswick to keep up with, including many lifelong residents. This fee can only increase when the Council makes a difficult political decision to up it (and you know how to find us and tell us what you think if and when we do).
Out of the $50, $15 will go toward water infrastructure, $10 will go toward sewer infrastructure, and $25 will go toward sidewalk projects. There are currently 3,312 households and businesses in town that the fee would be billed to, so that means Brunswick will raise about $52k for water, $33k for sewer, and $83k for sidewalks each year. Out-of-town households on City water will pay the $15 water infrastructure portion only. There are 163 of them, so that’s another roughly $2,400 for water.
That isn’t big bucks in municipal terms. Major infrastructure projects like replacing the reservoir near Souder Road or the sludge press at the wastewater treatment plant will still rely on tap fees from developments and/or grants from the state or federal governments. But this fee will make a difference in upgrading the many smaller pieces of equipment that have a price tag in the tens of thousands and are just as vital for making our water and sewer system work effectively.
It’s also key for keeping the ball rolling on sidewalks. The City’s recent sidewalk projects have been funded by grant money, which we had a lot of in the years following covid. There is a lot less to go around now. The $83k from this fee may get us only a block or two (depending on engineering and design costs), but it’ll be reliable. Fingers crossed, we’ll also be getting roughly $140k yearly from a federal grant program that can be used on sidewalks. Predictable funding sources like that allow us to make deliberate, methodical progress on Brunswick’s sidewalk issues: slow but steady, a few blocks at a time.
If I’m going to vote to make us to pay anything more to government—whether it’s a fee, a tax, or a utility rate—there has to be a clear need and it has to be for something that’s appropriate for government to do. In this case, I felt that standard was met. Maintaining and building infrastructure are basic responsibilities of local government, the sort of thing we should be prioritizing. Water and sewer and sidewalks are Brunswick’s most pressing infrastructure needs at the moment. This fee makes sure that funds are reliably dedicated to those things, and it helps us keep on top of them so that a steeper fee increase is less likely to be needed down the road.
So, we may not be particularly happy when we fork over another fifty bucks to The Man (I won’t be, especially after coughing up for Uncle Sam and the ever-hungry Maryland taxman). But I believe it will be money well-spent.
You can read the ordinance establishing the fee on page 28 of the agenda for the April 1 meeting (page 46 for the resolution establishing it for out-of-town water customers). You can also see Mayor Brown’s column about it on page 3 of the March issue of the Brunswick News-Journal, or read the Frederick News-Post article that quotes several of us from the meeting. And, of course, you can watch the recording of the meeting here.