Fees charged for these services are not considered taxes but rather user fees. These services are self-financed, meaning that all costs of operations are covered by user fees. For water and sewer, rates are established on a fixed and consumption cost formula that represents the infrastructure and operating costs.
New starting April 2024
On January 29, 2024, the Municipal Council voted in favor of a change regarding the fixed rates for drinking water and wastewater treatment to allow for a more fair distribution of costs, based on usage and impact on underground infrastructure.
Why?
The universal fixed rate applied to each property did not reflect the actual cost of each of the different categories of users on the infrastructure. Factors such as pipe size, meter size, water demand, and fire protection were not considered, making the model unfair and inequitable for all users in the Town of Hawkesbury.
The rates, which were initially evenly distributed between residential and commercial categories, will be adjusted to reflect these differences more fairly. This adjustment largely benefits the residential category, with over 5,300 units saving on their fixed rates. For commercial and industrial fixed rates, the calculation was established based on a multiplying factor as follows:
| Property Type | Multiplying factor |
| Residential, Multi-residential, and institutional properties | 1 |
| Commercial properties with a water meter less than 1.5" in circumference | 2 |
|
Commercial properties with a water meter 1.5" or larger in circumference, Restaurants, Dealerships or Repair services store |
4 |
| Schools | 8 |
| Industrial and Large-Scale Business Enterprises (10,000 Square Feet and above) | 14 |
What's the Impact?
According to the old billing model (combined drinking water and wastewater), the annual fixed rate would have been $405.00 in 2024. With this new adjustment, the residential annual fixed rate will be $380.00 for 2024, resulting in savings of $25.00. In total, over the next 5 years, residential properties will save approximately $230.00 on fixed drinking water and sanitary sewers rates according to the new model.
Other property categories will see increases in their fixed rates. However, the Town has decided to gradually phase-in the increase of this new model over 3 years. This will allow other property categories to adjust to this new reality, where the actual full increase will only take effect in 2026.
Increase model for a phased-in method based on property type
Dates to remember:
Billing is done quarterly in January, April, July and October
Year 2024
N_13-2024_fixing_the_rates_for_the_water_and_sewer_services.pdf
N_14-2024_to_impose_a_rate_for_the_collection_disposal_and_diversion_waste.pdf