Cambay water rates triple some residents’ bills

SARA MINOGUE

Renters in Cambridge Bay have signed a petition asking the town council to review a bylaw that doubled commercial water rates — and increased some tenants’ water bills by as much as $300 per month.

Six months ago, the hamlet passed a bylaw that raised the commercial water rate from $0.011 per litre to $0.023 per litre.

But the bylaw also revised the definition of a commercial user to include people renting apartments in commercial buildings. For those tenants, the cost of water has leapt from the old residential rate of $0.005 per litre to the new rate. That’s an increase of more than 300 per cent.

Several tenants who were previously being billed directly by the hamlet for water delivered to the individual tanks attached to their apartments, are now receiving their bills from their landlords, who are passing the increased costs directly down the line.

Charlie Lyall, the president of the Kitikmeot Inuit Association, which owns one of the multiplex units now being charged a commercial rate, is not happy.

“I wouldn’t have had a problem if they upped the rates 5 per cent across the board or whatever, but for them to single us out and put their rates up 300 per cent is disgusting,” Lyall said.

David General is a project manager with the Kitikmeot Corporation and one of the affected tenants who signed the petition.

General has been researching water rates around the territory. He believes that Cambridge Bay is the only hamlet where multiplex tenants who have their own water tank attached to their unit are being billed through their landlord, at a commercial rate.

“Basically, the tenant in a rental unit is now denied access to the residential subsidy,” General said.

According to General, that’s creating an inequity between apartment dwellers and homeowners.

In other communities, tenants are only billed through their landlord when they share a water tank with other tenants.

In Iqaluit, a water bylaw specifies that the end use of a building determines whether its tenants pay a commercial or residential rate. That means apartment dwellers always pay the residential rate, even if they happen to live in a building owned by a commercial enterprise.

Darren Flynn, the director of community development for the Government of Nunavut’s department of community and government services in Rankin Inlet, says his department will look into the situation, but cautions that the hamlet is free to set its own rates for its water delivery.

The water rates are not significantly higher than elsewhere in Nunavut, Flynn said, and are still heavily subsidized. The actual cost of delivering water in Cambridge Bay is $0.048 per litre, or twice as much as businesses are paying for their water.

“I do find it a little odd though,” Flynn said. “I know in any other situation where people are in multiplex units where they are responsible for water themselves personally, they would in fact get the private rate.”

Mayor Terry McCallum said the change was long overdue.

“This is the first time in 10 years since any changes were made,” McCallum said. “That said, it’s been six months and we will most likely review it.”

The new rates may be helping the hamlet to cut its deficit, but they have also contributed to an overall higher cost of living in Cambridge Bay.

“It all trickles down to the consumer,” General said.