For our

sixth public utilities sustainability committee hearing of the year.

Tonight we only have one presentation on the agenda.

However, I do want to give a brief update on where we are with the data center policy package.

We have been working on related to data centers and other large manufacturing uh operations.

You can find the most recent drafts on my council page.

You will notice that these drafts contain similar language released prior to our last hearing because we're still accepting feedback and making revisions.

Council often receives criticism for not giving enough time for feedback.

There was even some remarks made at our last hearing about the timing of the release of the updated drafts to alleviate any concern.

I want to reiterate the feedback window is still open.

You can email my age El Culturman to submit your thoughts to suggest the changes, our request a meeting to discuss with the team.

Her email C L Gulterman, G-O-L, T E R M-A-N at Columbus.gov.

And it is on the screen as well if you need to jot it down.

I want to acknowledge my colleagues for being here, Councilmember Ross and Vice Chair Reamy.

Any opening remarks from either one of you?

Vice Chair.

Thank you very much, Chair Weich, for convening today's hearing.

And for staying engaged in how Columbus's growth affects our public utilities.

We want to we want Columbus to continue attracting investment and creating jobs, but at the same time, when exceptionally large or unpredictable water demands require the city to build and maintain additional infrastructure.

So I want to give you credit, Chair Weich, for moving this conversation beyond general assurances and asking for a rate proposal that council and residents can evaluate in public.

As vice chair of this committee, I appreciate that leadership.

Growth should bring opportunities to Columbus without making reliable, affordable water service harder to maintain for the people who live here.

I also want to thank John Lee and the Columbus Water and Power Team for the analysis they have prepared today.

Today I'm interested in understanding how the proposed rates reflect actual infrastructure costs, how customers will be treated fairly, and what measurable benefits this approach could bring to residential ratepayers.

I look forward to the discussion.

So thank you very much, Chair.

No worries.

Thank you for being here and providing some remarks.

So tonight's presentation is an overview of Columbus Water and Power's proposal to establish a high demand surcharge for high volume peak water users.

The directive for the department was to create the surcharge was passed by council last month with the deadline of October 26th.

Deputy Director John Lee is here to present for Columbus Water Power.

Deputy Director, the floor is yours.

Good evening, Council members.

Tonight I'm going to walk through our proposed high-peaking, high demand surcharge.

And the purpose of this rate is pretty straightforward.

It's to more fairly recover the additional system capacity costs created by commercial customers whose water demand rises significantly above their normal usage.

So you'll hear me talking about capacity a lot during my presentation.

Not sure if you have the actual presentation before you.

Okay.

So the proposed surcharge that we've designed is going to recover those additional costs from the customers creating that additional demand.

On

the next slide, uh this graphic shows how the pieces work together.

So when a customer comes into the city, they pay a base capacity fee or a tap-in fee when they enter the system.

And this provides a baseline level of capacity.

Next, we have in green on number two the regular usage charge, which recovers the cost of normal ongoing usage and capacity.

Now we're looking

at

this high demand surcharge in the third column, as it only applies when a customer's demand substantially exceeds its normal level.

So more on capacity and capacity cost recovery.

I think just it's important distinction here.

Our existing capacity fee and the base water fee that I talked about already recover a normal level of capacity cost,

and

the high demand surcharge again is specifically intended to recover that additional capacity requirement created when a customer's demand significantly exceeds its normal pattern.

So we looked around and we looked at other utilities across the country.

That was part of the directive, part of the ordinances to survey what other customers and are experiencing, what other classes are out there.

So we reviewed other utilities that recover higher costs associated with high demand customers, and Prince William water is probably the closest comparison to Columbus, Ohio, while Loudoun and Austin use somewhat different structures.

The rate designs differ, but the underlying principle is the same across all of them.

Customers creating higher system capacity requirements should bear an appropriate share of those costs.

Next on this slide, this is the structure we are recommending.

So a customer would need to average at least 100 CCFs per month and have a peak month at least twice its average monthly usage.