City Of Bixby Announces Plans To Address Soaring Water Bills

Imagine getting your water bill and seeing your usage spiked by thousands of gallons and your bill more than doubled.

Wednesday, Bixby residents expressed their concerns with city leaders; Friday, the City announced initiatives to determine the cause of the high bills.

8/31/2016 Related Story: Bixby Residents Address City Leaders About Skyrocketing Water Bills

Water bill issues continue in Bixby as more people voice concern and skepticism over recently spiked water bills, but the city said it has a plan.

Glenn Morgan has only lived in Bixby since May. When he got his first water bill he said it was higher than he was used to, but his bill from July to August was even more.

Morgan: “An additional $100 on top of the previous bill.”
Marty: "Do you feel like you're using that much extra water?"
Morgan: "Absolutely not. No."

Other people in Bixby are seeing even higher bills. One issued Thursday showed almost $700 owed for the last two months.

"As long as somebody is willing to admit, 'Oh, we made a mistake and we're going to fix it,' then I'm good," Bixby resident Justin Tedesco said.

The City is checking to see if consumption, billing, or meter accuracy is the problem - all things requested by people in Bixby.

City manager Jared Cottle said, "Pulling those meters, having a third party test them to see how accurate they are."

The City is also making sure the bill software calculations are accurate, so they're checking by hand.

"I do believe it is the right direction, but I also think that they need to look at it, in a bigger picture," Morgan said.

Such as, is it cost effective for Bixby to continue to buy water from Tulsa - which increases the rate by seven percent each year - something Cottle said is also being looked into.

“How do our overall rates compare to those other communities that are also a purchased system," he said.

The City said it will have its reports done by September 22nd, which will include the meter test results as well as the manual bill calculations compared to the software calculations.