JAY – Selectmen are in the discovery process of how the town should assess sewer user rates for 2008-09.

The rate is $210 a unit now. Enough money to cover the Sewer Department budget is added to the receipts from the tax levy.

Two selectmen attended a meeting with water district and sewer department representatives from Jay and Livermore Falls as well as town office staff from both towns and Jay Town Manager Ruth Marden to discuss assessing sewer rates through metered water use.

Jay’s sewer use rate has been climbing since the 1990s and continues to do so.

A year ago, Sewer Department Superintendent Mark Holt proposed a five-year plan that would incrementally increase user fees so that by fiscal 2011, sewer users would pay the whole cost of the operation and maintenance budget. That would result in bills of about $400 a unit, he said.

Statewide in 2004, owners of an average house in Maine paid $400 per unit annually, Holt said back then. Without taxes kicking in, a Jay property owner on town sewer would pay $608 per unit yearly, he had said.

Selectmen took no action on Holt’s multi-year plan last year but did agree to explore options of charging sewer fees by water use and the feasibility of setting up a five-year rotation cycle of pumping residents’ septic systems to compensate taxpayers who are not on public sewer but pay for it through taxation.

That exploration began Tuesday and it left those looking into the options, including select board Chairman Bill Harlow and Selectman Rick Simoneau, with more questions than answers, Harlow said.

There are about 800 sewer connections in Jay and about 800 to 1,000 septic systems in the town, Holt said.

Pearl Cook who has a septic system, and Paul Gilbert who has public sewer, spoke in favor of residents who use the sewer to pay for it by the amount of water used.

“We’re very careful with our water usage,” Gilbert said. He has a three-unit apartment building with two units vacant. He pays full price for the unit he and his wife live in and is abated half the sewer rate cost of the other two units because they’re vacant, Gilbert said.

He pays $420 a year for sewer and $275 for water, he said.

Holt estimated that Gilbert’s sewer rate would go up if it was based on water use.

“I don’t know if it would go up, down or stay the same but I would be in control,” Gilbert said.

Simoneau said he was surprised by what some of the sewer user fees would be.

“We’ve got to do some homework and try to keep it as even as possible,” Simoneau said of changing the method to pay for sewer use.

Simoneau said he was previously in favor of having user fees pay the cost of sewer use but hearing some of the figures, he wants to think about it more.

“We have to be careful,” Simoneau said.

Selectmen decided to get more information before they make a decision.