NORWAY – The Board of Selectmen has approved a sewer rate hike to offset a drop in water usage.

The increase will bring the rate from $3.23 per 100 cubic feet to $3.39 for Norway users, and from $4.52 to $4.74 for Oxford users.

Town Manager David Holt said the hike is due to a 12 percent reduction in water usage this past year.

“There was a big downswing in revenues,” he said.

Although the budget expenditures are generally down, Holt said the service that customers demand still has to be paid for.

According to information from the Norway wastewater budget, money for capital improvements stayed the same this year at $42,000, electrical use went down by $3,000 and the overall budget went down almost $4,000, but several items such as employee health insurance rose by about $3,000.

It’s “cruel,” Holt said of the fact that users are conserving, but rates have to go up. “We have to pay the bills no matter how much water we use.”

Information from the wastewater department shows that in fiscal year 2005-2006, a total of 10,543,100 cubic feet of wastewater was billed compared to last year’s 7,858,100 cubic feet.

“We’re spending less money. I don’t know what we can do,” he said of efforts to keep a rate hike down.

Holt said it is still important for users to conserve because those who do will pay less on their bills than those who do not.

About half the bill is based on consumption, the other half on a flat fee rate, he said.

Holt said a few years ago the board decided to go from a flat fee only because those who use less were paying the same rate as those who use much larger amounts, and some people felt that was unfair.

Now, Holt said, the only alternative is to go back to the flat rate.

“Unfortunately, when everyone conserves at the same time, we still have the same bills to pay,” Holt said.

[email protected]