The Maine Department of Transportation bears some responsibility for the Buckfield Village Corporation’s rapidly escalating water rates. The corporation’s weary water customers learned recently they may soon be paying twice the state average, and, quite possibly, the most in the nation, for clean drinking water.

If another rate increase, needed to cover the water district’s debt payments on about $1.4 million, is approved by the Maine Public Utilities Commission, many of the district’s 179 customers will be facing water bills as high as $615 a year.

That’s a lot. It’s twice the state average and comparable to some of the most expensive water districts in the nation, including parts of the thirsty Southwest.

In water-rich Maine, this is a sham and a shame.

How the district’s high rates and MDOT intermingle is a long, winding and bumpy trail, in need of nearly as much smoothing as Route 117, which courses through downtown Buckfield and is at the heart of at least half the district’s debt.

The problem starts with the loss of a federal waiver under the Clean Water Act for filtration and, while the federal government could have and should have re-issued the waiver, that didn’t happen.

But, a later demand by MDOT that the district replace its water main under the highway or risk losing the repaving project left the district holding another $525,000 in debt, much of it with a private lender and thus wholly unforgivable.

“Before they would rebuild, the waterline would have to be replaced,” said Buckfield Town Manager Glen Holmes of MDOT’s demand.

The town, which is also a customer of the district, has as much at stake as any individual customer. It pays $27,400 a year for water for fire protection but, under the new rates, that bill nearly triples to $65,240.

The water district has lived up to its end of the deal: the main has been replaced. But, residents learned this week that MDOT, while moving slowly toward completion, hasn’t finished its side of the bargain to reconstruct Route 117. That project is behind schedule and over budget.

Barring a toll road in Buckfield, we suggest that MDOT or the Legislature find a way to help Buckfield and its residents solve their water woes.

The water district and town officials have already tried, with some success, to find relief from the federal government. The USDA, which issued about $1 million in loans and grants to the district, has forgiven about 50 percent of that debt. But, because the district failed to enlist the help of Maine’s senators when they could have done something – before the district took on the extra debt – their hands are more or less tied, said Jake Ward, press secretary for U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe.

Ward said Snowe and Sen. Susan Collins are doing what they can to find available federal grants that may help, but cautioned that, “It’s not going to be in Congress that this problem gets solved.”

That’s why the state must take on its share of financial responsibility for the debt.

When the PUC convenes this month to contemplate the next rate hike in Buckfield, it should, as it is tasked, keep the interests of water consumers in mind. We urge the commission to reject the rate hike and push the state to help bail the Buckfield Village Corporation out of debt.