CUC sets hearing on water project

The Commonwealth Utilities Corporation sets out to revive a proposed water desalination plant saddled with financing problem when it attempts again to ask residents of central Saipan whether they are willing to shoulder the costs of the $100 million project.

A public hearing is scheduled today at 7 p.m. at the Carolinian Utt in which CUC officials are hoping to sway residents of Garapan, China Town and Gualo Rai to agree on a proposed rate hike on their monthly water bills.

The three villages are perennially hit with acute water shortages and the desalination facility may be the only hope for residents frustrated over rapidly drying wells to have steady supply everyday, according to utility officials.

The hearing will only ask one question — that is, whether they are willing to be burdened with a water rate as much as 10 times greater than present flat charge of 50 cents per 1,000 gallons, said CUC information chief Pamela Mathis.

“The forum is not for people with water problems,” she said. “It is for people in central Saipan who will decide and vote on the proposal.”

The project, estimated to cost CUC some $100 million over a 20-year period, has been put off several times in the last two years largely due to constraint of sourcing necessary funds to build the plant on Saipan.

Under the proposal prepared by the government-owned utility firm, every household will have to shell out about $108 each month for 18,000 gallons of water in average consumption — a far cry from the $11.10 flat charge currently billed by CUC.

The higher utility rate, according to officials, is largely due to the overall cost of building the Saipan desalination facility which will be constructed through the build-operate-transfer scheme by Earth Tech, a U.S. water technology and engineering firm.

Since the government is not paying the $10 million construction cost, CUC is obliged to purchase its projected produce of three million gallons of water everyday at a cost of some $5 million each year for the next 20 years.

The town meeting, the second to be held in less than a year on the proposal, is expected to guide CUC whether to proceed with the project. “What we want is for people to say yes or no,” Mathis explained.

Residents of the three villages are asked to find out their water consumption and calculate from there how much they will have to pay if and when they hook with the desalination plant.

In a hearing conducted in March last year, island residents had frowned on the cost-sharing agreement as many are not ready to be burdened with additional costs on top of mounting household expenses in spite of the long-term solution offered by the project.

Executive Director Timothy P. Villagomez earlier had urged for its cancellation while CUC seeks other ways to build the plant at a lower price. Lawmakers have balked at the idea of subsidizing the costly project due to the financial crisis besetting the CNMI government.