The Estes Park Town Board approved the new water rates for 2020-2022. Rates are adjusted regularly to fund existing infrastructure and capital improvements in order to support the Town's high standard of service and exceptional water quality. New rates took effect with January 2020 usage and the next increases will occur in January of 2021 and 2022.
Tap fees are calculated by type of structure and number of taps per location.
For more information on tap fees, please contact Hannah McKellar, Water Administrative Assistant, at 970-577-3619.
To understand how the changes could affect a specific property's water bill, call Utility Billing at 970-577-4800.
All new customers who request water service are required to pay water tap fees. These one-time charges are a way for the water utility to recover a portion of the cost for system capacity and water rights obtained for new customers and also to assure that growth pays for growth and that existing utility customers will largely be sheltered from the financial impacts of new development.
To ensure continued high-quality utility service and plan for future upgrades through capital improvement projects, the Town of Estes Park periodically reviews the cost of providing services by having a system development charge/water rights fee study performed. The report, provided below, summarizes the results of a rigorous study of the Town's Water Division costs to meet customer demands, regulatory compliance and infrastructure repairs and replacements.
Estes Park Tap Fee Study, February 2016
The Town's public water utility is a cost-based entity that relies solely on user fees to operate. Costs and revenues must be balanced in order to maintain operations and keep utilities in line with ever-increasing federal standards. The Town's Water Division is capable of serving Estes Park on the busiest day of summer. Yet, like water utilities across the country, it is facing rising operational costs, aging infrastructure and increasingly stringent regulatory requirements.
