NATCHEZ, Miss. – State public service regulators Tuesday heard from Adams County Supervisor Ricky Gray along with others from Natchez and around the state complaining about high water expenses and poor services provided by their utility company.
“There needs to be an investigation,” Gray told the Mississippi Public Service Commission, which is considering Great River Utility’s request to increase customers’ water bills.
“Once y’all find that Great River is doing something that they have no business doing, I think the citizens of Adams County need to be reimbursed for all the money that they’ve paid and not getting service,” he said.
“We will get to the bottom of it,” said state Public Service Commissioner Chris Brown, who chairs the three-member regulatory board. It’s deciding whether to approve or reject Great River’s water rate increase imposed on the 20,000 or so customers it serves statewide.
Gray was among the 23 people from north, central and south Mississippi speaking Tuesday at the PSC public hearing in Jackson. They complained about Great River Utility Operating Co. charging more for its services they said have worsened since 2021, when it acquired more than 130 private water systems in Mississippi.
“Everybody in this room knows what’s going on is wrong, and we just need to find a solution to try to fix it,” Gray said.
The Missouri-based company began serving its 280 or so households in Adams County when it bought the Oakland water system in 2021 from David Huber. He was among the disgruntled customers Tuesday who addressed the PSC at the hearing, which was livestreamed from the commission’s website.
Huber noted his monthly water bills have increased from about $50 to $108, as they have for other customers in Natchez-Adams County’s Morgantown area.
The $108 a month is a flat rate charged to all households irregardless of the amount of water used. Great River representatives say the flat rates are charged because houses’ water meters are malfunctioning, but “that is not a true statement. They work,” Huber said.
His other grievances include Great River not having maintenance workers in Adams County to promptly make emergency repairs.
After hearing comments from the general public, the PSC listened to testimony from Great River Utility executives as they made their case justifying the increase on water bills. They explained that Great River acquired many distressed water systems in Mississippi that the company is having to spend millions of dollars to fix.
“Some of those things take time, and we are working on them,” said Jake Freeman, the company’s engineering director.
Great River is striving to inform its customers about improvements being made and explain why they should be charged more, said Aaron Silas, the company’s director of regulatory operations. “I think we’ve made a lot of progress in educating customers,” he told the PSC.
After hearing customers’ beefs expressed at the commission’s public hearing, Silas said “We take it very seriously and we will investigate those concerns.”
Great River implemented the water-charge increase on customers earlier this year without the PSC’s approval, which state law allows, on the condition customers will get rebates if the commission turns down the requested rate hike, according to the company’s attorney.
PSC members – along with state Attorney General Lynn Fitch – say Great River is charging too much to supply water and provide sewer services, which appear to be worse than before – as evident by frequent boil-water notices, low-water pressure and lack of response to customers’ complaints.
The company “is being paid (by customers) for services that are not being provided….Can you justify that?” Public Service Commissioner Wayne Carr said.
The commission recessed the Great River hearing Tuesday to resume today to hear more from company representatives.
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