The Enumclaw City Council recently revised its senior and disabled utility rate application process to make it smoother for customers.

The ordinance to change city code was approved during the Sept. 23 meeting.

A previous Courier-Herald article, published Sept. 11, misreported that the ordinance was approved during the Aug. 26 meeting, but a Sept. 9 vote was postponed after some concerns were brought up by council members.

According to the city’s Department of Finance, the current code requires utility customers — seniors over 65, those who are disabled or suffering from a long-term or deadly illness, or on at-home dialysis, all while also considered low-income — must provide the city with various tax documents and proof of their condition annually in order to receive a 30% discount.

The finance department considers these requirements “an unnecessary burden” to its customers, and is also a strain on the city, as employees must review the annual applications and keep those sensitive documents on file for six years.

“We would just like to clean that up a little bit, and make it easier on them and us,” city Finance Director Kristan Reed said during the Aug. 26 meeting.

The proposed new code, provided to the City Council on Sept. 9, originally eliminated the city’s need to collect annual tax documents and proof of permanent disability, instead only requiring proof of disability and low-income status when an application is filed.

The initial ordinance language was unclear regarding proof of low-income status, and this was met with some council pushback from Councilmembers Chris Gruner and Bobby Martinez; Reed said the revised ordinance cleared up this issue.

And, per the request of elected officials concerned with the city’s inability to audit discounted customers on their low-income status if documentation had to only be provided once, language was added to require discount customers provide updated low-income documentation every three years to continue to be enrolled in the program.

The ordinance also clarified that any Veterans Affairs benefits related to disability does not count toward the low-income requirements for the utility discount program. The ordinance also now allows for a veteran’s letter of disability to be acceptable proof of a disability.

Those enrolled in the program get a utility discount get 30% off sewer base and volume charges up to 5,200 gallons a month, natural gas charges up to 100 therms a month, solid waste utility charges for a mini or standard trash bin and one yard waste bin, and the water base and volume charges for the first 6,700 gallons.

Anyone found to have fraudulently enrolled in the program is required to repay the discount plus a 20% penalty.

There are currently 213 customers that receive the discount out of nearly 7,300 customers.