At the Aug. 16 meeting of the Sumner City Council, the city established new water and sewer rates.

The new base rate for a meter which is three quarters of an inch is $12.30 and the new sewer service minimum rate is $41.27 for a single-family residence.

This is a 16 percent increase for water and a 9.75 percent increase for sewer.

Sumner is raising the rates to support the utilities.

Each utility operates as its own business. Each utility gets money coming in from rate payers and system development charges each time a new building is constructed. Money from the funds is spent to provide each service. The last rate study occurred in 2004 and since then the utilities are not covering their costs.