“NO RATE HIKE”: A person holds up a sign protesting Illinois American’s proposed $152 million rate hike among hundreds of people who packed an ICC public forum in Bolingbrook in July. Almost all of them opposed the increase of up to nearly $30 a month.
The Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) held five public forums on proposals by the state’s two biggest private water companies to raise bills by up to nearly $30 a month, and the events reinforced something that CUB has known for years: Private water customers are fed up with rapidly escalating water bills.
In January, Aqua Illinois, which serves about 273,000 customers in Illinois, announced it was filing a $19.2 million rate-hike request that could increase water/wastewater bills by as much as $29.91 per month. Illinois American, which serves about 1.3 million Illinois customers, filed for a $152.4 million rate-hike request that could raise water/wastewater bills by up to $27 to $29 a month. The ICC will rule on the cases around November/December, and new rates would take effect in 2025. CUB calls the rate hikes unjust and unreasonable and has intervened in both cases to challenge them.
AARP Illinois requested the public forums, which were held in Jerseyville, Bolingbrook, Champaign, Crystal Lake and Bourbonnais from late June to early August. “Thousands of older customers, including those on fixed incomes, have written to tell us that these increases will mean they have to make tough choices between paying for water or paying for basic necessities like food and prescription drugs,” AARP Illinois State Director Philippe Largent said.
At the Bolingbrook forum, CUB Executive Director Sarah Moskowitz said in her 24 years as a consumer advocate she had never seen such a punishing increase, and she admonished Illinois American officials for downplaying the rate hike as “less than a dollar a day.”
“I’m sorry, ‘a dollar a day’ doesn’t make it sound any better,” said Moskowitz, sparking applause and hoots from the overflow crowd.
At one point during the raucous Bolingbrook forum, customers yelled out the size of their average water bills, prompted by Homer Glen Mayor Christina Neitzke-Troike:
“$256!”
“$300, if I don’t water my grass.”
“Mine’s $350 a month. It is ridiculous,” Neitzke-Troike said.
Another customer took the microphone and said to the ICC: “Three words: Stop corporate greed.”
About 10 days later and 60 miles away, Aqua customers were expressing the same sentiment at a forum in Bourbonnais. “Currently my monthly bill ranges ranges from $250 to $300 per month,” said one Aqua customer who is from a family of six. “An additional $30 per month is ridiculous.”
In Crystal Lake, one customer urged the ICC to require Aqua to first address ongoing problems, including water quality and poor customer service, before allowing the company to raise rates. “Aqua’s proposed rate increase could significantly worsen the financial strain on our working class community,” she said. “We cannot afford this. We just cannot. We can’t afford the bills we have now.”
This customer brought a jar of brown/orange water and a sign displaying pictures of discolored water at her home and the question: “Would you give this water to your children?”
Another customer came to the microphone toting a sign protesting Aqua’s water quality (it said: “Would you give this water to your children?”) and a jar of orange/brown water she said she had taken from her home. “The water is awful,” she said. “This is what I get to bathe in, to brush my teeth, to cook in.”
Aqua has had high-profile water service problems, including a water outage in Lake County in 2023 and unacceptable levels of lead in drinking water in University Park in 2019 that sparked a lawsuit from the Illinois Attorney General’s Office. The company says the problem has been fixed, but years later some customers were still drinking bottled water because they didn’t trust the company.
“This is about poor versus rich,” University Park Village Manager Elizabeth Scott said, pointing to Aqua Illinois’ president at the Bourbonnais forum. “This is environmental racism and injustice. And ICC, I want you to know we have to have you do something.”
While customers suffer under high bills and poor water quality, the utilities prosper. The parent companies of Aqua and Illinois American have raked in a combined total of $2.7 billion in profits over the last two years. And the current rate-hike requests suggest both companies have no intention of slowing down. CUB’s testimony in the rate cases exposed that they are pushing to raise their profit rate for shareholders to an obscene level — from an already excessive 9.6 percent for Aqua and 9.78 percent at Illinois American to 10.8 percent and 10.75 percent, respectively.
But long before the rate-hike requests and the public forums, Aqua and Illinois American customers contacted CUB to complain about excessive water bills. Those escalating bills are because of bad Illinois water policies:
- Private water utilities in 2000 won state legislative approval to add a “Qualifying Infrastructure Plant” surcharge to bills, which has needlessly increased costs for customers.
- In 2013, the utilities successfully pushed for a state law that allows Illinois American and Aqua to buy up depreciated water and wastewater systems across the state and charge their customers to cover 100 percent of the acquisition costs. CUB Water Tracker, CUB’s special online center monitoring the problem, found that these for-profit companies have purchased 59 systems since 2013 and have passed $402 million in acquisition costs onto their customers. Private water companies often charge customers more, once they take over those municipal systems.
These policies have been hard on private water customers. That’s why this summer we stood with legislators on both sides of the political aisle to let people know about the forums and also call for reforming Illinois water policy. We thank the legislators who stood with us and have been calling for reform: state Rep. Dagmara Avelar of Romeoville; state Sen. Sue Rezin of Morris; state Rep. Nabeela Syed of Palatine; and state Sen. Rachel Ventura of Joliet.
And we thank water customers throughout the state for attending the forums and speaking out against the rate hikes. CUB’s Sarah Moskowitz wrote in the Chicago Tribune that she hopes more legislators hear the pleas of people like Pat, who attended the Bolingbrook forum and said she’s so worried about her water bills that she limits dishwashing, laundry, lawn watering, even bathing. “We only bathe or shower twice a week now,” she said. “I’m not sure what else I can do to reduce water consumption.”
CUB will keep fighting–and people like Pat just strengthen our resolve. Please take action below:
Aqua Illinois Rate Hike (ICC Docket # 24-0044)
CUB petition: Tell the ICC to say no to Aqua Illinois.
Illinois American Rate Hike (ICC Docket # 24-0097)
CUB Petition: Tell the ICC to say no to Illinois American.
You can also call the ICC to oppose the rate hike, at 1-800-524-0795.
