Basic water needs should not become more expensive simply because more people share one water meter.

WaterRatesNY is asking New York State lawmakers to address two related but distinct rate-equity problems in Veolia’s residential water-rate structure: one affecting larger households, and another affecting master-metered multifamily properties. Each calls for a different solution while keeping conservation-oriented tiered pricing in place.

A Fairer Starting Allowance for Larger Households

For separately metered households covered by this proposal, the starting water allowance is the same whether one person or many people live in the home. More people means more basic water needs for cooking, bathing, laundry, cleaning, and sanitation. Larger households can therefore reach higher-priced tiers sooner through ordinary daily needs—even when water is being used carefully.

WaterRatesNY supports an optional household-size adjustment to make the starting allowance fairer while preserving conservation pricing.

Under the household-size proposal:

• Participation would be entirely voluntary.
• Participating households could request an adjusted starting allowance based on the number of permanent residents in the home, using secure verification and appropriate privacy protections.
• Households that do not participate would keep the standard starting allowance.
• The adjustment would affect only the starting allowance. The same tier rates and higher-priced conservation tiers would remain, while regulators establish the exact eligibility, documentation, privacy, renewal, and implementation rules, with PSC review before any final design is adopted.

Comparable water utilities already use household-occupancy adjustments while preserving conservation-oriented pricing, showing that fairness, verification, privacy, practical administration, and conservation can work together.

Fairer Rates for Master-Metered Multifamily Properties

In many multifamily properties, one master meter serves multiple apartments. Veolia provides larger lower-priced blocks for multifamily service than for an individual household, but the tier thresholds are fixed for the master-metered property and do not increase with the number of apartments being served. As a result, properties with more apartments can reach higher-priced tiers at lower average water use per apartment.

WaterRatesNY supports having Veolia examine this issue and propose a fairer multifamily rate structure for PSC review—one that more directly accounts for the number of dwelling units served while preserving conservation-oriented pricing.

Household size and the number of dwelling units behind a master meter are different rate-design problems; fixing one would not fix the other.

Send a letter to your New York State Senator and Assemblymember asking them to support fairer residential water rates for both larger households and master-metered multifamily properties.