Tapping fees to the Upper Montgomery Joint Authority (UMJA) have increased. On July 7, the authority's board of directors voted unanimously to approve a $2,974 increase.

        Effective immediately, new customers will now be required to pay $10,159 per EDU to dispose of their wastewater at the facility, located at 1100 Mensch Dam Road in Upper Hanover.

        Current customers will not be affected, according to David Busch, a financial adviser hired by the authority.  "They already own their capacity," said Busch, of Keystone Alliance Consulting, Inc. located in Ambler.

        UMJA officials set the previous tapping fee at $7,185 per EDU in October of 2006, according to Executive Superintendent Glenn Quinn.

        Any additional money generated by the increased fees should be used to fund capital projects, according to the financial adviser.  "The idea is to let development pay for development," Busch said during the monthly meeting.

        Any additional money generated from the connection rate increase would be deposited in the authority's capital account, according to authority Solicitor R. Kurtz Holloway.

        Municipal officials can't predict how much additional money the new fees will generate, according to Quinn.

        Prior to the vote, Busch advised the board to approve the increase at the highest level allowed by a calculation through Act 57 – a 2003 law that regulates the collection of tapping fees. He said anything less would be giving future developers a break.

        "Development has not been slowed by your previous tapping fees," Busch said. "I don't expect it to slow in the future."

        The adviser suggested that the board stay at or below the proposed rate.  "A penny more and you could be subject to questions and legal challenges," Busch said during the meeting.

        In May, the board directed Busch to study the issue. At that meeting, Brian Book, a senior associate with Hazen and Sawyer, UMJA's appointed engineering firm, told the directors that a rate increase would force new customers to effectively "catch up with what all the old customers have been paying for so long."

        According to Book, present customers were paying the debt service on unused sewer capacity under the previous fee schedule.

        Plant upgrades already completed and debt payments made provided a trigger to allow UMJA officials to adjust the connection fees, according to Holloway.