An artesian well near Clarion, with fields and an elevator in the distance. Photo: Brandonrush, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Wright County has set a public hearing for Monday, Nov. 23, on proposed changes to the water utility rates at the Wright County Agribusiness Park.
The county posted the hearing notice on Nov. 10, the day after supervisors met in Clarion and, according to the published agenda, considered rate-increase options in order to arrive at a formal recommendation. The same agenda, which KIOW listed ahead of the meeting, also called for setting a Nov. 23 hearing to amend Ordinance 61, the ordinance that covers those utility rates.
The Agribusiness Park, near Eagle Grove, is county-owned industrial ground with its own water system. Rate changes there do not show up on a Clarion or Eagle Grove city utility bill, but they do matter to the businesses that take water from the park, and to the county fund that has to keep the system maintained. Supervisors had been looking at options rather than a single number, at least as of the agenda posted before the Nov. 9 meeting. The formal proposal will be in the hearing notice and in the ordinance amendment the board has set for that morning.
The water hearing is not the only Agribusiness Park item on Nov. 23. Supervisors also scheduled a 9:15 a.m. hearing that day on the proposed sale of a 2-acre parcel in the park. The two hearings are related only in the sense that they are about the same county property. One is a utility rate; the other is a land sale.
The meeting will be at the courthouse, 115 North Main Street in Clarion. Agendas, notices and streaming links are posted at wrightcounty.iowa.gov. Anyone who takes water at the park, or who wants to speak on the ordinance, can use the hearing to do it on the record before the board votes.
Holly Shafer writes for Clarion News Online.