Docket Number	Docket Name	Company
UW 206	CROOKED RIVER RANCH WATER COMPANY REQUEST FOR A GENERAL RATE REVISION	CROOKED RIVER RANCH WATER COMPANY

Comment Number	Created Date	Email Received Date	Company Name	Comment Type	Source Type	First Name	Last Name	Email	Nearest City	Comment
UW 206-1	4/3/2025 11:39:45 AM		CROOKED RIVER RANCH WATER COMPANY	Oppose Docket	Web	Cathy			CROOKED RIVER RANCH	I highly object their request for higher rates. We just had higher rates last year. I can't see them getting any more money because I get black stuff in my water. Now my wash machine collects Alge, and the water pressure is terrible. They have Avion water help them with their water, why should we pay for that? We don't need another water increase. The only reason they want a water increase is because they want to build a new subdivision. I ask you guys deny their water increase.
UW 206-2	4/22/2025 12:33:00 AM	4/20/2025 6:11:56 PM		General Comment	Email			lindaolso@gmail.com		Hello! Thank you for allowing me to submit a comment by email. My husband and I have lived at Crooked River Ranch since 1992. We understood why the CRR Water District asked for an increase in water fees last year. Now, they are asking for another increase already. Like many residents of CRR, we are seniors with a limited income. We tightened our belts last year to accommodate the large rate hike, but can’t fathom them raising the rates again so quickly. I am quite sure that they could find other cost-saving measures rather than a runaway rate increase.please consider the elderly population at CRR. Respectfully, Fred and Linda Olson Linda Olson....Sent from my iPad
UW 206-3	4/27/2025 9:55:58 AM		CROOKED RIVER RANCH WATER COMPANY	General Comment	Web	Tony and Karyn	Carson		TERREBONNE	It sure feels like CRR Water Company is mismanaging the money it collects. We already have one of the highest water rates in Oregon, and not a drop of water is provided for the fees we pay just to be connected to the system. As a low-income senior, I find these rate increases to be a true hardship. I have to live within my budget, I expect the water company to do the same.
UW 206-4	5/20/2025 12:33:20 AM	5/16/2025 8:39:59 PM		General Comment	Email			jeff.murtaugh@gmail.com		Attached are public comments for UW 206. Please contact me at the number below if needed. Thank you. It is my hope these comments will be considered by PUC staff and Commissioners as they consider their recommendation towards a resolution. 1. The proposed rate increase is “marketed” to the community as a 5.9% rate increase. In fact, it is a 5.9% increase of total revenues, and an 8.1% rate increase for water (Q26). To generate an 8.1% increase for water, the case proposes a 7.9% increase in base rates and a 25.8% increase in the commodity rate. Given the company’s 2024 fixed/commodity mix of 71%/29%, that is a 13.1% water increase (assuming flat water sales and no increase in the number of meters on the system). Per the filing, it is a 13.5% increase for the largest bucket of customers (Residential 5/8" and 3/4" represent 91% of the accounts). 5.9% does not equal 8.1%, which does not equal 13.1%. or 13.5%. The community is being misled, and PUC staff needs to make that clear to the public and the company. 2. The company’s filing indicates total expenses rose 9% since the last rate filing. It ignores that total revenues increased 31.4% since then. A year plus in, that is a 22.4% net margin increase. Net cash flow from operations increased from $23K in 2023 to $234k in 2024. The company “banked” $130k in cash in 2024. Those results seem favorable. Is the community to expect PUC staff to accept a rate filing every year to match prior year expenses, while ignoring net margin increases granted by the PUC in the prior year being up more than 22%? Combining the prior rate increase and the current proposed request, the average water bill will be more than 49% higher than September, 2023. That is not driven by growth in the system, or wildland fire costs (like Pacific Power where the PUC has adjudicated), but by bloated labor costs more fully detailed in Point 4 below. 3. The company’s 2024 mix of 71% of water revenues from base rates, and only 29% from commodity sales seems to fail Oregon water company goals. In addition, the company has no customer programs, published or publicly under review, which incent any measure of conservation (the company has a single flat rate per 100cf usage). PUC staff needs to recommend that the company explore a more water efficient pricing structure in the use of the resource, for which they pay nothing (other than pumping costs). 4. In the prior rate case, using 2022 as the test year, water sales were reported as 26,649,100cf. In the current case, using 2024 as the test year, water sales are reported as 25,025,908cf, or 6.0% less than 2022 (relying on Q31 answers in both cases). While sales are down, comparing salaries and wages between test years of 2022 and 2024, they have increased 57.8% (25.6% CAGR). Employee Pension & Benefits have increased 282% (95.4% CAGR). The company’s employee payroll tax costs have increased 54.8% (24.4% CAGR). Meanwhile, purchased power, presented by the company as a major need for the rate increase, has increased “only” 23.1% (11.0% CAGR). And yet per the filing, total expenses have increased only 9%. So, what happened? The company adopted a far more labor intensive/fixed cost structure. In late 2022, to replace a $35,000 variable cost contract for emergency night and weekend repairs, the company hired two additional employees (estimated increased fixed operating cost of $175,000/year). That decision tore a hole in the operating cost structure. To support the new hires, two new pickups were purchased ($125,000), a new dump truck was purchased ($114,000), and a new trailer was purchased ($14,000). These cash purchases, totaling $253,000, were funded from reserve accounts, where cash had been accumulated specifically to fund replacement of the aging water plant. These purchases had nothing to do with the aging water plant, and the decisions decimated the cash positions of the company. So how has this worked out? After receiving a 31.4% rate increase in late 2023, the company is back for another rate increase, only 18 months after the last request. The company doesn’t have a revenue problem, it has an expense problem that neither the GM nor the BOD seem to understand. And rather than to seek solutions to fix the cost structure, their strategy is simply to come back to the PUC and ask for more money from the community. In public testimony in the prior rate case, it was clear from GM comments that the company was going to be over-staffed, without sufficient work to keep the new hires fully engaged, and they would have to “figure that out.” This from a company that works four days a week. 5. In 2024, total repairs to the water plant were $27,000, and projected by the company to now fall by $17,000, to $10,000 (Q28). Absorbing $175,000 in incremental labor expense to deal with emergency night and weekend crises, with only $27,000 in total repairs being