WEST BRANCH — This week West Branch’s water supply and billing methods were both shaken up by City Council.

On Jan. 20, the city officially started drawing water from two new wells located off of M-30 near The Brook Retirement Community.

“On Wednesday we discontinued our water service from West Branch Township,” said City Manager Tom Youatt. He added that over the past two years, approximately, the city has been working on constructing new wells after wells near city hall were deemed by the Environmental Protection Agency to have high levels of arsenic.

Youatt is confident in the new wells.

“It’s going to provide us with good, clean water for many, many years,” he said.

On Friday, Jan. 22, city officials and project engineers/designers met up at the new wells' location to have a ribbon-cutting ceremony.

In other West Branch water news, city council, on Jan. 18, approved the first reading of a plan to allow customers 60 days after issuance to pay water and sewer bills before being hit with a late fee. The change in late fee scheduling, which still has to be approved after a second reading, is retroactive to the most recently distributed bills, which cover water and sewer usage from October to December. The plan, which aims to eliminate charging customers a late fee after only 30 days, will be read again at council’s Feb. 1 meeting, Youatt said.

“In order to effect the change, we need to amend our ordinance for how we collect water and sewer bills,” Youatt said. “We’ll take it up again at our next meeting.”

If approved after the second reading, Youatt said customers who are late on the latest bills wouldn’t incur the late fee until March 2.

“Were trying to assist all of our customers to make it easier for them to pay their bills,” Youatt said.

He added that city water costs $2.79 per every thousand gallons used up to 10,000 gallons and beyond that, every thousand gallons costs $2.49. The city’s sewer rate is $10.17 per thousand gallons.

Last October, rates were increased, Youatt told the Herald on Jan. 21.

“The increase that we had in effect was $1.04 per thousand for water,” he said. He added that sewer rates were also hiked up by $4.85.

The water rate increases, Youatt said, is to pay off a $975,000 bond for the recently completed water wells that the city began using for its supply on Jan. 20. The increased sewer rates were to realign 80 percent of the city’s sewer mains and rebuild its wastewater treatment plant, he added.

“It’s (plant) being done as we speak,” the city manager told the Herald on Thursday, adding the plant and realignment is to “keep clean water out of our sewer mains.”