In the virtual meeting of town council on Tuesday evening, council received a report regarding 468 Holland St. West, the Bradford McDonald’s restaurant, which had requested a reduction in their utility bill.
The report, prepared by Chief Administrative Officer Geoff McKnight, indicated that from late 2019 to early 2020, the restaurant received higher than normal utility bills - nine times higher than normal.
“It’s a bit of a quandary,” said Mayor Rob Keffer, noting that the bills were extremely high for a couple of billing periods, then returned to normal.
The owner of the restaurant contacted the town in March to express his concerns over the high water/waste water utility charges the restaurant incurred for the previous October, December and February billing periods.
The report found that over the past two years, other than some seasonal fluctuations relating to summer irrigation, consumption remained at just under 500 cubic metres for the restaurant. But from October 2019-February 2020, usage was peaking around 4,300 cubic metres, with consumption returning to normal levels in April 2020.
Town staff reviewed the billing and metering systems and did not find any issues. The report noted that the water levels are consistent with a water hose running 24/7, but the restaurant owner was unable to find any leaks.
Since staff did not find an issue with the town water system, they could not justify the request for a reduction in the bills, but presented three options for council's consideration: No reduction; a 33 percent reduction on the Oct. 2019-Feb. 2020 billing; or an alternative solution, determined by council.
Deputy Mayor James Leduc called it "quite interesting" that there were no apparent leaks.
"From $2,000 to $20,000 - that's amazing," Leduc said. “The water went somewhere.”
He proposed cutting the bill by 50 percent.
“To me, McDonald’s is a good corporate business in our community. The owner certainly stepped up for the Lions during COVID and has been out in our community as much as possible,” Leduc said - and with the town's multi-million dollar Water/Wastewater surplus in 2019, "to give him a small break, won't break our financial back.”
Coun. Raj Sandhu seconded the motion of a 50 percent reduction in the bills.
Going from $10,000 in October to $18,000 in December, then $20,000 in February, “This is too much,” Sandhu said. "Someone in our staff should have sat up and said, Hey!"
Coun. Gary Lamb endorsed the reduction but warned it could be a “slippery slope,” setting a precedent for the rest of the town.
"I remember at the library, we had a toilet stick one weekend," Lamb said. "It was $700, and there was no break."
He said that people need to check their bills, and make sure "there's nothing broken, there's nothing leaking." However, he still supported the reduction. "They are a good corporate citizen and there should have been a flag,” Lamb said.
Mayor Keffer agreed that staff should flag similar situations, moving forward, “so this won’t happen in the future.”
Coun. Gary Baynes said he was comfortable supporting the 50 percent cut, but said the owner "should have noticed and been more proactive as well."
Staff explained that the bills went to McDonald's head office in Chicago. It wasn't until March that the local franchise owner saw the amounts and realized there was a problem, and immediately looked into the situation.
“The message here is we need to find a way to flag these (anomalies),” said Deputy Mayor Leduc. "We don't want to see businesses impacted like that."
McKnight noted that for residential users, water usage is fairly flat and the town is able to monitor on an hourly basis, but not for businesses.
“There can be wide fluctuations with our non-residential users... that are part of their normal operations,” he noted, warning that some "anomalies wouldn't show up until a month or two later."
Council voted to give McDonald’s a 50 percent reduction for the anomalous billings.
