Though it seems some recent water bills for pools in the Whistler area came as a surprise to local strata owners, municipal officials this week said the charges were not retroactive and don’t have anything to do with the municipality’s financial struggles.

Brian Barnett, general manager of environmental services, said because of a municipal billing mistake, water charges “slipped through the cracks” for about 16 Whistler pools, which were not charged until this year. He said the annual water charge for a pool is about $3,000 under municipal bylaws, and the total of lost municipal revenue because the charges were missed was about $50,000 per year.

“It was just a simple mistake,” Barnett said Monday (June 29).

He said he doesn’t know how long the water charges were not billed for the pools, but the mistake was caught during a recent internal review of water billing and rates. Many local pools were being billed correctly, and it’s believed the pools that were missed slipped through the cracks when properties were upgraded or pools added during renovations, Barnett said.

An additional $18,000 of annual water charges were also missed until this year for properties on Whistler and Blackcomb mountains, such as the Base II area, he said.

Owners in the Tamarisk subdivision were surprised when the invoice appeared for the first time recently. No explanation was provided, said strata property agent Shayne van Haeften. He said “a couple” other properties he manages have had similar bills.

The owners at Tamarisk are now dealing directly with the municipality on the charges, van Haeften said.

Though van Haeften said municipal officials told him that such charges could be levied retroactively for up to two years, the municipality maintains that retroactive bills for the missed pool charges have not been issued.

“We have not sent out any retroactive bills,” said Lisa Landry, general manager of economic viability.

It is the municipality’s policy to bill up to two years retroactively, but the decision was made in the case of these omissions only to bill for 2009 and moving forward, she said.

No explanations were sent with the invoices because the water fee for pools is outlined in municipal bylaws, Barnett said. “It’s pretty simple,” he said.

The charges are not related to recent budget shortfalls and pressure to cut spending at municipal hall, Barnett said. The water utility is a separate business unit in the municipality and no money is transferred in or out from other departments. The municipality bills for water use and the money collected goes directly into the water utility to be used for water purposes, he said.

To put the missed revenue into perspective, Barnett said the municipality charges about $5 million each year in water utility taxes and user fees.

“This is about a one per cent error in our bill,” he said. “It’s not a big problem and it has been fixed.”