San Diego’s Water Sellers Are Thirsty for Revenue

This post has been updated.

It’s that time of year – August – when San Diego’s real summer heats up and notices that the city of San Diego is raising water rates hit our mailboxes.

On Sept. 30, the San Diego City Council will take up the uncomfortable exercise of approving a 63 percent hike in water rates and a 31 percent hike in wastewater rates over the next four years. 

Ouchie. But we knew it was coming.

The table explaining how that will affect your average monthly bill on the front page of the water rates “notice of a public hearing,” that unholy baby blue packet in the mail, may be a little confusing. Voice of San Diego to the rescue.

This table is telling you how much more you should expect to pay for water on average each month if you’re the regular residential, single-family home. So next January, a San Diego family will pay about $17.30 more for water that month. In 2027, you’ll pay another $16.88 each month on average for water. And so on.

The city, unsurprisingly as we’ve covered, blamed the San Diego County Water Authority for the majority of those costs. A presentation given to the City Council says 40 percent of a San Diegan’s water bill pays for the Colorado River water the Water Authority transports to the region. 

San Diego expects the Water Authority to heftily raise rates in 2026 and 2027, so the city is deferring a bunch of its own projects until 2028 and 2029. That’s when the city starts shifting its own water costs back onto the ratepayer. 

And, hopefully, the Water Authority’s rates don’t vastly increase in 2028 or 2029. Otherwise San Diegans will start to feel an even tighter squeeze on their pocketbooks for turning on the tap.

The same logic goes for how much San Diegans should expect to pay on a monthly average for wastewater. In January of 2026 San Diegans will pay 80 cents more each month for wastewater. And January of 2027, that jumps to an additional $3.88 more per month, etcetera. While the wastewater costs don’t seem as severe as your regular water bill, it should still shock you. That 2026 to 2027 jump is a 6 percent increase, and another 6 percent in the next year and so on until we hit double 8 percent increases in the final two years. Double ouchie.

Ally Berenter, deputy director of external affairs for the Public Utilities Department, explained that’s largely due to the rising cost of energy purchased from San Diego Gas and Electric and chemicals – both key to treating the water we flush away.

Speaking of toilets, the city of San Diego is also working on building its massive wastewater-to-drinking water system called Pure Water.  

Berenter said the costs for that system – at least $1.5 billion – are spread across both water and wastewater bills since it touches both.

Correction: A previous version of this article misstated the percent increase in wastewater bills. The percent increase in those bills is 6 percent between 2026 and 2027 and another 6 percent between 2027 and 2028.

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