By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

At a time of year you might reasonably expect water use to be down dramatically, 50 water customers in Hays still used enough water during November to be charged the higher prices in the city’s Tier Two Conservation level.

Finance Director Kim Rupp told city commissioners during their final meeting of 2014 that November water consumption was down 24 percent, although the 50 top water users are consistently the same each month.

“Everybody else seems to be getting the message,” commented Vice-Mayor Eber Phelps. “Obviously, we’re seeing a drop in (water) revenues due to that and due to water conservation.”

“I honestly feel those (high use) people are ‘set it and forget it,’ ” Rupp responded. “They set their sprinkler system and forget about it or they have someone else taking care of it and they’ve forgotten about it, so they were watering (lawns and landscaping) into November.”

According to Rupp, water consumption in Hays was down 7 percent in 2014 from the year before. That also means a 2 percent decline in annual water revenue for the city.