Low income residents of the Iowa Quad Cities and Clinton may get a break on one of their bills. Iowa American Water has asked the Iowa Utilities Board to approve a discount program.
Spokeswoman Lisa Reisen says the discount would apply to those who already meet the income guidelines for Iowa's Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, and administered by Community Action of Eastern Iowa.
"If approved, those customers who would qualify in 2020 would be eligible to receive a discount on their monthly meter charge retro-actively back to March 13th of this year, and that's really just to coincide with the approximate beginning of the COVID-19 emergency."
For those who qualify, the current monthly water meter charge of 14 dollars, would be discounted 80 per cent, so they would pay 2-dollars and 80-cents instead. The cost of the program for the company would be offset by savings from federal tax cuts.
Reisen doesn't know how quickly the utilities board will act on the company's request, but thinks the earliest might be September.
Iowa American has 56,000 customers in the Iowa Quad Cities, and 10,000 in Clinton.
