The East Peoria City Council unanimously approved buying an automatic water meter reader program that will cover the remainder of the community. Peoria Public Radio’s Alex Rusciano reports the goal is to reduce costs and personnel time in reading water meters:
It will cost the city $1.6 million to buy and install the meters for the rest of it’s homes and businesses by the end of the year. About a 1,100 new meters have already been installed. Councilman Tim Jeffers says the new hand-held devices read the water meters from the street:
“This will improve our service, be more timely, more accurate. It’s just a winner, a winner all around. It saves us some manpower and some time that we can put towards other things that need to be done, perhaps street repair, other things that need service around the city,” Jeffers says.
Jeffers says the city will use new revenue from a water rate hike last fall to help pay down the cost of the meter reader system. In other business the Council approved spending more than $140,000 to buy seven new cars for the police department, in addition to covering the cost to outfit the cars with necessary equipment.