Bogalusa residents will notice an increase on their “water bills” on April 1, Mayor Wendy Perrette said during the City Council meeting Tuesday. The increase of slightly more than $3 is due to an increase on the trash pickup portion of the bill, as well as a rise in the Consumer Price Index on city water, she said.

Director of Public Works James Hall explained that residents pay $15 dollars for the first 3,000 gallons of water they use and then $2.40 per thousand gallons after that, and that “sewer” is 95 percent of the water bill.

He said that the trash pickup portion of the bill would go from $10.30 to $13.30, “for waste pollution and administrative fees.”

“The roughly $3 difference people will see is due to the CPI for water and for garbage pickup,” he said. “That’s still a good deal. And the rate probably will not go up, except for maybe a small amount, for the next five years.”

Perrette said that the CPI for the country was set at 2.1 percent this year, and she hated to pass the increase on to consumers. However, she pointed out that Franklinton residents pay more.

“In Franklinton, they went up to $15.50 a month, and it’s $13.30 here,” she said.