As published in Lakeway Voice, July 2017.

News from Lakeway MUD

Greetings from Lakeway MUD. We hope all of you are enjoying the spring weather and the beautiful vegetation we enjoy in Lakeway. At Lakeway MUD, we are gearing up for the increased water usage that always accompanies our hot summers. Lakeway MUD furnishes Water and Wastewater to the older sections of Lakeway. We have approximately 4,200 customers that rely on us to ensure their water supply us delivered uninterrupted. We supply Wastewater services to approximately 3,200 of these customers. Back when the MUD was first formed in early 1970s, there was a group of homes (Old Lakeway) that opted not to connect to our sewer lines. Most of these homes had recently put in septic tanks and did not want the added expense of sewer service so they chose to only use Lakeway MUD for water. We will talk more about what we might be able to do to help some of these customers in the column.

Lakeway MUD is one of 5 separate MUDs that serve the City of Lakeway. We are a separate entity from the City of Lakeway. We are our own self-contained Municipality, governed by a Board of Directors consisting of 5 Directors elected by our taxpayers who are water and Wastewater customers. These Directors serve 4 year terms, with either 2 or 3 positions up for election every other year. We are also supported by our volunteer committees: 20 citizens who devote time to our Finance, Engineering, Land, and Administrative/Personnel Committees. We stress that we are separate from the City of Lakeway partially to educate the citizens where to direct their payments for services. Water and Wastewater payments go to Lakeway MUD. Our Districvt Administrative office is at 1097 Lohmans Crossing, just one block past City Hall on your right, behind the Heritage Center. Many times citizens will drop off their trash payments at our office. These trash payments are collected by the City of Lakeway, and should be directed to 1102 Lohmans Crossing (City Hall).

We would like to remind everyone that we are on Stage 1 watering restrictions. Stage 1 has the same watering schedule from May 1-Sept 30 as Stage 2. Those restrictions call for residential addresses ending in Odd numbers to water Wednesday and Saturday. Those residences with addresses ending in even numbers may water on Thursday and Sunday. Commercial customers may water on Tuesday and Friday. As always during the summer months, NO WATERING IS ALLOWED BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 10AM and 7PM. Please check your sprinkler system to ensure you are in sync with the requirements.

Our new billing system is fully up and operational now. With a few minor hiccups, the conversion process went extremely well. We would like to thank our Administrative team for a job well done. It was very trying for the staff during the period of time when two systems were running at the same time, but our staff came throughout an did a terrific job. This is an ideal time to sign up for our paperless billing option. With that option, our customers get an e-mail with their bill attached in PDF format. You don’t even have to sign in to your account to see your bill! Even more convenient is our Auto Pay system where we charge your credit card or your checking or savings account automatically . It saves paper, time, and worry about whether you have paid your bill or not. If you are not interested in Auto Pay, the new system allows you to go to our website and pay your bill by credit card or check without having to sign into your account. Simply enter your phone number or email address (you don’t even have to remember your account number!) and the system will prompt you through making your payment. Over 53% of our customers now use the Auto Pay feature, and over 35% enjoy receiving their bill via email versus US Mail. We expect both participation numbers to grow substantially over the next few months. We would like to thank our customers for their patience as we progressed through the implementation of the new system.

I have mentioned in previous articles about the calls I get from out of District customers who have septic tanks and would like to connect to the Lakeway MUD wastewater collection system. I am gathering information from LCRA on septic tanks and what the requirements are for today’s standards. I would like to say there has been a lot of bad information out there. One concern seems to be if you have to hook up to the system. The answer is no and you will never be forced to hook up our system. The decision is your and/or the new owner’s decision. There will be a lot more information coming and public meetings to get feedback. You can always email me or call to discuss (email: efoster@lakewaymud.org phone: 512-261-6222 ext. 140). Thank you again for your patience and for conserving our valuable resource: WATER.