More than 8,000 Clark County residents will see higher water and sewer bills starting in January, a move that will generate about $277,000 annually for the Clark County Utilities Department.

Utiltiy bills will increase between an additional 29 cents to $3.20 per month, officials said.

The county’s last rate hike was in February 2010.

Director Alice Godsey and Deputy Director Chuck Bauer said the rate increases are needed to help pay for “pass through” water and sewer increases by North Hampton and the city of Springfield, and offset debt incurred by department’s construction projects that include upgrades to the Southwest Regional Waste Water Treatment Plant Solids Facility and the new waterline for the Limecrest Water System.

Bauer said raising rates in 2013 will prevent the need for much larger increases by 2016 or 2017, for example, and will help the department avoid dropping below a minimum fund water and sewer balances of $600,000 and $1 million, respectively.

“We’re trying to avoid asking for a much larger rate increase at a less frequent time because we believe it’s better to do a small change and watch the projections than to get behind and have to ask for a lot,” Bauer said.

The water rate increase will raise department general water revenues by $55,000 annually, and the sewer rate increase will bring in about $222,000 each year for the sewer water fund.

But despite the rate hikes, expenses for both water and sewer will remain higher than revenues, according to projection obtained by the Springfield News-Sun.

“Because there’s still that gap, the fund balance keeps going down and we want to avoid going below that recommended threshold of ($600,000), the minimum fund balance,” Godsey said.

“If projections hold we won’t need an increase unless there would be a pass through from the city of Springfield or our other providers.”

Notices on the increases were mailed to customers the week of Dec. 11.