Your Phone Bill Is About to Go Up
Photo credit: Matthew Pearce via Flickr.
If you think your phone bill is too high right now, wait until August.
Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf signed into law on Monday a bill that will increase the cost of calling 911 for emergencies, in an effort to raise additional funds to operate the call centers, PennLive reported yesterday.
The new law, PennLive says, will put into effect a uniform $1.65 911 fee irrespective of the type of phone service a customer uses. Cell phone and VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) users currently pay one dollar a month per line for 911 service, while landlines are charged between $1 – $1.50 depending on location.
According to PennLive, getting this new fee was a top policy target for the County Commissioners Association of America. The emergency call centers cost some 292 million dollars to operate each year, but the current 911 tariffs on each phone line only covered 190 million, leaving counties to put up the rest out of property tax funds, forcing other programs to be cut.
Several counties, including Delaware and Dauphin, have had trouble covering the costs unmet by the phone fees. Delaware specifically has had to raise taxes for the third year in a row to help offset the emergency call center and other services.
“Local governments have struggled to maintain adequate funding for 9-1-1 systems for far too long,” Governor Wolf told PennLive. “I commend the General Assembly for passing a bill that will bolster these institutions that are vital to maintaining public safety in our communities.”
The Associated Press reported on June 16 via WITF — a central Pennsylvania broadcast network — that the Pennsylvania Senate approved the fee increase, which is estimated to raise $314 million a year, according to Pennsylvania’s Emergency Management Agency, enough to cover the operating costs of the 911 centers with a surplus.
The Senate’s version of the bill also included a $52 per household charge for the emergency service, but the House’s version rejected that part of the legislation. The Senate passed that bill unanimously.
The new charges are set to take effect tomorrow, July 1st.
