VIENNA — The county’s water rate increases earlier this year have borne fruit, as a member of the county’s sanitary engineer’s office noted they were breaking even.

The 12-person Water Advisory Panel had its third meeting at the Trumbull County Sanitary Engineer’s Office earlier this month.

The panel is only able to bring recommendations before the county commissioners for their approval, but it couldn’t vote to bring any before them at the meeting because not enough representatives were present to have a quorum.

Bob Maiorano, comptroller at the county’s sanitary department, said the current quarter went “surprisingly well”, compared to the Sept. 19 operating statement that showed a $250,000 loss.

Maiorano said the operating budget was showing an approximate $13,000 loss at the time of the meeting, noting they had some inter-fund transactions to perform in the coming weeks.

“I think comparatively to where we were last year, we were bleeding and running out of money,” Maiorano said. “(With) the rate increase, we’ve pretty much steadied the ship and we’re now breaking even.”

Sanitary Engineer Gary Newbrough pointed out the $466,768 in the county’s unencumbered balance, comparing it to the $55,000 from the previous quarter’s report.

Maiorano said a lot of the money was year-end encumbrances, which the office was “zeroing out.”

Newbrough noted that areas such as Warren Township’s water district, which ended the year with a negative balance, has a small system with bigger pipes — meaning the sanitary engineer’s office had to do “quite a bit of flushing” to keep water quality up for its customers.

Newbrough said that with only 300 customers there, his office is still trying to formulate a solution to that problem.