At Tuesday’s Pella City Council meeting the council adopted an ordinance increasing wastewater rates. The rate increase is necessary to meet IDNR mandated sewer projects in order to eliminate bypasses in the sanitary sewer system. The council stated that rates would need to be increased 40 to 50% when those mandates were passed down. The council had previously raised rates by 25% and a new wave of rate increases will go into effect next year. The new rates will begin in February with the first phase, and in July for the second.