Miami-Dade water bills, ZIP by ZIP

Here's a number most people in Miami-Dade have never seen: what basic tap water actually costs them.

We pulled the current residential rate schedule from every utility that serves the cities we cover. Then we priced the same thing everywhere: about 4,000 gallons a month, which is what the water industry's own affordability framework calls basic use for a typical household. Water and sewer only.

On Miami-Dade Water and Sewer's own lines, that's $45.02 a month. In Miami Beach, it's $94.58.

Miami Beach buys its water from the county. Same source. More than double the bill. North Miami comes in at $80.91. Homestead is $76.47, North Miami Beach $73.04.

Those cities aren't doing anything wrong. They run their own pipes and their own sewers, and the bill pays for all of it. But almost nobody knows that their neighbor across the bay pays half as much for water from the same county system.

Is it affordable? By the industry's own yardstick, yes.

The American Water Works Association and two wastewater groups published a framework in 2019 that's become the standard way to ask whether water is affordable. Don't measure against the average household. Measure against the household at the 20th percentile of income, the family that feels a rate increase first. If basic water and sewer cost them 7% of income or more, that's a high burden.

We ran that test for every Miami-Dade ZIP code we could match to one utility, using the Census Bureau's latest five-year figures. None crossed 7%. The highest was 33139, South Beach, at 4.9%. Little Havana (33135) is 3.9%. Overtown (33136) is 3.7%. Palmetto Bay (33158) is 0.5%.

So the burden is real and uneven. A low-income household in Overtown spends about seven times the share of income on basic water that one in Palmetto Bay does. But by the standard the industry set for itself, Miami-Dade's water is affordable. That's good news, and it's worth saying out loud.

The catch is what's in it.

EPA's latest round of testing measured PFAS, the long-lasting industrial chemicals EPA began regulating in drinking water, in the county's main system. PFOS averaged 14.2 parts per trillion across those tests. PFOA averaged 5.4. Both are above 4.0 parts per trillion, the level EPA set in 2024. It isn't enforceable yet, and the county's own report says utilities must meet it starting in 2029.

The main system has no health-based violations on EPA's record for the years we checked. It meets every rule that applies today. I want to be fair about that.

But "meets today's rules" and "good" aren't the same thing, and the gap between them is about to cost money. Treating PFAS at a plant serving more than two million people isn't cheap. Somebody pays. Today, the people who care pay twice: once on the water bill, and again for a filter under the sink.

And the pipes matter as much as the plant. In the city of Miami, about half of all homes were built before 1980. Water can leave the plant meeting every rule and still pick up rust and sediment on the way to your glass. No utility report can tell you what's in your building's pipes.

What I'd ask for

From the county: a public PFAS plan with a price tag per household, published before the 2029 deadline, not after. People can handle a number. What erodes trust is finding out late.

From the cities that resell county water: put it on the bill. Show what share pays for the county's water and what share pays for the city's own system. Miami Beach residents deserve to see why their bill is double, and they may well decide it's worth it.

From everyone setting rates: keep running the 20th-percentile test. Miami-Dade passes today. A PFAS plan that adds cost without a matching help program for low-income households could change that.

From you: look up your own system's numbers before you buy anything. If you do buy a filter for PFAS, make sure it's certified to reduce PFOA and PFOS. Not every filter is.

Cheap water is a real achievement. Let's make sure the next decade doesn't trade it away by accident, and that "good" means more than "legal."