1. In a county whose population is 700,000 or more, the governing body of a city that owns a municipal water system may, if requested by a water authority, impose an excise tax on the use of water in an amount sufficient to ensure the payment, wholly or in part, of obligations incurred by the water authority to acquire, establish, construct, improve or equip, or any combination thereof, a water facility. The tax must be imposed by ordinance on customers of the municipal water system that are capable of using or benefiting from the water facility financed, wholly or in part, with the proceeds of the tax.

2. An excise tax imposed pursuant to subsection 1 must be levied at different rates for different classes of customers and must take into account differences in the amount of water used or estimated to be used and the size of the connection.

3. The ordinance imposing the tax must provide:

(a) The rate or rates of the tax, which must not exceed one-quarter of 1 percent of the monthly water bill of customers of all residential classes and 5 percent of the monthly water bill of customers of all commercial classes and any other class;

(b) The procedure for collection of the tax;

(c) The duration of the tax; and

(d) The rate of interest that will be charged on late payments.

4. Late payments of the tax must bear interest at a rate not exceeding 1 percent per month, or fraction thereof. The tax due is a perpetual lien against the property served by the water on whose use the tax is imposed until the tax and any interest that may accrue thereon are paid. Collection of the tax may be enforced in any manner authorized by law for the collection of unpaid water bills. In addition to all other methods available to enforce payment of the tax, the city, by ordinance, may provide that it will be collected in the same manner as delinquent charges are collected pursuant to NRS 268.043 for utility services charges.

5. Subject to the provisions of this subsection, the governing body of the city may reduce the amount of the tax imposed pursuant to this section as the obligations of the city and the water authority allow. No ordinance imposing a tax which is enacted pursuant to this section may be repealed or amended or otherwise directly or indirectly modified in such a manner as to impair any outstanding bonds or other obligations which are payable from or secured by a pledge of a tax enacted pursuant to this section until those bonds or other obligations have been discharged in full.

6. The governing body of the city shall review the necessity for the continued imposition of the tax authorized pursuant to this section at least once every 10 years.

7. As used in this section:

(a) “Utility services” has the meaning ascribed to it in NRS 268.043.

(b) “Water authority” means a water authority organized as a public agency or entity created by cooperative agreement pursuant to chapter 277 of NRS whose members at the time of formation include the three largest retail water purveyors in the county and which is responsible for the acquisition, treatment and delivery of water and water resources on a wholesale basis to utilities, governmental agencies and entities and other large customers.

(c) “Water facility” means a facility pertaining to a water system for the collection, transportation, treatment, purification and distribution of water, including, without limitation, springs, wells, ponds, lakes, water rights, other raw water sources, basin cribs, dams, spillways, retarding basins, detention basins, reservoirs, towers and other storage facilities, pumping plants, infiltration galleries, filtration plants, purification systems, other water treatment facilities, waterworks plants, pumping stations, gauging stations, ventilating facilities, stream gauges, rain gauges, valves, standpipes, connections, hydrants, conduits, flumes, sluices, canals, channels, ditches, pipes, lines, laterals, service pipes, force mains, submains, siphons, other water transmission and distribution mains, engines, boilers, pumps, meters, apparatus, tools, equipment, fixtures, structures, buildings and other facilities for the acquisition, transportation, treatment, purification and distribution of untreated water or potable water for domestic, commercial and industrial use and irrigation, or any combination thereof.

(Added to NRS by 1997, 1551; A 1999, 464; 2011, 1158; 2017, 376)