BELLEVUE, Wash. -- Some 37,000 local utility customers are about to be soaked with a bigger bill. The city knows it's bad timing, but says it has to raise rates.

There are more than a few problems inside the city's water system. Those issues bubbled up on Somerset Hill two weeks ago when a water main broke and popped out concrete driveways.

"When I got up and looked, it wasn't raining. Instead it was water just flowing down both sides of the street, like five feet wide," said resident Theresa Stewart.

The city cleaned up most of the mess and even put in new curbs. The problem has been fixed; all that remains is the bill for the repairs. As a result, water, sewer and storm rates are going up 16 percent.

"Combined with our property taxes, water, sewer, garbage, all that, they're driving up utilities pretty good," said resident Steve Adams.

And the city's not done with all its repairs yet. What's under the streets is about 40 or 50 years old, and will eventually have to be replaced. And that's only half the story.

Bob Brooks, who balances the books for Bellevue Utilities, says the city's supplier, Cascade Water Alliance, is charging more for water to recover the costs of building new pipelines. And King County wants more money for watstewater treatment.

"This is actually a fairly bare-bones proposal. Even though it's a significant rate increase, it's as mean and lean as we can get," he said.

The average residential water bill in the city this year is $100 per month. Come January, it will jump to $109. In 2010, the bill will average $116 per month -- a jump of nearly $200 for the year.

After three water main breaks in three months, residents on Somerset Hill are trying to see the rate increase as an investment.

"I guess they're going to have to get it fixed, 'cause you can't have all this water. And I am glad I didn't live at the bottom of this hill," said Stewart.

Residents know aging pipes could flood them with more problems in the future.