It is no longer in question that the sewer rates are going up. Single family homes will now pay $335 a year. This does not mean that the residents need to let the issue go. Tonight at the Council meeting, a question that has come up before was raised again. Why do we have a flat fee instead of a user based system given the gas, electric and water bills are user based? Who benefits from the flat fee system?
Mayor Sutherland responded that with a flat fee, there is equal interest in assuring a system that works correctly. I believe with any fee there is absolute interest that the system and this one in particular, work correctly. She further stated, to switch the system to user based will take months to gather data and evaluate. She cautioned that the City of Cleveland would have to bill us if our bills were based on usage and would pass that expense on to us. It did sound like she would look into it but why would we increase fees first, and evaluate later?
Talking with the audience after the meeting, there is a belief that Cleveland does not need to handle the billing. The belief is that Cleveland supply the information by individual address to Bay and Bay in turn would bill us accordingly, by usage. One little old lady in a 1,200 square foot bungalow would be paying equal to a family of four or more in a mansion on the lake complete with, well, you get the point. Without question, the owners of the largest homes in town benefit.
The City did drop the ball when there was an issue with a broken meter and the push to remedy this was not hard enough to be heard. We will not know for sure how this contributed to the increase. Speaking of the increase, the budget was tight in the audit of the RR WWTP. One has to wonder how long during the election the Mayor knew an increase would be in order. It all just seems convenient, again.
Would it be helpful if the blog owners would post their Progressive political beliefs on an "about" page?
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