Last week, I highlighted the NACWA (The National Association of Clean Water Agencies) statement about proposed budget cuts to the Clean Water Act. At issue was the effect of such a proposal: The NACWA believes that these cuts will ultimately help balance one budget by transferring the costs of compliance to the municipalities, who will likely tap their ratepayers to make up the difference. As we know, municipalities are themselves struggling to meet costs, and our ever-expanding infrastructure crisis is not helping.
The numbers from my last blog bear repeating: According to the EPA, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), and the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN), over the next 20 years, a $500-billion gap will exist between the funding available and desperately needed repairs. And we need not prognosticate to see what the next two decades will look like when real-world examples are available in every newspaper across the country. Type in “water” into a Google news search, and you will see story after story about boil water notices and water main breaks.
For example, just this week, The Seattle Times reported on a family facing a mortgage, an unstable job market, and a $2,500 repair bill for a broken water main. Apparently, the Croskey’s of Auburn, WA, were recently billed $900 to repair an underground pipe. Unfortunately, the bill also included $2,500 in charges for water lost due to the leak.
The family disputes the charges for the lost water. The city’s technicians were unable to find the leak, which was later discovered in a neighbor’s yard. Additionally, the family disputes the costs associated with the lost water, alleging that the city cannot clearly establish how much the leak actually cost other ratepayers or the city itself.
To many of us, the city’s stance sound reasonable. The Seattle Times quotes Mark Gregg, Auburn’s utilities and accounting services manager as saying, “
“There is a cost to delivery to the entire water structure, and the system of payment is based on everyone paying a certain share.”
We all know that consumers are unaware of the real costs behind the water that flows from their tap, blissfully ignorant of the pipes, pumps, meters, and other infrastructure that supports, treats, and delivers their water supply. And Auburn is not alone in holding users responsible for infrastructure repairs. In Seattle, homeowners are given a one-time “pass” for leaking underground pipes located between the street and their residence—but only if they can document the leak and the repair, which will make them eligible for up to 50% of the bill that exceeds average consumption for the period of the leak’s existence.
Here are some of the hard numbers behind the Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) billing and repair rates (Source: The Seattle Times):
* The utility receives about 1,800 requests for bill adjustments per year.
* In 2008, SPU made over $335,000 worth of billing adjustments for water leaks.
* Because sewage rates are tied to water consumption, the combined adjustments for SPU amounted to $812,000 in 2008 and about $1.5 million last year.
Repairs and leaks constitute a big chunk of any water utilities budget, and with $1.5 million in adjustments, the stakes are particularly high for SPU. But the Croskey’s story is particularly problematic. After being flagged for a “potential leak” in March of 2009, and then again in January of 2010, city utility technicians tried to find the possible leak—but on two occasions the technicians failed to find the source of the problem. In the mean time, the family’s meter indicated that about 547,000 gallons had been consumed in two months (the family’s average consumption up to that point had been around 10,000 gallons for every two months). It wasn’t until technicians expanded their search that the source of the leak was located . . . in a neighbor’s yard.
The family’s formal appeal of the bill was denied without reason, and so far the chairman of the Public Works Committee has not released a comment explaining the committee’s decision. The strangeness of the decision is echoed in Croskey’s own statement to The Seattle Times, “Are they saying I should have been looking in my neighbor’s yard, too?”
As it stands, the Croskey’s are expect to pay Auburn $400 a month towards their outstanding balance ($2,600), in addition to their regular monthly bill. And while it may seem melodramatic to assert that one water bill could send the family over the edge, an extra $500 a month would surely make many of us scramble for funding.
So what do you think? With a “the money’s got to come from somewhere” mindset, should we brace ourselves for similar stories? If the consumer is not accountable for the water loss, where will the utility find the funding for these costly repairs? And are we now simply reaping what we sowed—after years of undervaluing water and tying water bills to water use without also adding some sort of “infrastructure insurance” surcharge, what other options are available?
To read more about the Croskey’s saga: seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2014295189_waterbill22m.html