City aims to plug delinquent water bills with service shutoffs

In order to avoid having a work crew come to your house and shut off water service, make sure you are up to date on your water bills. The city began shutting off service this week to those who are behind on their bills.

In order to avoid having a work crew come to your house and shut off water service, make sure you are up to date on your water bills. The city began shutting off service this week to those who are behind on their bills.

 

By Charles Sercombe
For the second time in about a year, the city is getting serious about water bill deadbeats.
Some 950 water shutoff notices were sent out on April 2, warning property owners to pay up within 10 days or face having their service shut down.
This week, the city made good on that threat and began shutting off water to those who owed $250 or more.
On Tuesday, city hall had a line going out the door of people rushing to pay their bills. It was not known how many out of the 950 households and businesses paid up by Thursday, the day The Review went to press.
Mark Ragsdale, the Director of Public Works, said his work crew can do only 20 to 40 shutoffs a day.
Ragsdale said that 30 percent of the city’s water users are behind on their bills. That means out of 6,000 houses and businesses, 2,000 are delinquent.
In terms of revenue to the city, that means there is $1.2 million to collect. Ragsdale said that money could have been used to repair leaking water lines and old fire hydrants, some of which date back to the 1920s.
For those who owe $500 or more, the city has a deal for you. If you pay one third of what’s owed, the city will let you spread out the balance in six payments.
But, you must also at the same time keep up with current bills. One missed payment, and the city will shut off your service and in order to restore it, you have to pay the entire amount owed.
If your water service is shut off before you make a payment plan agreement, that deal won’t be offered.
Ragsdale said he will soon hire part-time employees whose only job will be to turn off water service.
While some customers claim financial hardship, Ragsdale said that it’s not uncommon to see those folks holding top-of-the line cell phones worth $700 or more.
“It’s all about priorities,” Ragsdale said.
Ragsdale said that although the city has been spotty about enforcing water payments, this is a new era for the city. He said the city will be cracking down on a regular basis from now on.
“It will be culture shock for some people,” he said.
The last time the city forced the issue was when Emergency Manager Cathy Square was in charge. However, she launched the crackdown only once, back when the city was owed over $600,000.

 

One Response to City aims to plug delinquent water bills with service shutoffs

  1. Jolanta

    April 19, 2015 at 5:32 pm

    Let’s not have a shutoff on Election Day as we did in August of 2013 so residents were inhibited from voting as they were instead waiting in long lines at City Hall to get their service reinstated.

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