Water Rates going up? That’s news to me.

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Apparently Councilor Rick Kiley has a crystal ball, because he is predicting our water and sewer rates are going up;

“They foresee a possible increase of about $2 per month for a family of five,” city councilor Rick Kiley said.

Kiley says the city knew this day was coming.

“You never want to raise rates, but in a situation like this where we are at 82% capacity today, we have a community that’s growing by 5,000 people every year and we are bringing on regional customers in addition to that it’s the prudent thing to do now is to expand our existing facilities,” Kiley said.

The city council will be voting on the funding this project when it passes the city budget in October.

While I agree we need to fix up a 1980’s water treatment plant, if we didn’t switch the rates over to enterprise funds we could easily pay the bonds with 2nd penny CIP revenue without raising fees. But see, former mayor Bucktooth & Bowlcut wanted to free up the 2nd penny from paying for silly old water pipes, and use it for paying down bonds for monument building.

So now our taxes are going up for a new jail, and Minnehaha county admitted at their Tuesday meeting (Commissioner Barth) that there will likely be another opt out, put that on top of a 25 year around $300 million dollar new school bond and our already existing $300 million city debt, and things are going to get a lot more expensive in Sioux Falls, including taking a dump.

Posted in: City Administration Building, County Commission, Jeff Barth, Mayor TenHaken, Minnehaha County, Public Utilities, Public Works, Rick Kiley, SF City Council, SF School District, Sioux Falls

Mayor justifies $25 million dollar admin building by overcharging us on water rates

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Boy, the man can spin.

Recently the city re-financed the Lewis & Clark bonds with a supposed $25 million in interest savings. But how this was accomplished was under the guise we were paying higher water/sewer rates for infrastructure upgrades.

We have been told over the past 7-10 years that we had to increase these rates and turn them into their own fund (enterprise) so we could upgrade our aging water & sewer infrastructure.

Sounds reasonable . . . if the city was telling the truth.

They actually have been putting the money in a savings account, $25 million to be exact. In order to save the $25 million in interest for the L & C bonds we had to make a $25 million principal payment. That money came from the ‘savings’ account.

During the Listening and Learning session the mayor justifies the $25 million dollar admin building because we saved $25 million on the L & C bonds. What a stretch.

Okay, let’s break down his illogical argument;

• We never needed the $80 million dollar hookup to L & C. In fact we only get about 10% of our water from the pipe (contract requirement) while we continue to buy land for more wells. I believe all along that we bailed out L & C and if they would not have gotten the $80 million from us they would have struggled to stay afloat. How was that the responsibility of Sioux Falls taxpayers? Our genius DC reps should have stepped up, I guess they were busy trying to get $27 million for Warren Buffet.

• We were lied to about increasing water rates. We were told this was for fixing infrastructure. It was never mentioned to us at ANY TIME over past 7 years that this money was going into a savings account, let alone a savings account to pay for an administration building.

• We didn’t need an administration building. In fact it would be more fiscally responsible to continue to lease property instead of adding more capital that we have to pay off and maintain. We essentially traded a $100K a year lease payment for $1 million dollar a year mortgage payment. There is nothing in the charter that says the city needs to own it’s own office space for employees. Even our finance director said over 2 years ago it made more sense to lease. The city should also concentrate on using more technology to reduce the number of city employees. They should also work on home work spaces.

Like paying for the indoor pool with a Federal levee bond repayment the mayor has justified an unneeded city building by overcharging us on water rates.

Always on the spin cycle.

 

Posted in: Mayor High Crimes, Mayor Hubris, Mayor Pants on Fire, Mayor Subprime Mike Huether, Mike Huether, Public Utilities, Public Works, Sioux Falls

Are our water rates going up to provide better service?

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UPDATE: This is the results of the Argue Endorser’s poll yesterday.

If you read over all the documents when it comes to our water department you will find some glaring facts. While our city would like to proclaim rates need to go up due to the cost of chemicals, they are only telling HALF of the story, literally. Notice from this chart that 51% of expenses are in wages.

We also have a problem with heavy management (see the convuluted document here)

There should be three managers. Director of Public Works, Director of Water and Director of Reclamation (Sewer). That’s it. Wanna know why rates are going up? Too much management. I don’t have a problem with paying management well. That is not the problem here. There seems to be too much management. Take for instance the ‘Residue coordinator’ and the ‘WW super’ and the ‘collection super’ Couldn’t that be one manager? I work in the restaurant business, and management is expected to know every duty, from washing dishes, grilling a steak to waiting on a table. Not sure why in the public sector they need to have so many specialized managers?

Posted in: Sioux Falls

Have water rates doubled in 5 years?

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Just imagine your property taxes doubling in that amount of time? As you can see from this chart that will be presented today in the SF City council informational meeting;

If you look at a bill in 2007 of a family of 5 it was about $31 a month it is about $61 a month now. That is about a $360 a year hike in a 5 year period. While there may be many justifications for this like infrastructure upgrades and Lewis in Clark, I say poppycock. Lewis and Clark is mearly a ‘backup’ in case we run out of water down the road. And as for infrastructure upgrades, those should have been done yearly with small percentage increases. This is highway robbery and the increases need to end or at least be reasonable. As you can see the ridiculous increases continue into 2013.

Posted in: Sioux Falls

There is only one reason we need to raise water rates in SF; GREED

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The Gargoyle Leader editorial board touched on the rate increase proposals in Sioux Falls today, but they didn’t go far enough;

The item residents had most advance warning on is water rates. In order to pay for the city’s portion of the Lewis & Clark Regional Water System, officials began with annual increases in 2007 that have amounted to a total of 54 percent.

First off, the AL ED board fails to mention that 1) We shouldn’t have paid in advance for something we have not gotten yet (Lewis & Clark) and secondly most of the increases in water fees will go to reserves and new development. While I still think this town is growing to fast, I am not opposed to expanding our water and sewer for new development (though I think developers should pay most of the cost), what bothers me the most is raising rates during an awful recession simply to add to reserve funds. While the rest of us are struggling to pay bills let alone SAVE or INVEST money, the city is raising rates so they can have a savings account? WTF?! If the new council had any balls whatsoever (which I don’t think they do) they would vote down the rate increases, for at least 12 months.

Posted in: Sioux Falls