Sewers, Infrastructure Repairs

Today's Journal story.....

GOVERNMENT SPENDING

Butler County cities must repair critical water, sewer lines piece by piece

Butler County’s two largest cities will spend nearly $10 million this year repairing aging water and sewer lines.

More than $7.2 million worth of water, sanitary and storm water repair work is scheduled in Middletown for 2013.

Out of 63 southwest Ohio water and sewer providers, Hamilton ranks 34th least expensive city for those two utilities, according to the city of Oakwood’s 2012 water and sewer study. Middletown rates 18th.

“I think we’ve been doing a better job of our utilities, slowly but surely,” said Preston Combs, Middletown’s interim public works and utilities director. “We do have a little more ability budgetarily to deal with some of these than we do our streets. But it’s still a slow improvement.”

The city has an easier time paying for utility work that paving and repairing roads, he said, because of the city’s water, storm water and sewer enterprise funds, which are funded through utility bills.

“It’s not to say we have unlimited money, because to do this work we have to have water and sewer rate increases,” Combs said. “If we want to do a better job to take care of any one of these utilities, we need to raise rates to bring in more money.”

AH YES, THE OLD "RAISE WATER AND SEWER RATES TO MAINTAIN" THEME FROM PRESTON COMBS. THE AUTOMATIC ANSWER TO EVERY PROBLEM IN MIDDLETOWN. BEAT ON THE RESIDENTS. DRAIN THE OLD WALLET.


Like more than 770 communities in the United States, Middletown is in the middle of negotiating with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to address the overflow of the city’s combined storm water and sanitary sewer system.

The unfunded federal mandate to significantly reduce the number of overflow events could cost tens of millions of dollars, according to city officials. However, a true dollar figure won’t be known until next year, Combs said. This could also result in sewer fees tripling in order to accomplish it, Combs said
WELL, SON OF A GUN, PRESTON SAID IT AGAIN......."SEWER FEES TRIPLING"
PEOPLE IN THIS CITY CAN'T AFFORD YOUR ANSWER TO THE PROBLEM PRESTON. WHY DO YOU CITY PEOPLE WAIT UNTIL IT BECOMES A CRISIS BEFORE YOU ACT ON ANYTHING, THEN GOUGE THE HECK OUT OF THE PEOPLE TO FOOT THE BILL? WHAT HAPPENED TO THE IDEA OF PREVENTATIVE MAINTENANCE ALL THESE YEARS? AND WHAT ABOUT THAT FUND WE HAVE TALKED ABOUT THAT WAS SUPPOSE TO HELP TAKE CARE OF THIS SITUATION? WHERE DID THE MONEY GO FOR THAT?