Leave it to the Arizona Republic to take the position that the City of Phoenix water rates aren’t high enough. In fact, the shadowy “editorial board,“ an assemblage that we are to believe writes in unison, takes that editorial view.
The rate hike will be nominal, we are told. It would add “about $1.59 per month” to the bill of the average Phoenix residential customer. It would be the first water rate increase in nearly four years. We should go for it…and then some, since its such a bargain. The sub rosa authors remind us we live in a desert and the pipes do a yeoman’s job carrying water here and there.
Though we are continually told by the newspaper’s open borders liberals who crank out their daily pap, “our immigration system is broken,” they make no such claim about the water pipes. Instead they turn to the director of the Phoenix Water Services Department speaking governmentese, who says, “This rate increase is about enabling a steady level of investment in the rehabilitation and replacement of aging infrastructure so that we can continue to provide reliable water deliveries out here in the middle of the desert.”
There’s that “desert” jargon again, as if the approximately 1.5 million Phoenix customers don’t know where they live.
City Council members are expected to vote on the proposed hike in water and sewer rates at a public hearing scheduled for 2:30 p.m. today. And, wouldn’t you know, the City neglected to advise us of that 2.6 percent increase in our bill — though the editorial advises the council to vote for the rate increase.
Here are the facts as they appear on the monthly City of Phoenix Services Bill which is misidentified as the “water bill”:
Water Base Fee
Water Usage Fee
Environmental Mandates – Water
City Services Tax
Sewer Fee
Environmental Mandates – Sewer
State Mandated Jail Costs
City Sales Tax
State and Other Taxes
——————–
Solid Waste Services
Refuse
State Landfill Disposal Fee
We need to pay more for all of these obscure charges and hidden fees. The newspaper says so. End of story.
Seeing Red AZ 
Typical government shell game. List it as a fee and give it a new name. The put in with a bunch of other non-descriptive items and you have a tax increase that isn’t called a tax increase. Some day I hope the government employees realize they are just like us, tax payers.
More slickery trickery from the City of Phoenix, the Mayor, council and their willing propagandists at The AZ Repugnant.
Even the council members who vote against this rate increase will be doing so because they know in advance how the votes will go and theirs won’t be needed to pull off this latest heist. In this regard they are no different from the congressional vote counters who can then return to their home districts and tell us how they tried in vain to stop the rolling train. I’ve become seriously suspicious of them all.
The city council meetings should be held in the evenings when working stiffs like me can attend and have our say. By the way, in reference to the water rates not going up in four years, I haven’t had a raise in that same period of time. Many of us are just glad to be working.
The newspaper’s numbers are unadulterated BS! We are two working adults gone throughout the day. Many of our clothes are dry cleaned, so the washer get minimum usage. Our dishwasher is only turned on when he have a full load. We have desert landscaping, but do have a pool. I just pulled our last City of Phoenix water bill and see that though the “base water fee” was just under $5.00, our “water usage fee” was nearly $90.00. The “sewer fee” was over $60.00. The combined environmental “mandates” were close to “$27.00!! Something labeled “refuse” which is either weekly garbage or quarterly curb side junk and trimmings pickup is nearly $29.00 a month. On top of this we are dinged for “city sales tax” and “state and other taxes” to the tune of about $13 bucks a month. Can anyone explain why we are hit with “jail costs” on the water bill?? Our last “water bill” was in well in excess of $200!! And, no, we do not have a leak, although that’s what the city suggests when we’ve complained about our sky high bill. (We hired a plumber and a hydraulics engineer to check.) The city will not budge.
I located the article in which this opinion/sewage was printed. The newspaper along with the City of Phoenix both lie with the claim that with the combined increases in sewer and water rates, the average residential bill would be bumped to “about $59.77 per month.” We live in Phoenix and our bill is many times that amount.
Vote all the bums out and if you still subscribe, cancel the newspaper!
I drove down to Phoenix on Sunday, after having not been there in several years. What a dump! As with places like Philadelphia, if you venture a few blocks from the tourist zone, it’s ugly; dirty, and downright scarey.
And what about all of those traffic signals in Phoenix that, for years, have had the ability to give a left turn signal? It appears that despite all the hundreds of intersection accidents, no one in Phoenix has ever activated those left hand turn signal lights.
Off Topic, but there is this:
Obama is apparently giving a televised town hall on CNN on Thursday, which will be hosted by Anderson Cooper. The prez will be taking questions from the audience. (And we are supposed to believe that the members of the audience and their questions are random. Yeah, right.)
In his gun control speech on Monday, Obama referred to himself 76 times. HIs insatiable quest for adoration is pathological.
For several years Brazil has advised its residents to pee in the shower to “save the rain forest.” No Joke. Maybe Phoenix will add that advice to its next bloated water bill?