Bevirt: Stormwater Fee Well Publicized

By Tom Bevirt

By now, you have received a notice that you will pay about $36 per property for a waste water fee. So what is this about and why were so many of you calling the city complaining that you did not know anything about this? I will try to explain a complicated situation.

The state informed all cities that they had to do a study of their waste water problem, then do something about it based on guidelines put down by them.

This is a mandated program. If the cities don't do it, they get fined. Our information from a citizens review and studies indicated that it would cost the city about $385,000 to abide by this mandate.

Therefore, since the city is having financial problems, as are most cities, the money has to come from somewhere, thus the fee. The city held at the . About six citizens showed up per meeting.

They also put all of the information on the city's web site. The subject was and other news media. This went on for about six months. Therefore, the city made every attempt to inform the citizens that this was coming.

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