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Letters to the EditorsWater rate increase won't work
© St. Petersburg Times, published January 10, 2001 Re: Raising the price would help conserve water, Dec. 31 guest column. I normally don't respond to columns but I will to refute Geoff Nunn on raising water rates to curb usage. This proposal is possibly one of the worst for many reasons. First, people of fixed and low incomes would shoulder most of the burden. Families with large numbers of children can't stop giving their children baths or cleaning their clothes. Elderly people would again face a choice of which necessity to sacrifice: water, food or medicine. Meanwhile, the affluent would see this increase as no more than an inconvenience. Second, once you empower government with the right to increase revenue, chances of it ever being lowered are nil. Third, the progressive way to solve any problem is to deal with it before it becomes unmanageable. The time for action by Swiftmud, Pinellas County, Tampa Bay Water and others was 15 to 20 years ago. That is when reclaimed water lines should have been laid to keep up with future demand. Unfortunately too much time has passed, and now they are playing a game of catch-up. But to my chagrin, the game is not being played fairly. Pinellas County Utilities is targeting big users or abusers of water for its upcoming reclaimed-water projects. Affluent people are being supplied reclaimed water while our smaller subdivisions are being passed by even though the main line will run by my front door. Fourth, by not watering outdoor plants, bushes and grass, we would be setting up the environment for a disaster. Without grass to hold the soil, rains will wash sand and sediment into roads and storm systems that are not designed for that. Property values will fall and in turn erode the tax base. The time is at hand for desalination plants. Saltwater is one of the most abundant and cheap resources that we have. The plants won't be cheap, but at least it is a long-term solution for generations to come.
Raising water rates is ridiculousRe: Raising the price would help conserve water, Dec. 31 guest column. The suggestion to raise the price to conserve water is ridiculous. If one wants an example of how raising the price results in reduced usage, just look at how it affected the consumption of gasoline. The only result of a price increase would be to further burden low-income people. What is needed is an increased supply or curtailing the number of new users. The curtailment of new users and raising the money to expand supply facilities could be accomplished by imposing a substantial impact fee on all new construction.
Other solutions better than rate increaseRe: Raising the price would help conserve water, Dec. 31 guest column. Raising taxes to conserve water -- is this really necessary or fair? Even the poorest person has a right to clean drinking water. There are simpler solutions if we have the will. Here they are: Cut the valves back on your sinks. You won't even notice the difference when you are brushing your teeth or washing -- in fact, it is better: less force and splashing. Xeriscape or use recycled water on yards. Now you have helped clean the environment, saved drinking water and have a green yard. These two simple methods alone could reduce consumption by nearly two-thirds. I did it four years ago and reduced usage from an average of about 90,000 gallons a year to less than 30,000 gallons in a household of two plus company. Ultimately, this is not a matter of money but a matter of water for everyone. We don't need to tax everyone; just put a penalty on the bill of excessive consumers. That's fair, isn't it? We will conserve, or pay the consequences.
Raise rates of those who are responsibleRe: Raising the price would help conserve water, Dec. 31 guest column by Geoffrey Nunn. If Mr. Nunn were a resident of Florida 27 years ago, he should have heard the same water shortage story that we hear about today. The story back in those days was that building should be curtailed because if it continued, we wouldn't have enough water to go around. Twenty-seven years later, it now is advocated that the people bear the brunt of somebody else's lack of knowledge and mistakes. I say, let's put the burden where it belongs. Go back three years and levy a water surcharge of 50 cents per month per unit on all high-rise owners, multiple-dwelling complex owners, mobile home park owners, restaurants, golf courses, laundries and car washes. And second, when Swiftmud can come up with a date and time agreeable to all communities, take a meter reading and penalize each offender using more than his or her normal mean water usage and assess a $100 fine per infraction. Also, build desalination plants along the east and west coast. Please don't charge everyone a flat rate, because everyone is not to blame for what the masterminds haven't been able to figure out in the past 27 years.
Economics of increase doesn't add upRe: Raising the price would help conserve water, Dec. 31 guest column by Geoffrey Nunn. This column, written by a retired economics professor, suggests raising the price of water to slow down its use. Then, so as not to consider it a tax increase, he proposes returning that money by reducing property taxes. As I see it, this causes a few problems: 1) Renters do not own real estate. 2) Increase in price does not slow down the affluent from using water. 3) The affluent again reap the benefits of the masses that do conserve. By far, the majority of letter writers about this issue suggest a building moratorium as the short-term solution. The very best idea to solve the water problem was reaffirmed by a Tarpon Springs man in his Jan. 2 letter. There are 5-million gallons of fresh water flowing into the Gulf of Mexico each day from the springs supplying Crystal River alone. Other rivers in northern Florida also supply the gulf with additional millions of gallons each day. If American ingenuity could build the Alaska pipeline, a few hundred miles of water pipe should be a cakewalk. Desalination facilities on Tampa Bay are not only a bad idea, but they would be a disaster for the ecology. What I would like to see is for the hundreds of concerned people writing letters to get together and help solve this water problem, not only for us, but also for the coming generations.
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