The Common Council met 02/16/2022. Two items were separated out for individual votes. The first was the request to extend the development agreement with Bela Development, LLC by 12 months. The second was a request from a property owner for a credit adjustment for water use between May 29, 2021 and June 11, 2021 of $65.98.
This item had been discussed extensively at the 02/08/2022 Utilities Committee meeting and was eventually recommended for approval by a 3-1 vote even though the property owner failed to meet all of the criteria to receive a credit adjustment as set out in the city’s Water Leak Policy because she did not have an AquaHawk account established prior to the onset of the water leak.
Alderperson Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) was the alderperson who requested the item be separated out and started the discussion out by saying that at the conclusion of the Utilities Committee meeting there had been a question as to whether landlords were able to access the AquaHawk water usage monitoring system even if they were not the individuals being billed for the water. She asked if Director of Public Works Paula Vandehey could speak to that.
Mayor Woodford allowed the question because it was a topic of general interest, but cautioned the Council that the discussion would not be allowed to stray from whether or not to approve the credit adjustment.
Director Vandehey said that a landlord could sign up for AquaHawk; however, they would have to either get the account information needed to sign up directly from their tenant or the tenant could sign a consent form allowing the city to provide that information to the land lord. Since it was private information, the city didn’t want to give it out to anyone who might call and say they are a landlord, hence the consent form.
Alderperson Nate Wolff (District 12) said he supported giving the credit adjustment.
Alderperson Chad Doran (District 15) was the member of the Utilities Committee who had voted against approving the adjustment. He thought a lot of emotion had been shared during the meeting and said, “I think any of us who would find ourselves in this situation having a water leak and a pretty hefty bill from the city would be pretty upset about it, but I think our job in this instance is to separate the emotion and kind of the feelings that we have for this property owner from our responsibility which is to the rate payers of the water utility who will bear the cost of this and any other water credit request that we get. Now, granted this is a small amount of money but the issue is really should we or shouldn’t we, and the rules that the city has in place for requesting a credit are pretty clear, and those requirements were not met. And I don’t believe we should be approving this credit. Because, as I said, the rules are clear and they were not met, so I encourage my colleagues to vote no on approving this request.”
Alderperson Vered Meltzer (District 2) who was also a member of the Utilities Committee and had voted in favor of the credit adjustment said, “I’m gonna ask all of my colleagues to support this request for a credit adjustment. [I] think that there are a lot of very strict rules and regulations that the public service commission requires us to follow. They have a formula that has calculated an allowable credit. I think with any system if you have to completely alienate any sense of humanity or compassion in order to work within that system then that’s a flawed system.
“So, the Public Service Commission does have this formula. I believe the requirements for providing this credit have been met. This is $65.98. Just given the whole context of the situation and the frustration that the people might have and that desire to get a bill waived, we—again at our discussions at committee we talked about how we do need to be very sensitive not to put an excess burden onto the rate payers. I do not believe that $65.98 is an excess burden, and I believe this is our opportunity to show compassion and humanity in this situation and move forward and work on communicating more about the tools that we have at hand such as AquaHawk to prevent situations from—like this from happening in the future.”
Alderperson Wolff agreed and said, “The events leading up to this situation are tragic and unfortunate, and this is something very small that the city can do to help out in this situation.” [I’m assuming that the tragic situation he referred to was a miscarriage experienced by the tenant who refused to pay the utility bill, leaving the landlord with the bill.]
Alderperson Michael Smith (District 10) was also a Utilities Committee member who had voted in favor of the credit adjustment. He wanted to clarify that the amount the property owner had requested was much greater than the $65 they approved. He also said, “The protocol was followed. It was looked at by the departments to see what they could do, and this is what they could do without being in violation or doing contrary to the guidelines we have to follow, so that’s why we voted to support—to grant this request.”
Alderperson Joe Martin (District 4) was opposed to granting the credit adjustment and said, “I would ask my colleagues to defeat this. There is a not only history in the policy but the policy has something to stand on. We have rules and the city is responsible to the rate payers…You’re going down a really slippery slope, and so I’d like to ask my colleagues to defeat this.”
Alderperson Hartzheim agreed that this was a slippery slope, and said, “We are responsible to all the rate payers. While it seems that $65 is a very minimal thing, this could be something else in the future, and we are leading to setting a precedent.”
Alderperson Meltzer disagreed. “I do not believe this is a slippery slope. I believe the Public Service Commission, with all of their due responsibility and power, have very strict rules that we have to follow, and there was a formula that calculated this allowable credit adjustment and something violating that formula would not be permissible. There are safeguards against that slippery slope. We are not on the slippery slope.”
Alderperson Wolff said he agreed they were not on a slippery slope, but then said, “We are setting a precedent here, and I would say that the city didn’t communicate with landlords effectively in letting them know that they could sign up their tenants for AquaHawk which would have caught this…. Mistakes happen, but I do think that the city holds some accountability in this situation, and this is something we can to do at least help.”
Alderperson Kristine Alfheim (District 11) didn’t think the issue was about $65 but about accountability. When she looked at the timeline of events, “I see that there was a meter reading—again we all get our quarterly bills—on 8/1 of a certain dollar amount, of 11/1 of a certain dollar amount, and then all of a sudden in February it almost doubles and then in May it more than doubles again.” When she received a utility bill that was higher than normal, she immediately investigated her situation and looked into why it had increased. “All of us as responsible home owners or renters understand we have to look at our bills and see what’s going on and be our own best representative in making calls to ask ‘why’ sooner. I appreciate the situation that she’s in, but I think $65 either way is not going to make, you know, a great situation no matter what. But I do believe that accountability at some point in time does need to fall to us to manage our business of daily living which is to watch our bills and start asking why when the time comes, and I think this is a good reminder that it is on us first and really the government cannot take care of everything for us every step of the way. So, I will be voting against it.”
Alderperson Doran wanted to touch on Alderperson Wolff’s suggestion that the city had not its job to communication. The timeline showed the communications that were given. The city also has the AquaHawk program about which it routinely communication. “The responsibility here doesn’t fall on the city. If you don’t put your trash out on garbage day it’s not the city’s fault it doesn’t get picked up. If you don’t fix the leak in your toilet that’s causing you to have a higher water bill it’s not the city’s fault. It’s your responsibility as a homeowner. It’s not the city’s fault.”
Alderperson Smith felt they were picking apart a little thing and pointed out that the request was approved by the departments and brought to the committee to approve. There was a reason the $65 figure was brought to the committee. He asked Director Vandehey to clear us where that number came from.
Director Vandehey answered, “That calculation was based on the day that the criteria hit the thresholds that we set up and the day that [the property owner] received the notice. And I think if you recall there was a time when the postal service was really lagging so it took quite a bit of time for that notice to get to her. I think our argument was she would have had the toilet leak fixed sooner if she would have received the notice from the city sooner. So, the calculation that we did was for those days, from the day we noticed it ’til the day the toilet leak was fixed. So, it’s based on the Public Service Commission rate reduction but then it’s timed by those dates. If she would have had the AquaHawk set up, she would have gotten a greater credit than the $65.”
Before proceeding with further discussion Mayor Woodford pointed out that they had been discussing the item for a while and had heard a number of different points of view on the issue. If anyone had anything new to contribute, he invited them to speak, but if not, he asked that they move the discussion along.
No one had anything to add so they took the vote. The item was approved 9-5 with Alderpersons William Siebers (District 1), Meltzer, Katie Van Zeeland (District 5), Denise Fenton (District 6), Maiyoua Thao (District 7), Matt Reed (District 8), Alex Schultz (District 9), Smith, and Wolf voting to approve it, and Alderpersons Brad Firkus (District 3), Martin, Alfheim, Hartzheim, and Doran voting against it.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=917288&GUID=027ACB1D-AF8C-4480-B87D-52B8D0EF1B95
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