 The members of that committee are Alderman Buzz Busby as chair,
Alderwoman Marty Neitzel as vice chair, Alderwoman Stacy Bacon,
Alderman David Armbrust and Alderman David Wilmert.
As is normally the case with special committee meetings, all 10
members of the council were present to discuss the issues, along
with Mayor Keith Snyder; Denise Martinek, city clerk; Les Plotner,
city treasurer; and Bill Bates, city attorney.
Busby called the meeting to order and began by telling the group
that currently the city has over $200,000 in uncollected sewer bills
on the books. He noted that $86,000 of that was money due from the
Illinois Department of Corrections for services provided to the
prisons. He then said that there was approximately $130,000 due from
residential clients.
Busby said he wanted to look at turning the billing of the sewage
fees over to Illinois American Water. He said that the company would
bill clients monthly, instead of every four months as the city does,
and that there would be a 99-cent fee for each bill mailed, each
month.
He said he was also estimating that turning the billing over to
Illinois American would save the city about $136,000 in the first
year of the five-year contract and $86,000 each year thereafter.
Alderwoman Melody Anderson, who chairs the finance committee, asked how he had
arrived at those figures, and Busby said that he had taken into
consideration all the costs involved in the current billing process:
an employee, postage expense, office supplies and more, plus he was
considering the high cost of upgrading the billing software the city
currently uses.
He cited that several months ago, WTI, the providers of software
for the city, had quoted $50,000 for a complete upgrade of the
billing system.
Martinek spoke up, though, and said that early estimates from WTI
and information she'd gained from the city of Galesburg indicated
that the cost could be as high as $90,000. However, those estimates
had been based on software that would bill for the sewer service
plus water.
When it was clarified that the city only bills for the sewer, the
software needs changed and the cost became much less.
She also indicated that she had spoken with software providers
other than WTI, and one had estimated a cost of $8,500 for new
software and the training that would be required, while another
company had estimated the cost at around $5,000.
Busby said that in that case, the savings to the city would still
have to be close to $90,000.
Anderson then asked if he was considering passing the
99-cent-per-month fee on to the consumer, and Busby said he was.
"I don't think that's fair." Anderson said. "That is another
sewer increase that our constituents are getting; then they are
going to get another one next year."
Busby countered, though, that perhaps not everyone would see an
increase. He explained that if Illinois American takes over the
sewer billing, the bills will then be based on water consumption.
Because of this, he said that a household of four, which would
use more water than a household of two, would possibly pay more than
the current $80 every four months, while the household of two could
pay considerably less.
The discussion then turned to the other portion of the contract,
the shut-off service, as Wilmert asked for a brief explanation of
everything that was in the contract between the city and Illinois
American Water.
The contract is in two parts, one for the billing and one for the
shut-off service.
The shut-off service agreement would be that for a cost, Illinois
American would turn water off at addresses where the sewer bills
were delinquent.
The cost involved would be $65 for the shut-off and another $65
to have the water turned back on. These costs, the committee agreed,
would be passed to the consumer, meaning they would have to pay
their sewer bill plus $130 to get their water service back.
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Alderman Tom O'Donohue asked if he had read correctly that in addition to the
$130 there would be an expense to the city for the shut-off.
Bates said that was correct. As the contract was presented, there
is a reimbursement from the city to the company for their revenues
lost while the water is shut off.
Wilmert surmised then that the city would not want to order the
shut-off on small accounts. The amount due from the homeowner would
need to be a large amount to justify the payment of lost revenues to
Illinois American.
Bates said that another course of action would be to actually
shut off the sewer. However, he said the cost of doing that
would run upward of $2,500 per sewer disconnect.
Busby said the only other option the city has right now is to
place a lien on the property, and they can only cash in on that if
the property is sold.
But Bates said the sewer bills could be sent to collections,
through him or a collection agency. He noted that in the nine years
he has been city attorney, he has never been asked to enter a sewer
bill into small claims or other court processes.
As the discussions continued, it was brought up that once the
water was shut off, the home would have to be declared
uninhabitable, and from there the residents of the property would
have to be forced to leave the property. Busby said that would be a
health department issue, not a city issue. Bates added, though, that
like the city, the health department is working on a limited budget
this year, and he didn't know that they had the money or manpower to
deal with the issue.
Wilmert said that he didn't know that shutting off the water in
some of these cases would make any difference to the inhabitants. He
indicated that at least some of those who are not paying their sewer
bills wouldn't really care whether they had running water in their
homes or not.
Snyder brought up the fact that in Lincoln, landlords pay the
sewer and residents pay the water bill. Bates said that would indeed
be a problem, and Bacon agreed, saying she'd looked at a list
provided last fall of delinquent accounts and knew that several of
those named were landlords.
Before the meeting concluded, the topic turned back to Illinois
American billing for sewer service, when O'Donohue asked how many
bills the company would generate each month. The answer was
approximately 6,000. The final outcome would be an annual charge of
approximately $72,000 for the service only.
O'Donohue expressed displeasure at putting that amount of money
in the pocket of Illinois American at the expense of city
constituents.
Wilmert asked if the contract could be divided into two parts, so
that the city could perhaps go into an agreement for the shut-off
service and table the billing service to some later date.
Busby said he thought that could be done. He asked that Snyder,
Anderson and Bates accompany him in a meeting with Illinois American
to discuss the contract.
At the end of the meeting, Busby polled the committee members
regarding their feelings on the billing. Of the five members, Bacon,
Neitzel and Wilmert all said they were not in favor of a billing
agreement with Illinois American Water at this time. The committee
also polled in favor of pursuing an agreeable contract for the
shut-off service.
[By NILA SMITH]
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