Only in the pea-brained world of government does this make any sense. From Georgia:
Fulton to increase water rates 15 percent
Fulton County officials praised county water users Wednesday for their success at conservation — then socked them with a 15 percent rate increase for their effort.
The conservation penalty the County Commission adopted Wednesday 6-0 matches the increase Atlanta utility officials asked to impose earlier this year but which the City Council so far has resisted. The average water/sewer bill should increase nearly $9 per month to a total of about $68 per month, water officials said.
Why raise rates on water? Well, because the conservation has cut revenues:
Utility managers said water use has dropped by as much as 30 percent since last year when Gov. Sonny Perdue asked each county to cut usage by at least 10 percent because of the lingering drought. That has Fulton facing potential default on its bonds, said Angela Parker, public works director.
“We just can’t swallow this reduction in revenues,” Parker said.
She said Fulton one day might roll back the rates if the drought ends and revenues return to pre-drought levels.
Riiight.
This is Fulton county doing this. Apparently the city of Atlanta is trying to do the same thing but has been blocked so far.
No good deed goes unpunished, right?
Every single time, the government will expect you, not them, to do more with less.
Its the lib way isnt it? Getting less service for more money.
Comment by WMD_Maker — May 9, 2008 @ 10:16 am
I’m honestly surprised they didn’t try and call the increase a Global Warming Fee. They might as well, since everything bad that happens can be attributed to Global Warming Hoax.
Comment by TheBad — May 9, 2008 @ 3:18 pm
They are doing the same thing down here in South Florida. We are in a drought and The South Florida Water Management District, a Florida Government Body, says I can only water my lawn (due my address number) 1 day Sundays between 5 & 7 am or get fined up to $5000 per incident. Then the localities, because they are loosing money in water bills, doubled my water costs. Talk about can’t win for loosing.
Comment by Steve — May 9, 2008 @ 6:24 pm
Ooooooorrrrrrr, we could reduce handouts to the low life, non tax paying illegals that are breathing my air, using my water, making me pay for their health care and writing bad checks. But that just wouldn’t be fair, would it?
Comment by Submariner — May 9, 2008 @ 9:19 pm
Once again liberalism always generates the exact opposite of its stated intent.
Comment by Braden — May 10, 2008 @ 7:09 am
Sometimes I just have to laugh at the hypocrisy. I used to just get angry, but that never seems to help. Maybe if the liberals keep doing things like this they will just push voters towards conservatives.
Comment by Toni — May 10, 2008 @ 8:31 pm
They are doing this in Charlotte, NC as well. Since they aren’t bringing in enough money, because they told us to conserve, now they are raising the rates. Ironically, they say the way to keep our bill low, even after they jack the rate, is to conserve more water. Yeah, that’s worked out well for us so far….
Comment by steve — May 11, 2008 @ 12:36 pm