ALL WET ON WATER BILLS

Granted, it’s a modest amount of money, but it’s unreasonable to charge every Calgary water customer 30 or 40 cents each month to compensate for people who rack up huge bills.

Sadly, this seems to be the city’s approach to most challenges: charge Calgarians more, with little regard for their ability to pay. There never seems to be much effort expended in looking for efficiencies or ways of economizing so that taxpayers aren’t asked to contribute more.

The city plans to start budgeting $1.5 million a year for refunds for those who complain about their Enmax water bills, but surely not every customer should have to feel the pain. The key is to ensure water meters can be relied upon to accurately measure consumption. Once that’s been achieved, it’s appropriate to waive a sky-high water bill on one occasion while a customer deals with an unintended leak.

Exorbitant water bills have been an embarrassment for the city. Hundreds of invoices have been inspected and approximately $947,000 was returned to customers in the past two years. Under the city’s recent policy, Calgarians who unintentionally use three times their average seasonal volume of water may be eligible for reimbursement.

Such a policy is fine, but Enmax and the city should absorb the expense themselves and consider it part of the cost of doing business. If you go to a restaurant, after all, you don’t expect to pick up the tab for a fellow diner who eats more than he’s entitled to. By the same logic, Calgarians who limit their water use shouldn’t have to pay for those who consume more — whether by design or a faulty toilet.

The city says only about 20 of its 345,000 customers receive hefty water bills each month that cannot be explained. In most other cases, it can be attributed to undetected leaks in toilets, irrigation systems or hot tubs. In cases where the excessive usage cannot be explained, the utility is now dispatching a technician at a cost of $600 per visit. Seriously, who gets paid $600 to make a house call?

The fact is, Enmax, which is owned by the city, is a very lucrative company. Each year, it pays a dividend to the city, which in 2016, was a whopping $47 million. In 2013, the dividend was $67.5 million.

Rather than keep asking Calgarians to contribute more money toward the operation of the city and its services, city council should be more resourceful.

It should find the $1.5 million it anticipates returning to water users in existing budgets. Calgarians have grown weary of continually getting soaked.