Obviously, meant appropriate use of retirees. One little secret Infurna and alderman have is approving Dolan's transfers of some of his city hall PR staff -- some of whom work PT for FT bennies -- to the Water and Sewer account. That way they pay for some salaries by jacking rates even more.
Well, it's now the ritual time of year for members of the BOA to wring its hands about how utterly helpless it is to do anything more than has already been done to manage rate increases, and how much they regret this situation. And for local press to be helpless to probe this further.
I still smile whenever i think of that override getting flushed down the toilet by the realistic people in our city.
Tells you all you need to know about the political corruption in this single party state!So all you good Democrats - hold your nose, cover your ears, and mask your face - while you pull that lever or fill in that circle in the voting booth - 'cause the shame is on you!
Clean the swamp and Melrose will change.
The full corrupt details about the way water and sewer rates have been calculate on truth about the Enterprise funds, ... for starters.
Water is going up 1-2% this year. Sewer is not going up, although I think there is a small increase in the base charges - I'm sure this will all be explained at the next Appropriations meeting. The rates in Melrose are ridiculous compared to other communities, but I will say that last year there was no increase and this year is minimal. I'll take that as a win, but our infrastructure has been neglected for decades.... I think the Administration is waking up to the fact that we need to invest $$ in these areas for the sake of all residents. They own it - so fix it with the dollars you are collecting.
Who would be tried in court and possibly go to jail, if a forensic audit were conducted....?
Here's the memo detailing the increases - which would effectively be $20 more for the first 2000 cf, and $1.30 more on each 100 cf above that.
http://melrosecityma.iqm2.com/citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=3308&Inline=True
That's it. I'm buying 5,000 shares in the KY company.
I already did. Go to the agenda packet. Base sewer rates are going up about 40%.
Substantial water and sewer rate increases will kill any hope for new $ for schools or anything else!
Water and sewer rates will always go up substantially. It is the only slush fund the mayor and aldermen can tap within their legal but unethical balancing of the city budget without reconstructing services and moving PT city workers (currently 450) to the unemployment line. They get FT health insurance (18K) and FT life pensions after 10 years "work." Currently, Melrose ranks No. 3 of the 66 MRA cities and towns in most expensive water and sewer rates.
Investor #2
"Base sewer rates are going up about 40%."
Where did you get that from?
Base fees are not increasing (sewer is automatically 90% of water unless you have a special meter for non-sewer water usage, which is a pain to get) as best I can tell from the agenda packet (which explicitly says they aren't changing). On the first 2000cf, the percentage increase is ~1.6%; over 200cf, it's 1.5% more.
I don't say this because I am a fan of how the city has handled the water/sewer budget-billing system, mind you. Indeed, I wonder if some folks in City Hall may finally be wondering if how ratepayers have reacted to the shift in that system in recent years has dampened the appetite of the same ratepayers voting for an override (hint: those folks in City Hall should be wondering more about that and looking at how past mishandling and shuffling folks/line items around to get paid off the water/sewer coffers has further degraded trust in what City Hall folk say about our fiscal needs. I would tell them the water/sewer stuff is an own-goal in that regard, and they should pay more attention to unwinding the damage it created before proposing an override).
Sewer Rates for Quarterly Billing Customers (based on 90% consumption if no
irrigation meter)
BBase Sewer Charges Quarterly Base Fee
Up to 1 inch Meter $14.25 19.95
1 1/2 inch Meter $55.93 78.48
2 inch Meter $87.19 122.37
3 inch Meter $160.13 224.76
4 inch Meter $264.33 371.07
6 inch Meter $524.83 736.83
Column 1 is crossed out and replaced with column 2
Thanks. It's odd (to this layman) that they do that in two separate orders that appear to conflict with each other. I made the mistake of assuming that the top item was the actual proposal and that the rest was preceding background....
Sure. I cut and pasted this right from the agenda packet, pg 10 or 11, if I remember correctly. Sorry MM wouldn't let me edit and make the columns a little less jumbled.
The City from paying over $2,000,000.00 from the enterprise fund for cityside salaries that have nothing to do with water and sewer.
No override should be taken seriously.
A forensic audit of the whole city's finances regardless of and prior to the override issue. There is pervasive fraud. One need only watch PdR's oily displays, complete with kindergarten patronizing waving around of his papers and charts to the half-shell and tv "audience" to see how hard he's working to convince us all of the veracity of his numbers. No one who's telling the truth would be behaving that way. Why the elected officials aren't calling him out openly, especially when he denigrates members of the public and even aldermen as "ignorant" (on tv no less!), is beyond belief. Don Conn did not come through in many regards, but he did openly call out this kind of slimy dog-and-pony show of PdR and JS on more than one occasion (just not consistently/often enough). What's wrong with SF for allowing this??? We know why MM bites her tongue because she knows that she's surrounded by spineless sycophants by and large and will only be treated abusively again and again (with literally zero on that body stepping up and ending the abuse). Now basically both BOA and SC are useless, with only the occasional flicker of something (MM or SF) surfacing briefly with some actual scrutiny and due diligence. This is what Melrose votes for and all it deserves as it stands now.
Everywhere you go the prices have increased by five to seven dollars. You can't win pay goes up and everything else too.