Addendum to "Mayor's Dumb Comment"

As is customary--and sincerely appreciated by residents--Gyula Kiss has some comments that follow the newspaper story, entitled Mayor's Dumb Comment, on a dry cleaner's permanent closure because of the area's ridiculously-high water rates.

Here's Gyula Kiss' "take" on it:

Surprisingly, nobody seems to know the reasons for the high price of water. Those in charge are not interested in my opinion but I might be able to shed some light on the reasons for the high cost of water. Here are some of the reasons:

1.     Wasted too much money on altering the recently improved VID system. It needed no changes. Wasted infrastructure cost about $40-45 million.

2.     Overestimated water demand and sized the capacity of the MWP accordingly, significantly increasing costs.

3.     Procrastinated with the MWP. 15 years passed since the original plan was announced in 2002 and it is still not finalized.

4.     Doubled the 2004 Referendum approved borrowing by collecting cash over and above the approved $35 million during the past 12 years.

5.     Ignoring the results of the 2014 Referendum and continuing to collect direct cash from customers in order to avoid going back to ratepayers for their approval.

Those are some of the reasons for the high water rates. Keep watching: those rates will continue escalating and reaching to the stars. 

In contrast, Kelowna is going to solve their identical problem by removing domestic customers for the South East Kelowna Irrigation District (SEKID) irrigation lines and extending Kelowna's domestic water supply from Okanagan Lake to the current SEKID domestic customers. Total estimated cost: $64 million. Learn more about Kelowna's plan here.

GVWU's estimated cost: over $200 million. Wasted time over 15 years. 

More wasted money: continue treating water for agricultural irrigation estimated to be $1-2 million annually. You, the domestic customer foot the bill. The agriculture community does not need treated irrigation water.

Could it be improved? I say yes. Staff say no. An independent reviewer is needed to review the plan and possible alternatives. Kelowna will do it's plan for less than a third of the cost and no wasted water on agricultural irrigation.

Just my opinion now!"

And Gyula just did!
Thank you, sir!