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Home My WebLink About06-17-2014 pc schmidtKremke, Kate From: Mejia, Anthony Sent: Friday, June 20, 2014 11:51 AM To: Kremke, Kate Subject: FW: More misuse of city utility user funds Attachments: madonna sewer payment.doc; council annual water report.doc; council water fees to gen govt.doc Agenda Correspondence for 06/17/14 Public Comment. Anthony J. Mejia i City Clerk (:rt,y ol., sml I ms omspo 9 )o Palm Street `sari Luis Obispo, ("A 9 401 tel 1805,78-1,-7102 JUN 20 2014 AGENDA CORRESPONDENCE 6 ` ' 7'� Date i G tem #� From: Richard Schmidt [mailto:slobuild @ yahoo.com] Sent: Thursday, June 19, 2014 9:24 PM To: Marx, Jan; Ashbaugh, John; Christianson, Carlyn; Smith, Kathy; Carpenter, Dan Cc: Mejia, Anthony Subject: More misuse of city utility user funds Dear Council Members, Attached are three more letters about different aspects of the misuse of our city utility user funds -- i.e., the fees we supposedly pay for water and sewer service which are being used for non - service items ranging from public relations to handouts for city cronies to paying Ms. Lichtig's and Ms. Dietrick's inflated salaries. I missed getting two of these to you in a timely way for Tuesday's meeting, but still wanted to make my disgust at how these funds are being spent improperly known to you. The third letter is about a non - agenda item entailing still more waste of user fees. Sincerely, Richard Schmidt Re: C -6 June 17, Agenda Dear Council Members, Am I to understand this agreement as follows: • The city will turn over to the Madonnas $509,337 in funds generated from sewer rate- payers' sewer charges so that ... Well, why, exactly? Because somebody at city hall in the past did some work with a handshake with Alex, and the Madonna heirs are now using the lack of legal documentation as an excuse for legal extortion? Wow, wait till the word gets out about that maneuver! • How, exactly, does this payment benefit the sewer customer ratepayers, who are providing the funds? • Why should this be charged to sewer ratepayers? If it's justified at all, why isn't it a general city expense since the ratepayers had no part in the deal- making that led to the alleged "problem" that's being "resolved" by this half million dollar handout? I find the reasoning, that this payment to the Madonnas is less than it would have cost to rebuild the thing, to be hollow, shallow, and without merit. The real question is why is it justified at all? This wouldn't be the first handout of public funds to the Madonnas. When the Target site was being developed, the city — instead of having "development pay its own way" as the general plan and the law say it must — opted to raid "neighborhood flood maintenance" funds to the tune of 6 figures to save the Madonnas the cost of making Prefumo Creek safe for their project. Meanwhile, thanks to that diversion, serious flood dangers continue to exist all over town, putting residents' lives and their properties in totally unnecessary danger — and no matter how many times this is pointed out to the Council, nothing happens to correct those dangers. In fact, Ms. Lichtig has said she thinks it's just fine residents live with things as they are, even referring to one rock - clogged culvert as being in the best shape it could be for facing winter's storms. Our sewer user funds are supposed to be used for the direct benefit of sewer ratepayers, not as payoffs to city cronies. This appears to be yet another example of padding utility user fees to accomplish ends that are at best tangential, at worst unrelated, to the alleged reason for charging those fees in the first place, the provision of utilities to the broad public. The Council needs to use greater oversight, commonsense and common decency in setting and using the city's utility fees. I urge you to turn down this request to hand over a half million dollars to the Madonnas for what appear to be frivolous reasons. Sincerely, Richard Schmidt June 17, 2014 Re: Annual Water Quality Report Dear Council Members, I'd like to comment once again on the shameful padding of our utility bills by charging the costs of unnecessary PR fluff to them. Previously I've commented several times on "Resource," a silly bit of fluff mailed to utility customers many times per year whose cost is added onto utility bills. We all learned from Carrie Mattingly's straight - forward responses to my recent questions that "Resource" costs utility users about $11 K per issue. That's a significant amount of padding for an unwanted and unnecessary bit of junk mail added onto our utility rates many times per year. NOW, in addition to the recent special edition and subsequent regular edition of "Resource," WE'VE RECEIVED YET ANOTHER PRETTY FULL -COLOR SPECIAL MAILING FROM UTILITIES, "ANNUAL WATER QUALITY REPORT." There's every reason to suspect this publication is comparable in cost to "Resource." And that's three special big glossy mailers in just over one month! How many $11 K fluffs do you think it is decent to tack onto our utility bills in a year? There is no reason communications from "utilities" to customers need to exist in their current format. You could, for example, put simple inserts into utility bills providing NECESSARY utilities information, including your required annual water quality report. Use of utility bill inserts for other notices (for example, seasonal fire abatements, and the resident survey included in the current bill) proves this is possible, at a substantially reduced cost to utility customers and the environment. (Just think of all the trees you'd not need to kill to create those big glitzy flyers if you used a little insert instead!) It is bizarre that utility bill inserts are used for these tangential purposes, but are not used for straight - forwardly communicating utility information at minimal cost. There also needs to be some discipline about what is sent by utilities, about content, and about how it is prepared (the PR agency junk in "Resource" is barf- inducing for anyone with a functioning brain, and professional PR is a huge unnecessary economic drain on the city — we really don't need our water charges to pay for fishing propaganda for "the other rock "). It seems you've given Utilities license to send out whatever they please, and just pass the cost along to those who throw it into the trash along with their other junk mail. The mayor is on record as saying there's nothing the Council can do to lower water and sewer fees. That's just plain not true. Simply by eliminating the wasteful publications mailed out by the Utilities Department, you could give us all a nice little monetary reward. I'm asking you to do just that. Put an immediate end to this conspicuous anti - environmental waste, and lower our bills accordingly. Even if it's only a couple of dollars per month reduction, it would show you care — about our pocketbooks, and about the earth. Sincerely, Richard Schmidt C -8, June 17 Agenda Dear Council Members, Yet again I am amazed at how the utility user fees are being used for illegitimate purposes. Your financial best practices report's Appendix (p. 5, Attachment 2) shows that you are draining utility user fees to the tune of $2.4 million per year to finance the city's general government operations unrelated to the actual provision of water and sewer services. For example, I see the following eye - popping subsidies of general government by robbing funds from the utility enterprise funds (water and sewer combined): • $595,000 to subsidize the Finance Department. • $142,000 to subsidize the Administration Department. • $100,000 to subsidize the City Attorney. • $83,000 for "building maintenance." And so on. Up to a total of $2.4 million. Now, Ms. Lichtig and Ms. Dietrick may be worth what you pay them, but neither of them is supplying us with water and sewer service, so why are large parts of their salaries being paid with water and sewer user fees? Far from being "best practices," this looks more like a ripoff of utility customers. request you immediately remove these "assessed costs" of general government from what's paid for with our utility user fees. If general government cannot be financed through the general fund, you need to redesign it and shrink it so it can be. What's being done, as indicated on the chart in your agenda packet, is just plain wrong. The utility enterprise fund appears to be being used as city hall's private slush fund. This is yet another indication our utility fees are far higher than they should be because of profligate use of them for ego- boosting frills, for handouts to city cronies, and even for non - utility purposes. Sincerely, Richard Schmidt Attachment IVA/Capgb City of San Luis Obispo, CA OMB A•87 Central Service Cost Allocation 05/14/14 Allocated Costa by Department ;antral Service Departments FD240 CDBG 7�i 1D� Cap Erm FD4D0 Water F6570 Parklnp F0530 Trans ffid 3ullding Use Charge 5886 51,203 51,160 amity Administration $3.162 $121066 $73,650 $21,703 568,289 $3,248 Velural Resources Protection $9,300 $16,600 wily Attomey 52,258 68,577 $52,261 $15,400 $46,457 $22,863 Admimstralion 6 Records $71 S58 518,026 S2,523 591559 52,296 ;inane. 53,088 512,031 5298,800 $101,721 5296,794 $39,202 NolwGrk Services 51,763 $193,069 545,113 $221,137 552,137 3eographlc Information Services $124,954 598,093 Support Services $348 $1,104 $8,457 $3,373 581054 52,951 -Iuman Rasourcee $1,511 51,284 $43,428 $30,967 544,637 $3,505 Sisk Management $5,842 $4,961 5167,944 $119.751 $172,617 513,553 Nellness Program S58 $51 $1,666 $1,189 $1,714 $134 subtle Wwks AdmialeArafkm $188,915 $110,929 3ullding Maintenance $788 $41,521 $21,725 541,521 $1,164 J'4hlcla S Equlpmerrl Mainieneca $116,919 $13.030 $1831043 SIP Project Engineering $17,790 5736,235 $44,681 545,230 Transportation Engineering 5392,674 532,329 58,580 Engineering Development Review (511,5M) (511,500) iazard Prevention $8,400 Sutnolal 534,148 542,723 6928,909 51,192,664 $597,739 $1,245,448 $29,742 Imposed Costs 534,148 542,723 $928,909 $1,192,864 $597,739 $1,245,446 5290,742 Attschmeni &mmary page S Schedule A.005 2013 sgJL FD540 Reeervol Buis $16 $9,987 $11 $7,015 5256 $281 $11,037 $350 $23,101 $1 $1,117 $5,438 $21,030 5206 $16,662 5659 $95,751 $650 $95,751