Politics & Government

Postcard Mailing Aims to Simplify Water-Rate Protest

Rather than include the protest notice with the next bill cycle, the City of Davis will send out a special postcard with a check box.

Plenty of controversy has bubbled up around the city’s planned water-rate hike, which would nearly triple the current bill. At last night’s meeting, the council made efforts to add transparency to the processes in hopes of quelling that controversy.

They unanimously approved a motion to send out a postcard-like notice that, in the simplest terminology available, allows the bill payer to protest the rate hike by simply checking a box and mailing it back.

The rates hikes come under Proposition 218 and are largely to fund a project to divert reportedly cleaner water from the Sacramento River to Davis and Woodland.

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The hike would bump the current water bill in Davis from $69.50 to $192.75 by 2016. Other utilities would rise as well, but less drastically, bringing the entire utility bill from $241.82 to $393.04.

“It’s extremely important that it not be a sales job,” said Mayor Joe Krovoza of the protest notices. “Just the facts … Adding some transparency and clarity is a good thing.”

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While all councilmemebers agreed that a simple mailing should be sent to inform bill payers of how to protest, there was some discussion as to whether that mailing should be included in a bill, or sent separately.

Mailing the card separately could cost the city about $9,000, while stuffing it in the bill would cost about $4,000.

Community member Elaine Roberts Musser said during the public comments that it should be included in the bill.

“If you put it inside the bill, there’s no excuse,” she said. “If they don’t read it, then too bad.”

But Krovoza pointed out that his bill is set up to pay automatically, so he rarely even opens the envelope. Staff said that about 10 percent of bill payers have automatic payment.

Councilmember Sue Greenwald said that she preferred a separate mailer, mostly because it otherwise looked like the notice was being hidden in an envelope, along with the bill.

“It’ll be like we’re disguising it,” she said. “I don’t think we want to hide it in the bill.”

The rest of the council agreed, with Councilmember Dan Wolk insisting several times that the protest process be as basic as possible. He even suggested printing the names and addresses on each individual card so that the only thing people had to do was check a protest box and put it back in the mail.

But that would add cost as well as time, so it wasn’t included in the motion. People will have to write their own names on the protest card.

It is expected to go out in mid-late July, leaving bill payers about six weeks to return them by the September 6 deadline.


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