Response to last Wednesday’s unsigned Editorial By The Evansville Courier and Press Titled “Rural residents Chose To Pay More”

First, all the residents of Vanderburgh county voted to defeat the ill fated Consolidation plan several years ago, in fact the anonymous author seemed to fail to remember that 59% of the city residents voted to defeat this plan. Should they then pay extra for their sewers?

Second, there was a section in the plan (7.2.1) indicating a pledge to  equalize  the sewer rates over a three year period  but suffice it to say the people have heard promises from politicians before and this was just another promise in this document that the voters did not believe in.

The fact is that rural residents that are connected to the sewer system pay higher rates because the State law allows it, the City run public utility asked for it, the City appointed utility board passed it, and the City elected City council voted for it. Do you see a pattern here? All City appointed or elected people decided to charge more for a public utility to a group of people who have no power to remove them from their position. Sounds like “Taxation without representation”

To make matters worse the State government which allows this to happen also allows the Evansville Sewer system to operate unregulated by the IURC (Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission).  So when the State law says ” the burden of proof to demonstrate that the proposed rates and charges are nondiscriminatory, reasonable, and just is on the municipality”  (IC8-1.5-3-8 Sec 8.3g), the State should regulate that condition. I don’t think the State legislators would approve of using the median income of the rural residents being higher than the median income of city residents,  as a demonstration of reasonable or just cause for increased sewer fees (City council meeting Oct 28, 2013).

Finally, if you look at the proposed remediation plan that the city has proposed as I have, you will find that of the some $540 million dollars planned to be spent on the remediation of the Evansville sewers and not one penny of it is being spent outside the city limits of Evansville. With friends like this who needs enemies.  First they charge you more money for the same service as city residents then vote to make you pay more to fix the problems that reside only within the city and more specifically within the area of the city that has combined storm and sanitary sewer systems. I thought we were all one big happy community?

I challenge the rural residents to contact your State legislators and the IURC and demand to stop this nonsense and change the law to prevent this from happening again. If the State is going to pass a law, then they should be required by that law to enforce its conditions. Residents of the rural community are willing to pay their fair and equal share but should no longer stand still while the public utility discriminates against them with unreasonable and unjust sewer rates.

Bruce Ungethiem

Vanderburgh County Commissioner, District 2

Please take time and vote in today’s “Readers Poll”. Don’t miss reading today’s Feature articles because they are always an interesting read. New addition to the CCO is the Cause of Death reports generated by the Vanderburgh County Health Department.Copyright 2015 City County Observer. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.