Only 1.5 percent of property owners have protested proposed
water rate hikes.
If half of the city’s 10,962 property owners write letters to
City Clerk Shawna Freels by Monday telling her they don’t want
their water rates to go up, then they won’t.
Gilroy – Only 1.5 percent of property owners have protested proposed water rate hikes.
If half of the city’s 10,962 property owners write letters to City Clerk Shawna Freels by Monday telling her they don’t want their water rates to go up, then they won’t.
But as of Thursday afternoon, Freels had received only 160 letters at a rate of about 10 a day for the past few weeks from individuals and couples, some of whom own more than one of the 12,832 properties in Gilroy.
Local senior citizen Marguerite Henry was one such writer who said any upward fluctuation in water rates is too much for her.
“I’m on a very fixed income. I don’t use a lot of water, and I get angry when I see people washing their cars once a week,” Henry said. “I don’t think people will come together to stop this rate hike because they don’t really realize how much it costs people like me. I married a handsome man instead of a rich man.”
Henry discovered that she could protest water rates after reading about it Aug. 9 in the Dispatch, which reported that 5,482 letters would prevent the average annual bill for a south county family of five of going from $115 to about $127, according to Santa Clara Valley Water District figures.
Two days later the paper published a letter from Debbie Bradshaw, which read, “Like almost every other property owners, I muttered “Jerks!” under my breath [when I received the rate hike notice], and threw the offending letter in the recycle bin without thoroughly reading it.”
This is exactly what Linda Frantzich did, missing the letter’s last sentence that informs readers of their write to protest water rate hikes since the California Supreme Court’s July 2006 decision says land owners have the right to protest any increases in “property-related fees” that include water, sewer and garbage rates.
These rates were previously exempt from public outcry since cities had cast them as necessary public health matters, according to Jolie Houston, Gilroy’s assistant attorney.
“I did not read all the way down to the bottom of my letter that was sent to me that I could protest,” said Frantzich, a mother of five who added that she suspected the sentence informing readers of their right to protest was intentionally placed at the bottom so property owners skimming the letter would pass it over and just accept the change.
“I just tossed it away thinking we were going to have another increase, but when I read Bradshaw’s letter in the Dispatch that I have the option to protest, then I went, ‘Oh, well, yeah, I’ll protest.’ ”
Unlike Henry, Frantzich is holding out hope.
“I have been telling my friends … I am hoping with word of mouth and the Dispatch that more people will write in and protest,” Frantzich said. “The Santa Clara Valley Water District is wasting an awful lot of money, and it could be better spent.”
