File Photo (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

By James Peters

Two & Out

PETERS: We’re stuck with the bill for previous councils’ short-sighted water rate decisions

Nov 24, 2023 | 12:30 PM

IT’S EASY TO UNDERSTAND why residents struggling in the midst of an affordability crisis might be more than a little miffed at the City of Kamloops right now.

Any explanation as to why the water rate might rise by 63 per cent over the next five years — no matter how logical — is bound to be met with frustration.

If politicians can do little to control inflation — as has been made clear over the past years — they should at least attempt to control the costs that they set directly.

Those include taxes and utility rates.

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But here we are.

The city has to pay for decommissioning the Noble Creek Irrigation System, it has to pay for its own decision to eat a chunk of growth-supporting infrastructure costs and it has to pay for upgrades to the water treatment plant.

Not only that, city staff will be all too eager to tell you about the complexities of pumping water up into the hills and far reaches of this city.

For years, rates were kept either flat or at a minimal increase. We took it for granted that the water utility wasn’t costing us more money as time went on.

It sounds great, but it was actually poor planning. A strategy of slow and steady increases to build up reserves would have been much more prudent.

Then the city would have a nest egg set aside to handle the unexpected, like Noble Creek, or the strategic, like the decision on the development assist factor.

And then they wouldn’t even have to entertain the thought of relying on a magical grant fairy to bail them out.

But hindsight is 20/20.

The mayors and councils who okayed those decisions are no longer here and thus can escape accountability. They did their successors who sit around the council horseshoe today no favours.

It’s an ugly side of democracy as old as time. Elected officials are able to make short-sighted decisions, knowing they will never have to pay the proverbial piper. The problem is dumped on the next crop of unsuspecting councillors.

If we want to criticize the current council, there may be plenty of fodder for that cannon.

The water rate decision, though, is the result of this council trying to make chicken soup out of the plate of chicken excrement they have been served by their predecessors.

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Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or Pattison Media.