Get your checkbook... Time to pay the stormwater "fee"

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Grab your ankles. You're about to get spanked. Again. We didn't whine loudly enough regarding the garbage "fee" currently applied to our water bills, so, as expected, more "fees" are coming.

A fee charged by the City is simply a tax that isn't tax deductible. The newest fee being discussed is a stormwater tax - er - I mean, fee.

In some areas of Peoria - especially in older neighborhoods and the Rolling Acres Subdivision- stormwater is a real problem. With every rain, basements flood. This is due to the fact that the City has done very little to provide repair and upkeep of its stormwater system over the years. In some places retention walls are crumbling. Erosion has been allowed to progress to the point that in one neighborhood, there is a house that has actually slid and settled on the edge of a retention wall.

In order to do necessary repairs, the City has to gain right-of-way privileges. These repairs require deep digging and heavy equipment which takes a toll on landscape and property. It is possible the City will have to go to Court to get access to some properties. Regardless, because of the neglect the system has suffered, we are looking at least a $17 Million bill to fix the problem.

So...According to today's Peoria Times Observer North, the City is considering a wastewater user fee, raising the sales tax to 8.9 percent or raising property taxes 16 percent. DeWayne Bartels from The Observer wrote that such an increase would increase taxes $51.53 on a $100,000 home.

I'm guessing that they will go with the fee. Elections are four years away for district council members and two years off for those who run At-Large. They can up the fee a few bucks and hope folks will put it behind them before election time.

The highest voter turnout always lies in the fourth and fifth districts, and they will not forgive a property tax increase. (If you live in Weaver Ridge, relax. Pat Nichting of the Fifth would never vote for a fee or tax increase no matter how worthy. I'd find this admirable except for the fact that he has, on occasion, voted for pork.)

No matter how Council chooses to solve the problem, people will be peeved. Those in newer areas, who already pay high property taxes and have no drainage problems, will be ticked when forced to pay the plumbing bills of those who live in the poorer South Side and East Bluff. I have one fifth district friend who put it this way, "I'm already paying for public schools I'd never send my own kids to, now I have to pay for someone else's ditches too? It's not my water that's running into their basement."