The Shreveport Times writer Adam Duvernay’s Nov. 14 piece, “Sewer overhaul wasn’t top priority,” is a must-read for Bossier City residents who might not see the reasoning in a $15 increase in fixed sewer rates for Bossier City utility customers – an issue up for final consideration at the Council’s Dec. 3 regular meeting.

In the article Durvenay said, “Shreveport residents are on the hook for the city’s neglect of the sewer system.

“Now-mandatory repairs expected to cost $342 million might have been handled piecemeal over a more agreeable time frame and a $650,000 [EPA] fine would have been non-existent if the city had kept its underground pumping correctly before the federal government got involved.”

“‘We got here by continuing to kick the can down the road,’ Shreveport City Councilman Michael Corbin said.”

Corbin’s observation would have been an apt response to Bossier City At-large Council Member David Montgomery’s question to fellow council members at the body’s Nov. 19 regular meeting: “I think you have to ask yourself, what’s the alternative?” He pointed out the Council and administration had done their respective due diligence – and that “if we wait, it’s not going to be $15 increase – it will be $17 or $18 and deferring more problems and costs to citizens this is the least expensive way today; it only gets more expensive.”

District 1 Representative Scott Irwin seconded Montgomery’s concerns. He said noting delaying Bossier’s $52 million plan to accomplish a major overhaul of its waste water system will result in increased costs of the planned projects and much increased costs of borrowing the money to do a majority of the work. The city’s present plan for underwriting about $30 million of the project is a 20-year loan from Louisiana DEQ at a .95 percent interest rate and what Irwin described as an “historically low rate.”

At-large member Tim Larkin also weighed-in saying, “There is just no reward for raising sewer rates. I have come to the conclusion for me to do the right thing is a difficult thing it’s not a glamorous thing to fix sewer lines.”

Then Larkin held up a photograph of a broken sewer line – one that’s currently under repair – and there are many more in need of such, along with a variety of other components of Bossier’s underground sewer system.

A couple of council members are still struggling with the idea of the robust rate increase for Bossier City utility customers. District 5 Council Member Tommy Harvey said he had received a number of calls in opposition to the increase.

He noted an increase in the rates in the monthly trash collection services along with increased water bills resulting from new automated meters, and said, “The timing is wrong” for the sewer increase.

“The $15 [increase] is just not sitting well, and I’m not going to be able to support it,” Harvey said.

District 3’s Don “Bubba” Williams voted to introduce the ordinance to increase the sewer fee – but said he had not decided how he would vote on the issue.

District 2 Council Member Jeff Darby didn’t attend Tuesday’s meeting, as he was on vacation.

Bossier’s work to date on the city’s utility system has produced a stateof-the-art water treatment plant and a major increase in water production, substantial upgrades to the water transmission system and a new south Bossier wastewater treatment plant (under construction).

Committing to correct and improve on an old and deteriorating system of sewer lines and various other system components would round out this utility system effort and put Bossier City on solid utility system footing for at least the next 20 years. Importantly, this work would keep Bossier off the EPA’s and state DEQ’s very expensive radar.The proposed rate increase accomplishes two goals. First, it helps pay for the necessary improvements, and it releases $3 million a year in gaming revenues that have been used to augment the cost of other utility improvements to go back into the city’s capital revenue stream.

As most Bossier residents are aware, the city’s chief revenue stream is produced by sales taxes, which make up roughly 80 percent of the annual budget; property taxes account for only about 20 percent of that revenue stream. But to keep up with increased annual operating costs, the city must work to generate another $1 million year-over-year to keep the budget balanced.

Generating that additional income depends on generating additional sales taxes and that effort relies on available capital funding as represented by gaming revenues which really don’t belong in what is city charter directed to be a selfsupporting utility system.

I live in Bossier. Like most, I don’t care to pay higher costs for anything. On the other hand, I believe a majority of my fellow residents can take a lesson from the west side of the river and hope the Council chooses the less expensive road to a safe and reliable utility system.