Water Rate Advisory Committee Meeting

The Water Rate Advisory Committee of the City of Dixon met on Thursday night, May 25, 2023 to hear a staff presentation on water rates of the last 10 years and to hear co-chair Kevin Johnson’s 10 year cash flow analysis of the city run water system.

The meeting was disrupted by the temporary unavailability of the print out of the power point presentation for substitute city attorney Christina Pritchard’s rate history and by Johnson’s admitted inability to “wrap his head around” the cash flow material available to him at this point.

With only three attendees in the audience, including mayor Steve Bird, many on the committee again expressed their disappointment and frustration in communicating with the public. Considering that the latest water bill insert failed to list this meeting but had four subsequent dates, this was opined to be part of the reason for sparse attendance. Only one participant was available on Zoom.

The power point presentation by Pritchard was criticized by Michael Ceremello as being insufficient because it did not give a full picture of where rates have gone over the last 30 years including a rate reduction which occurred in the early 2000’s. The same criticism was leveled at the cash flow analysis but extended to the fact that no material on cash flow was available before the meeting and, as it turned out, to any other member of the committee. Although Ceremello stated this first, neither Frank Drayton nor Herb Cross acknowledged Ceremello’s complaint but repeated it as though they never heard it in demanding the same solution.

Further along in the meeting, it was decided that the committee would meet in closed session to tour the water facilities. The supposed reason for once again excluding the public was explained as it being a Homeland Security threat to allow any regular citizen of Dixon to attend as any resident could be a terrorist threat. The additional rationale was that no one should know where all of the water facilities in the city run system are located.

The meeting was lengthened by an ongoing charge of who said what initiated by Mike Jones, one of the proponents of the tripled water rate repeal. According to Jones, either co-chair Thom Bogue or mayor Bird stated that “if they (any citizen) don’t like any future proposed rate hike, they can leave”. Bird vehemently denied making that statement. Bogue stated he didn’t remember making the statement and that it would be an atypical response if he had.

The next meeting of this committee is June 22, 2023 at 7pm.