Iain Moodie, Plumstead
City managers should not obfuscate on the water and electricity funding issue and hide project costs by confusing city residents with added charges here and there for extraneous issues (eg. pipe diameter, meter size, irrelevant property valuations) together with an avalanche of figures and tables that few of our citizens are able to understand (“City’s budget burden”, Bulletin April 12).
Cut to the chase, admit that past financial predictions and estimates have been just plain wrong (few people admit to being wrong these days) and come up front by stating that water and electricity must be paid for based on the amounts used, thus meaning substantial increase in tariffs.
At least citizens will then know how they stand and budget accordingly.
This means that all those refusing to pay for water and electricity, illegally using and wasting water (allowing stand taps to run water to waste) and stealing electricity by illegally linking to the grid, will be blacklisted and cut off until payment is made.
However, as politicians, this approach will have been rejected as not being politically correct and their current efforts to avoid this have resulted in the existing lack of transparency in presenting proposals in the current unacceptable form to city residents.
City managers should present a straightforward, uncomplicated summary of their intentions and necessary charges (especially fair assessments for the indigent, pensioners and those with fixed income) so that citizens can assess and make informed suggestions and constructive comment which will be treated with appropriate attention.
