Did you read last weeks Sacramento News & Review article exposing the major scandal in the Citys installation of water meters and new water mains? (We posted the link last Friday; here it is again - newsreview/sacramento/is-sacramentos-costly-water-meter-install/content?oid=15466771) CALL FOR ACTION: Eye on Sacramento calls upon the Sacramento city council and city manager John Shirey to impose an immediate moratorium on all water meter installations and to halt the abandonment of backyard water mains pending a full, independent review of both programs by independent experts. We also call for a joint investigation by PG&E and the Sacramento Fire Department into the methods and practices of the citys contractors responsible for breaking gas mains and endangering the lives of Sacramento residents. If you share our concerns with these developments, you should contact Mayor Kevin Johnson, city councilmembers and city manager John Shirey: Kevin Johnson [email protected] (916) 808-5300 Angelique Ashby [email protected] (916) 808-7001 Allen Warren [email protected] (916) 808-7002 Steve Cohn [email protected] (916) 808-7003 Steve Hansen [email protected] (916) 808-7004 Jay Schenirer [email protected] (916) 808-7005 Kevin McCarty [email protected] (916) 808-7006 Darrell Fong [email protected] (916) 808-7007 John Shirey [email protected] (916) 808-5704 Here is EOS President Craig Powells summary of the issues - In a blockbuster cover story in this weeks Sacramento News & Review (Flushing Money), veteran investigative journalist Joe Rubin reports on his six-month investigation into massive waste in the City of Sacramentos programs for installing water meters and new water mains. The crux of the story is that independent utility experts, utilities officials in other California cities and Sacramentos own city auditor have concluded that Sacramento is making two very bad and costly decisions: (1) Sacramento is unnecessarily abandoning perfectly good backyard water mains and moving them to the streets; and (2) Sacramento is needlessly tearing up city sidewalks to install state-mandated water meters in sidewalks instead of placing meters far less expensively in homeowners yards. The water meter project in Sacramento is 50% complete. Sacramento is planning to spend an eye-popping $473 million on these two programs over 20 years (plus inflation), financed with long-term bonds that will add another $400 million in costs on city ratepayers. By contrast, the City of Fresno - which left backyard water mains intact and installed water meters in homeowners yards instead of in sidewalks - installed the same number of waters as Sacramento is installing (105,000) in just two years at a cost of just $70 million, a mere 15% of the cost of Sacramentos plan. But Rubins story reveals so much more, including alleged misrepresentations by top utilities officials to the city council of the findings of a key citizen focus group on their preferences for the location of water meters, manipulation by a city engineer of the results of a purportedly independent engineering study that was commissioned to assess the citys decision to abandon backyard water meters. Rubin also reveals that one of the key proponents of the 2005 decision to abandon backyard water mains was then Sacramento Water Superintendent Barry Holland, who pled guilty to federal bribery charges in 2008 after an FBI investigation revealed that Holland was accepting kickbacks for selling the citys used water meters to an unscrupulous contractor. The story also reveals that a city contractor installing meters and water mains has twice broken underground gas lines in the past two years, leading to home evacuations and, according to PG&E officials, the risk of home explosions of the kind that leveled a Rancho Cordova home a few years ago. Rubin reveals that the director of the citys utilities department was entirely unaware of the gas line breaks until Rubin informed him of them. Since Rubins story broke on November 13th, Eye on Sacramento has received reports of two more gas line breaks in the Land Park neighborhood caused by city contractors, one on Thursday and another on Friday of last week, neither of which was been reported by local media. While city council member Steve Hansen last Thursday publicly asked city manager John Shirey to review the citys oversight of the two projects, as well as order an independent peer review of the projects by utilities officials from other California municipalities, Shirey has not announced any action on Hansens request.
Posted on: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 17:52:21 +0000
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