La Mesa 'A Bit Deceptive' to Residents In Recent Sewer Rate Increase

To the editor:

My name is Chris Poole and I've been a resident, and tenant, of La Mesa for about 2 years now. 

I am writing because I think the City of La Mesa has been a bit deceptive in their recent rate increase.

They highly publicized the fact that the bimonthly bill will now be collected from home owners in their property tax bill, once a year. They even sent out a projected cost to all homeowners, the landlords, not tenants, for the fiscal year 2013.

My landlord was kind enough to pass on a copy of his expected sewer bill.

I was surprised to see that the yearly cost was about $100 more per year than we have been paying (if you total all the bimonthly bills).

I had heard nothing about this from the City of La Mesa, so I gave them a call.
I was finally told (in a vague and circuitous way) that the previous "single-family residential cap" of 22 units has been raised to 28 units.

In my family's case, since we pass the cap regularly, this equates to a 20 percent increase in our bill.

My anger at this increase has little to do with the actual increase, rather, I feel [the city] they tried to hide the increase behind their well-publicized change in the way they bill.

I would be very surprised if I'm the  only person who is peeved at what seems to me to be a bit of deception by The City of La Mesa.

Chris Poole
La Mesa