1984-09-05 Regular Meeting and Public Hearing

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( ( l r:::: . Minutes, Regular Meeting and Public Hearing La Porte City Council September 5, 1984, Page 6 Counci1person Gay: I concur with Mr. Knox and Mr. Pfeiffer on the statements that they made. I feel that to correct this problem would be a bigger (1) and I am in accordance with my peers. Mayor Cline: I have one comment to make and that is this: I don't feel that it's the property owners responsibility to get these encroachments out of the right of way. I think it's the City's responsibility. It's the City's right of ways and >> I think it's entirely up to the City to either remove them or if they're, going to leave them stand, leave them stand. But I don't think the property owners should have to hire attor- neys and fight this thing out in court. I think that is entirely up to the City of La Porte, and going by the more or less unwritten policy that we've had in the City for many years on encroachments, it would be my recommendation to Council that we get something in writing - we get a written policy on this and just exactly how we're going to handle them. As I stated earlier, if you're going to leave it up to the City department that's working in the area to take care of it, if it's bothering them they're going to remove it - if it's not they're going to leave it. Then it should never ever come before Council again. But I would recommend that staff and perhaps a couple of people from this Council form a com- mittee and work on a policy on this so everybody is treated equally. 13. Mr. Cary Burnley addressed Council concerning water and sewer rates. He presented graphs comparing water and sewer rates of Bay town, La porte, Deer Park and Pasadena. He noted that in Bay town there is a cutoff point on sewer charges for resi- dences that use water that actually does not return to the sewer (such as for watering plants, grass, swimming pool maintenance, etc.) and that commercial businesses are charged normally because their water usage does ultimately return to the sewer. Businesses with extensive sprinkler systems are allowed, at their own expense, to install a second meter for their sprinkler system and are billed only for that water, with no sewer charge. He understands that La Porte is considering entering into such an arrangement, also. He has talked with staff and.understands the rationale behind the rates. The water and wastewater departments combined revenue is well above the cost to operate these departments. In fact, the 1984-85 preliminary proposed budget includes a transfer of between $500,000 and $600,000 from the waterl wastewater departments to the general fund. He understands that this is being done in some degree to prepare the City for future issuance of revenue bonds. If making a profit in A~