rate increases at City Council meetings Thursday in a rare opportunity
to comment on the project before all 10 members.
feedback on a water policy report, the pipeline and the rate hikes
became the focus. To start its 9 a.m. meeting, council heard a briefing
on the water study by Texas A&M University Institute for Renewable
Natural Resources director Roel Lopez, who oversaw the final version. Council held a second comment period Thursday evening.
the street and holding signs that read: “Local water solutions only”
and “50% water bill increase is unsustainable.”
Council members will vote next Thursday on rate increases to pay for
Vista Ridge, a desalination plant to treat salty groundwater in South
Bexar County, sewer upgrades required by the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency and other projects.
Last week, five council members said they supported the Vista Ridge project. Mayor Ivy Taylor, as a member of the San Antonio Water System board of trustees, voted for the rate hikes earlier this month.
“I know it is going to pass, and I know there is not going to be one
vote against Vista Ridge and the rate increases,” former councilwoman
Maria Berriozábal told council members. “It is one of these David and
Goliath issues, and we are David.”
Most of the speakers Thursday night used their allotted three minutes
to criticize the rate increases and the pipeline, which would deliver
water from the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer 142 miles away in Burleson County.
When asked by District 1 Councilman Roberto Treviño about his
greatest concern regarding Vista Ridge, Lopez said a five-member review
panel he picked had listed the availability of groundwater from the
aquifer as an issue that needs further consideration.
The Post Oak Savannah Groundwater Conservation District in Burleson
and Milam counties regulates groundwater in that area and can cut back
on pumping if it determines the full 16.3 billion gallons per year for
Vista Ridge is not available.
“I hope the ratepayers know we can turn off the hose to San Antone,”
said Kenneth “Gabbo” Goetsch, a Burleson County landowner who made a
second trip to San Antonio this week to protest the project. “It may
take a long time, but the way the rules are written at the Post Oak
Savannah district are so we can turn it off.”
Residents organized by Esperanza Peace & Justice Center,
Southwest Workers Union, Alamo Sierra Club and other groups called the
pipeline unsustainable, the process undemocratic and the rate increases
unfair to low-income people, who they argue will bear the cost of a
project that will only benefit irrigators and developers.
“You aren’t listening to us,” Esperanza activist Gianna Rendón said,
calling out council members for checking their phones during public
comment and District 9 Councilman Joe Krier by name for speaking with
City Manager Sheryl Sculley while Rendón was talking.
Krier said he has been listening to constituents on this topic for
years. SAWS officials have also answered transparency questions by
pointing to a series of community meetings and public negotiations with
Spanish conglomerate Abengoa, which will build the pipeline.
“Listening is not the same as, ‘Do what I want, period,’” Krier said.
“Transparency is an open process for public input, transparency is not,
‘Do what I want.’”
District 10 Councilman Mike Gallagher also told the crowd he has
taken residents’ complaints seriously, but worries about the city’s
economic and social future without the project.
“How could we afford to run out of water?” he said. “It would be disasterous.”
Retired Trinity University professor Meredith McGuire told council
she attended several rate study meetings and thought the rates were
biased in favor of large business-class users. These rates do not
encourage conservation because the per-gallon rate for large-scale users
starts at 100 percent of the previous year’s use, rather than a lower
volume. The cost for this level of use will only increase slightly from
this year’s rate.
Rate increases drew more outrage from speakers than any other issue.
“I’m very scared to know that because I cannot afford my water, I
cannot afford my health,” Southwest Workers Union activist Arturo Trejo
said. “I can barely afford rent.”
“If (SAWS CEO) Robert Puente was here, I would call him a coward, straight to his face,” he continued.
Puente, sitting behind Trejo, waved. Trejo looked back and said, “Oh hey, what’s up, coward,” then left the lectern.
SAWS spokeswoman Anne Hayden referred people to a rate calculator on SAWS’ website,
where people can input their water use and get an estimate of their
monthly bill under the higher rates. “I have a feeling that there a lot
of people here, if they actually put their numbers into that rate
calculator, it would actually be much smaller than they might think,”
she said.
Esperanza director Graciela Sanchez stressed how difficult it is for
people without Internet access to inform themselves about the Vista
Ridge project and participate in the public process.
Taylor later asked deputy city manager Peter Zanoni to make the water
report available in print in public libraries and have it translated in
Spanish.
bgibbons@express-news.net
On Twitter: @bgibbs
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