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Wanamingo OKs new administrator
By: Kay Fate
Posted: Wednesday, January 13, 2010 1:42 am
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Wanamingo OKs new administrator

Michael Boulton, center, listens to discussion at his first official Wanamingo City Council meeting Monday evening as council members formally approved his hiring. Mayor John Simonson is on the right. (Kay Fate/The Kenyon Leader)
WANAMINGO — The Wanamingo City Council on Monday formally approved hiring Michael Boulton as city administrator.

Boulton will earn $50,000 annually his first two years.

Council members had a more difficult time deciding how to handle a resident’s excessive water bill.

An undetected leak under a mobile home during December resulted in a $433 bill; homeowner Jack Sabin claimed city officials — in addition to the mobile home park manager — knew of the leak at least two weeks before the amount due was automatically withdrawn from his bank account.

Sabin’s monthly bill had averaged about $65 in the past five months.

City officials forgave the sewer charge — nearly half of the amount owed — since none of the water had gone into the sewer system.

Sabin, however, requested an additional reduction because he hadn’t been notified immediately after meters were read, indicating a sharp increase in water usage over previous months.

A letter alerting the homeowner to the spike in use had been sent, according to City Clerk Jean Rugg.

The Sabins denied receiving it; after receiving the bill, they put a stop on the bank payment.

Council members Larry Van De Walker and Ryan Holmes, while empathizing, said they’d had similar experiences, but had to pay the bill.

An initial motion by Van De Walker for Sabin to pay the remaining $222 owed failed for lack of a second.

Council member Dan Benson moved the bill be reduced to $122, putting the city on the hook for the other $100.

That motion failed on a 2-2 tie; Van De Walker and Holmes dissented. Councilman Ron Berg was absent.

“I don’t want to set a precedent, where you’re jockeying around and negotiating water bills,” Holmes said.

A third motion by Holmes to set the bill at $172 — essentially splitting the difference — also failed on a 2-2 tie.





Van De Walker and Benson dissented.

“What would you guys like?” Benson asked Sabin.

“We just want it to be fair,” Sabin answered. “If the city knew about it, we should have been told. You should have come right to the source.”

A final motion to charge Sabin a flat $150 eventually passed 4-0.

Kenyon City Administrator Chris Heineman is inclined to agree with Holmes.

“History is, you don’t make exceptions,” he said Tuesday, “because then you set precedents, and you don’t want to do that.”

Had the situation happened in Kenyon, he said, “I don’t think it would even get a motion. The homeowner would just be responsible, unless the water line is the responsibility of the city.”

The council, he added, “has stayed firm on that.”

In the past, Heineman said, if city staff catches a variance in average water usage, a re-read request will be ordered.

“If it’s accurate, we make contact” with the homeowner, he said, in the form of a phone call.
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Member Opinions:
By: BiggerthenSanta on 1/13/10
Why does the blame fall on the city to notify the user of a leak? If my gas or electric bill were high and I had a leak could I blame that on the utility and refuse to pay it? It is water used, treated and pumped. Every other user will now pay for that water. Giving a sewer break is understandable, but the water was used and of no fault of the city.


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