Community & Business
12 May, 2022
Grazier wins reprieve on water bill
A PERSONAL appeal by a property owner who was hit with a $5293 water bill has paid off, with Tablelands Regional Council voting to cut the amount owing in half.
A PERSONAL appeal by a property owner who was hit with a $5293 water bill has paid off, with Tablelands Regional Council voting to cut the amount owing in half.
Upper Barron landowner Jeff Strazzeri put his case to the council after officers refused his request to have the bill halved despite his protests that he had not used the water and was unaware the tap had been turned on until it was too late. The issue came to Mr Strazzeri’s attention when he received a $5,293.95 water account for 5,402 kilolitres of water used from July 2021 to January 2022.
Despite officers recognising that the water use was markedly different to previous bills which had ranged from $0 to $57 over the past three years, they were not prepared to give Mr Strazzeri a discount. He told council the water provided was gravity fed and untreated, and had flowed from a tap he did not use unless his pumping system to cattle troughs failed. He did not check the tap regularly, assuming it was always off.
“If I’m going to pay $5000 for water, I would want it to be at least drinkable,” he told council. “There’s been a lot of council resources wasted on this issue – the time it’s taken to look into this issue and the costs incurred by the council would surpass the $5000 owed.”
Mr Strazzeri claimed it could have been left on after council officers repaired an upstream leak last year. But a report stated that the repairs had occurred in February 2021 and were not in the period when the water use had been recorded.
“Based on the information provided by the customer in their application and subsequent verbal communications, TRC Water and Waste has assessed the application and deemed a concession does not apply in this instance,” the report stated. “On that basis the customer was informed in writing that their application was declined. The customer was dissatisfied with the decision and proposed to escalate the matter with council.”
Water and Waste manager Jon Turner said officers had thought it prudent to put the matter before council given officers did not have the delegated authority to determine the bill could be reduced because the reasons given were not supported by the policy.
Deputy Mayor Kevin Cardew put forward an alternate recommendation to reduce the bill by 50 per cent – a position supported by Cr Bernie Wilce who put forward that given there had been “some sort of benefit” to the property owner because the water had been used, he believed halving the account was fair. The recommendation was passed unanimously.
