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Those causing money shortages should have to pay
To the editor:
Congratulations to the managing editor on his editorial concerning the interference by a city councilman with the operations of the water plant.
In this person's opinion, the city councilman had zero authority to discount or dismiss a water customer's water bill as stated by the newspaper article and it should be treated as a direct loss of revenue and should be replaced by the city councilman.
The sewer fiasco represents another situation where as there was an indirect loss to sewer plant operations of approximately $5 million due to, as it appears, to be non-compliance with the ADEQ inspection reports. The $5 million, five-year, consent order by ADEQ was the result of repeat write-ups for four years by the ADEQ inspectors (repeat write-ups for four years without corrective action being taken). This failure of the responsible individual to perform his duty resulted in the city placing a $5 per month surcharge on the sewer customer services so as to meet the consent order by ADEQ. These write-ups were addressed to the former mayor as the responsible individual of city government to comply with the requirements of ADEQ.
In this individual's opinion, the former mayor of Blytheville should be required to pay this $5 a month surcharge consent order cost due to the appearance of malfeasance by his office. When the former mayor gave himself a pay raise, his justification was that he had to take on more responsibilities due to the dismissal of the waterworks and sewer system commissions. The individuals who have or are causing the money shortages, which appear to be violations of the law, should have to pay the moneys that were lost as a result of their un-authorized personal action or lack of personal action.