A few months ago, the Binghamton-Johnson City Joint Sewage Treatment Plant’s board put forth a budget with a 63 percent increase. Believe me folks, I don’t make this stuff up! New state and federal “mandates” placed on the plant to clean up discharges into the Susquehanna River are being blamed, in part, for the increase. Fact is, no one knows for sure just why this is the year the board that operates the plant decided to raise the rates so high. If it truly is because of government regulations, the sewage board has done a very poor job of communicating it to the public. I suspect there are fat raises for workers and management, among other things, at work in this increase.

I call the sewage plant Exhibit A in why government consolidation does not work. Weekly we hear the bleating of local politicians (in particular Barbara Fiala, County Executive) about the wonders of consolidating governments and services. Bunkum. I’ve written about this before, but thought it would be a good time to revisit the topic in light of the fact the local socialist Democrats are about to re-elect Fiala to another four years. What a shame.

But back to sewage as our topic. It certainly seems to make sense to share services like sewage so only one (or maybe two) plants, which are expensive to construct and maintain, are built. Makes sense to me! Except when politicians get involved. This plant was built in 1965 and is 55% owned by the City of Binghamton, and 45% owned by the neighboring Village of Johnson City. The plant serves not only those two municipalities, but also eight others in the county. There’s a lot of…waste…that flows through the plant.

When the plant was built, the politicians decided that both Binghamton and J.C. would each appoint three members to a six-member board. The board has complete power to control spending, hiring and daily operations at the plant. Such brillance! We not only see this kind of abdication of responsibility locally, it’s through every layer of government. Let the “experts” run it and make the decisions. Throw away your constitutional authority by giving it to someone else and let them make the decisions–because it’s “too hard to run it unless you’re an expert”. Bunkum. Meanwhile, the taxpayers are hosed and we can’t do anything about it. You can vote politicians out of office every few years. Not so with the board of the sewage plant. They are insulated from accountability for the decisions they make.

Yesterday the Johnson City Board of Trustees voted not to accept the sewage board’s latest budget. Each year for 43 years they have voted to accept it, which is largely ceremonial. Until now. So what happens, you may ask? Nothing. The sewage board still holds the power to raise the rates and they will. Which means J.C. rate payers will see about a 58.5% jump in their sewage bills, along with similar jumps in Binghamton and the other affected municipalities. Talk about adding insult to injury! Mayor Matt Ryan just raised water rates 43%. And now this! Hold on to your wallets Binghamtonians. The good Mayor Ryan and his merry band of socialists will be knocking on your door soon to relieve you of ALL your money.

My take on this “mess” and how I would handle it if I were Mayor Harry Lewis from J.C.: Immediately fire the three members of the sewage board that J.C. appoints. There must be some provision to replace members of the board. You must get the current members out–now. And replace them with citizens who are not happy with the way things are being run at the plant. Second, sue the state and federal government over their unfunded and unfair regulations. If they are requiring obscenely strict new rules, you need to challenge them and tie it up in court to prevent it from busting this year’s budget. Third, work with Binghamton (if you can–they’re such dolts in Binghamton City government it will be a difficult task) to rewrite the agreement for governing the plant to make it more responsive to the rate payers (i.e. taxpayers).

One thing’s for sure: Status quo at the sewage plant is not an option. We must get a handle on it now to prevent this from happening again. Let this sad tale of sewage be a lesson to everyone on the folly of government consolidation.

Technorati Tags: Binghamton, Johnson City, sewage plant, government consolidation, municipal consolidation, Broome County, Mayor Harry Lewis, Mayor Matt Ryan