Gary Blair during his tenure on the Orange City Council voted to increase water rates and fees. Voted to impose taxes on utilities and to allow for them to be increased by resolution of city council. So your electric bill could go up by council voting once on the increase. These taxes are still in effect and the water rate could go up at any time, particularly with Gary on the council.
Resolution 15-00 5/9/2000 Voted yes to increase rates on water service
Ordinance 99-08-01 8/10/1999 8/24/1999 voted yes twice on taxing electric bills by 10% for all users and provides for the option to increase this tax by resolution at any time in the future.
Ordinance 78 5/14/2002 5/28/2002 voted yes twice for taxing bottled or metered gas sales by 10% for all sales within the city and to increase the tax by resolution.
Source of this information is public records of the City of Orange City
Hugh,
Water rates are a function of the enterprise fund providing water in Orange City. Orange City Utilities is a provider of water seperate from the operations of the Government of Orange City. In essence the citizens of Orange City own the water company. The Council is the board of directors for the company. As with any company Orange City Utilities must be able to pay operating costs with the revenues generated by selling water. If the cost of the water delivery goes up so must the rate to the customer or else the company will go broke. If a proper rate structure was not put in place in 2000, our water company would not exist today.
Hugh,again I ask to read about good things concerning your selected candidates and their vision for the future rather than negative fear campaigns.