Rainwater Tax

Yesterday a little gem came in the mail from the City of Durham regarding my storm water fee tax.

For those of you reading from elsewhere, here in the big Bull City, which I love, a lot; we have a little gem of a tax called a storm water utility fee. Basically, we are taxed on the amount of rain that falls on our property. Insanity reigns supreme with this one and I really resent it. Today rain, tomorrow the sun.

What the city does is; it calculates the amount of impervious surface that one has and then levies a tax on such surface. The pretense with this tax is that the city will clean up wetlands, streams, Jordan Lake….in Chatham County and Falls Lake…in Wake and Granville counties mostly.

So my rain fall bill is going up from $4.50 to $4.92 per month. What do I get for this increase in tax?

* Capital improvement projects including Northeast Creek watershed
* A new inspection position to oversee storm water drainage
* A water quality technician to monitor and inspect industrial sites.
* A water quality analysis to implement storm water controls
* A 1/2 time pollution control coordinator to conduct in service classes for city employees to teach them about best storm water practices
* A senior engineering technician to inspect drainage ponds and other structures to ensure proper operation.

On a cursory level, that sounds like a lot, on a more in -depth level, I’m thinking that perhaps the city could hire ONE person to handle the above outlined tasks. In this age of fiscal leanness one wonders when the Bull City will catch up and catch on and trim things down a bit a lot.