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TWSA still examining foreclosed home policy
By Justin Goble
Members of the Tuckaseigee Water and Sewer Authority returned to their policy on foreclosed homes during their Nov. 18 meeting.
Officials had discussed the issue during an Oct. 14 work session after hearing complaints from county residents. Attorney Eric Ridenour of Sylva brought up the matter during a September TWSA meeting, and TWSA Director Joe Cline said he’d received other calls over the past few weeks.
Ridenour told the board in September that he recently bought a house on Sylva’s Hampton Street that he is remodeling. When he went to pay his deposit and have the water turned on, he said he was told he would have to pay for a new water and sewer allocation, which would cost $4,000.
The house Ridenour bought had been foreclosed on, and when the prior tenants stopped paying their water and sewer bill TWSA rescinded the allocation.
Since allocations run with the land, Ridenour said he researched the issue to see why TWSA had taken this one back.
When banks foreclose on a house, TWSA is not notified of that fact, Cline said. After the homeowners fail to pay a bill for six months, TWSA policy states that the authority can pull that allocation.
However, Sylva town board member Stacy Knotts, a town representative on the TWSA board, has been vocal about her opposition to pulling an allocation under any circumstance. She has argued that if TWSA is able to pull those allocations, it will make it hard for the homes to sell since they would essentially be condemned.
During the Nov. 18 meeting she discussed a letter sent to TWSA members by interim town Manager Chris Carter. That letter states that the town is also against TWSA pulling allocations.
“The Sylva town fully backs my comments on the issue,” Knotts said at the Nov.18 meeting.
While agreeing that the authority had the power to cut off services, she said that pulling the allocation in its entirety was too drastic of a measure. Instead, she said that water and sewer could be turned off to homes and homeowners that haven’t paid their bills, with the allocations being held until TWSA is paid.
Under the current draft, TWSA can rescind the allocation and put that water and sewer capacity back into the system. However, the authority allows people to pay a fee to have that allocation restored. In most cases that fee will be less than if a customer was forced to get a new allocation.
“It’s like we want revenue on every single gallon,” Knotts said. “That’s not necessarily the best business sense. If we do it this way, it gives people time to make good on their bills without totally losing that allocation.”
However, other TWSA members disagreed with the proposal. Board member Brad Moses said the policy could have some big impacts if water and sewer capacity ever became scarce in the county.
“I don’t see it as a money issue,” Moses said. “If it gets really bad and we run out of capacity, there could be instances where a dilapidated house will have an allocation but someone who wants to build a new house won’t. We want to encourage people to build new houses, but in that case we wouldn’t have the water and sewer for them to do it.”
TWSA member and County Commissioners’ Chairman Brian McMahan agreed.
“You have to pay your bill for a service,” McMahan said. “If you don’t pay, you don’t get service. It’s simple. If you don’t pay, there’s a threat of losing your service. If you don’t pay your car payment, they come and take your car.”
Since taxpayer money paid for the current sewer lines, McMahan said all taxpayers that are able should have the right to use them. If TWSA cannot rescind allocations on foreclosed homes, he said that could stop someone from tapping into them.
“If you want to get really technical, I as a taxpayer own part of the lines,” he said. “All of the taxpayers do, since it was their money that paid for the installation. If we don’t allow for revoking allocations, especially in times when capacity is scarce, we might be keeping people from using those lines that they paid for.”
Cline said one of the main reasons he left in language allowing the authority to rescind allocations is to protect customers. All of TWSA’s customers help pay to keep up the system, and if one person fails to pay their bill, it hurts the other customers as well, he said.
“Pulling an allocation like that just to resell it is not our intent whatsoever,” Cline said. “We want to make sure every customer pays what they owe. That helps keep the system up. If one person doesn’t pay, every other customer has to pick up the slack.”
Officials will continue discussing the issue at their next meeting, which is set for Tuesday, Dec. 9, at 5:30 p.m.
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