Behind The Readers' Forum: Citizens need say in water deal

2/2/2018

In this week’s edition of Behind The Readers’ Forum, The Blade welcomes letter writer David J. Neuendorff to discuss his recent letter.

VIDEO: David J. Neuendorff discusses the future of Toledo’s most valuable natural resource
View last week’s Behind The Readers’ Forum | View the entire Behind The Readers’ Forum series

Here is the text of Mr. Neuendorff’s letter:

The most valuable natural resource we will have this century is potable water. We must do everything we can to preserve and protect this national resource. Protecting our fresh water from pollution should be one of our nation’s sacred duties to the future. Potable water can be equated to our community possession of gold.

According to City Law Director Dale Emch and Mayor Kapszukiewicz (Jan. 25, “City nears agreement for water sale”), the city is going to continue the proud tradition of telling the resident voter taxpayers what is best for them without bothering with a vote of the citizens.

Without any announced public hearings or citizen input to date, elected city officials plan to give, lease, or sell the Toledo taxpayer-owned municipal water system assets to a metropolitan authority.

Is the money realized from that sale going to be refunded directly to Toledo taxpayers who have paid for, upgraded, and maintained the creation of potable water for most of the residents of the region for generations ?

The benefit to the suburban communities who will not have to spend upwards of one billion dollars to build their own municipal potable water supply system is obvious. They have always added surplus charges to the cost of Toledo supplied city water for their citizens, who also appear not to be getting the chance to vote on a regional municipal system they will be required to pay more in taxes to operate.

DAVID J. NEUENDORFF
Scottwood Avenue

Each week The Blade’s editorial board will pick a “letter of the week,” and the writer will be asked to come to The Blade to be interviewed for our Behind the Readers’ Forum feature, which appears on toledoblade.com and Blade NewsSlide.

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