Citizens continue utility complaints at council

Oct. 11—Citizen complaints took up the bulk of the Duncan City Council's regular meeting on Tuesday night as just over half a dozen once again raised concerns with their high utility bills.

The public comment portion of the meeting took precedence after a short agenda with the presentation of a proclamation and a certificate of appreciation and two agenda items.

Crystal Farmer, who lives on C Street and addressed the council just two weeks ago about her bill, opened the public comment segment on utility bills with her concerns. Farmer said she had indeed heard from someone with the city but had received no resolutions.

"My problem is hearing from y'all and not getting any resolution," Farmer said. "I've got over a $4,000 water bill. If it is not paid by the 12th, it shows I'm getting like a $125 late fee on my bill. I have already signed up for mediation, but the mediation is not until Nov. 27, which is the week of Thanksgiving. Everybody knows more than likely nothing's going to get done."

Farmer said a lot of people are upset with the city.

"My thing is I don't mind paying what I owe, but a $4,000 bill is enough to pay for a whole year, and then some," she said. "Probably for a lot of people. I am one person with five dogs, so there's no way that much water is being used. We just need to figure out what's happening."

The next women to speak, Rachel Sherill, who lives on D Street, said her water bill totaled $1,200.

"They said they were going to get a bill correction in August and they still have not," she said. "It just keeps getting higher."

Ariana Acosta then stepped up to the microphone. She said her family moved from California because they were excited to raise their kids in Duncan.

Acosta said she also received an irregular bill and said she's not worried about paying something she's used, but doesn't want to pay something she didn't use or be charged a late fee when the bill isn't accurate. She said her bill doubled from month to month.

"We are very responsible people, paying all my bills, trying to not have any problems with the city," she said.

After multiple calls to the city, Acosta said city staff told her they were working on it but haven't gotten to it yet.

"The due date is Thursday," she said. "I don't know what to do ... I don't want to be worried for the next month."

Randall Pitts was the next person to voice concerns. He said his bill had jumped from $300 to $800.

"I've been there 15 years, I've never had a utility bill more than $300," Pitts said.

He told the council about his wife seeing someone coming out of their backyard who said they had changed the electric meter. When asked if the electric meter would increase the bill, the person said no.

"It went from $300 to $800," Pitts said.

Shanda Savage also lodged a complaint. She said her bill in August was $425 and the meter usage came in at 2,200.

"I get the next bill and it is $642 and it says I used 21,000," Savage said. "Of course I can't pay this bill. I contacted the city. They said that they would have somebody come out, read the meter — nobody ever came out. Never heard back from them."

This month, her bill went up to $1,100.

"It does show that all of my billing dates are from the 12th to the 12th," Savage said. "Well I just happened to see the meter reader out there and he came on the 20th, so that's eight extra days on my bill. I took a picture of him and I took a picture of meter and the meter was right, but he's added eight extra days onto my billing cycle."

Savage also said she feels like her bills are the same readings as from the previous year.

"I feel like it's all from last year's billing," she said. "I did have a water leak and I had a gas leak. I've got a receipt in from the plumber where that was fixed in the last year, but the bills match up the same from December to now. It's like they just added onto my amount from last year. So I've got a cutoff date. I don't have a way to pay. I need somebody to do something before I don't have electricity and I'm camping out at city hall."

Before any other comments came from the public, City Attorney David Hammond told the audience that if a person comes up and has a disputed part of their electric bill or water bill, he wanted them to call city hall and set up a review hearing date.

"Once that's done, it will stop a turn off or collection of your utilities," Hammond said, noting no interest would collect.

He said if citizens were calling and getting no call backs, that was a problem they wanted to address.

"We want to start working these things until we get caught up," Hammond said.

Hammond said in the instance where a cut off date comes before the hearing date, to make sure city hall knows that so the cut off will not happen.

When Hammond said from there, an estimation would be made for the payments, a person from the audience said regardless of the cutoffs not happening, the bills would just keep adding up.

Mayor Robert Armstrong then addressed decorum in the council chambers and warned that the matters would be handled professionally so he didn't have to remove anyone from the meeting.

Hammond then continued.

"We'll give you an estimated amount," Hammond said, noting there had been some complaints about the estimations. "And we'll deal with that when you come in. But you pay that amount until we get the repealed part resolved. Once we get that part resolved, then we can do a payment plan on that, so there'll be no interruption of services."

Hammond reiterated if citizens have a mediation date after the cutoff date, to communicate with city hall and customer service so they can notate it on the account.

"We'll move your date for you," Hammond said. "Go to City Hall, and they have a form for you to fill out to set a mediation day."

Hammond said if there's any issue or citizens can't afford it, they'll work with them.

"There's no penalty, there's no interest, there's no shut off of any services during that time," Hammond said. "And that's water and electric."

The floor was turned back to public comment.

Lori Walls, who lives on A Street and spoke at the last council meeting, then approached to follow up on her billing issues.

"I stood here and I spoke about my utility bill being $652.89 with a kilowatt usage reading at 5,393 kilowatts for the month," Walls said. "My meter reading at that time on Sept. 6 was 26,510. Today, Oct. 10, at 3:24 p.m., it reads 28,126. That would make my total kilowatt usage for this bill 1,616 as of today, which my meter was supposed to be read on the sixth of October. It still has not been."

Walls said at the last council meeting, the city attorney took her contact information, but she had not received a call from him.

Hammond said he did call.

"I say I'll return a call, I'll return a call," Hammond said. "You ask the others."

Walls continued and said when she went to file for mediation, the earliest date she could get in was Dec. 18.

"I was also informed due to COVID, you don't actually meet with the city attorney," Walls said. "He makes a decision. I asked how that decision was made. Nobody could provide that information. I understand my bill is not as high as some of the individual there today, but $652.89 is a lot of money for a family of three children."

Walls, who works in assisted living, raised concerns about the elderly in the community and those living on a fixed income.

"They are having to choose between utilities or food," she said.

She also said she reached out to the Oklahoma Attorney General's office and filled out a citizen complaint form.

"As a resident of this community, I implore you to have some sense of duty to your citizens and give us the help we're asking for because as a community, we're tired of not being heard," Walls said.

She told Hammond he must have the wrong phone number and again left contact information, but Hammond said the number was going straight to recording.

Allyson Greenroyd spoke next and was the last of the public comments on the issue.

Greenroyd said she has lived in Duncan for 40 years and "watched over the past, a little over a decade, of the way we've illegally misappropriated funds."

"I myself don't have a big bill," Greenroyd said. "I see that everyone else pretty much in the town has an issue either electric or water or both and they're getting the run around. No one's answering. Pretty broad statements as far as any when we hear from any of you guys, whether it's the paper or KSWO. It's a broad statement — pretty much what's on your website."

Greenroyd said her issues personally come from looking over the accounting records.

"I noticed that you place a lot of your assets and revenue of the city of Duncan inside the Duncan Area Economic Development Foundation," she told the council. "And I was under the impression that our sales tax revenue is what we put over in the foundation, not necessarily our revenue or assets for that matter."

Greenroyd said she printed off citizen complaint forms from the Attorney General's office for those in the audience who wanted them.

"If the city council or the mayor — if you guys aren't going to address the issue, we can go a level up," she said. "We really are not tied to just you guys making those decisions or making those changes."

Greenroyd said because nothing is ever addressed publicly, the community gets together on Facebook and keeps making assumptions.

"We do a little digging and we share what information we have between us," she said.

She then addressed City Manager Kim Meek and said "a lot of it falls on you."

"A lot of the oversight of the utilities is your responsibility," Greenroyd said. "Creating the budget, the financials, all of that — that's your responsibility."

Greenroyd said she went to obtain a copy of the 2023 budget from the City of Duncan this last week but when staff wanted her to pay for it, she asked the state investigator instead.

Greenroyd was cut off at the three minute mark, which is usual for public comment during City Council meetings.

Before the meeting ended, City Manager Meek did provide an update on the water meter project and the new system.

"We're in cycle route three right now and that route is 43% complete and the total project is 14% complete," Meek said. "The new meters are going in the ground roughly at 250 a week. We are on schedule to complete that by the end of the first quarter of January."

The next regular meeting of the Duncan City Council will take place at 5:15 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 24, in chambers located inside the Duncan Police Department.