Detroit water shutoffs to begin Tuesday

Water shutoff crews will begin cutting service Tuesday to Detroiters behind on their bills while officials continue to debate possible water bill subsidies for those living in poverty.

The Detroit water department has delivered about 3,000 shutoff notices to households with delinquent bills since May 11, giving those customers 10 business days to make arrangements to pay their bill or have their service cut off. More notices will be delivered as the shutoffs are carried out this week.

Detroit's number of delinquent accounts — those owing $150 or more in bills that are at least two months late — remains a significant problem. There are 64,769 delinquent residential accounts owing $48.9 million, according to the water department. As of last June, there were more than 79,000 delinquent accounts owing $42 million.

The department, under the leadership of Mayor Mike Duggan, is proceeding with shutoffs against the wishes of the City Council, which passed a resolution May 12 for a shutoff moratorium until the current financial assistance programs are evaluated and a subsidy plan is pursued to lower water bills for poor people before they fall behind.

The latest crackdown is raising fears of a growing public health crisis. Thousands already are living in southeast Michigan without running water, according to the Sierra Club.

Councilwoman Raquel Castaneda-Lopez said the shutoffs lead to unsanitary living conditions. "It could put children or seniors at risk if they don't have access to water," she said.

Greg Eno, a spokesman for the water department, declined to comment on the water shutoffs.

The seemingly never-ending problem of Detroit's unpaid water bills comes as city and county officials work to craft a new strategy to fight the problem under the Great Lakes Water Authority, a regional operation created during Detroit's bankruptcy case. The regional authority is expected to have $4.5 million available to help water customers in the tri-county area pay their bills.

There are two fundamentally different ways to design the strategy.

The water department's current model is known as an assistance-based plan, which provides discounts to qualified residents with overdue bills. Critics say that approach does not prevent delinquency, nor does it offer enough help to keep people from defaulting on their payment plans. These critics point to the persistent number of delinquent accounts to support their argument.

An alternative is an affordability-based plan, which would reduce bills for poor people while adding fees to other customers. Supporters argue this approach is more pro-active, but others consider an affordability plan to be an illegal tax in violation of equal protection clauses in the state and federal constitutions. Still, there are other legal opinions that conclude affordability plans are legal.

The City Council supported an affordability plan in 2006 that proposed to set rates at between 2% and 3% of residents' income. The plan was never implemented.

The city's law department said then that the plan was not possible — an opinion to which the department still clings.

"The law department stands by an opinion it issued in 2006 that DWSD cannot charge some Detroit residents less than the cost of providing its service, causing it to raise the rates paid by other customers for the purpose of providing a financial subsidy to low income residents," corporation counsel Melvin (Butch) Hollowell said in a statement on Friday.

Nevertheless, the City Council and other groups, including the Sierra Club and the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization, continue to encourage the city water department and those developing the new regional authority to pursue an affordability plan.

So far they have not been successful. In fact, the Sierra Club resigned last week from its position among stakeholders developing the regional water assistance plan once it became clear an affordability strategy was not on the table.

"We went as far as we could, but we wanted to make sure we maintained the integrity of our organization," said Melissa Damaschke, Great Lakes program director for the Sierra Club. "It's so unfortunate that in the crisis that the region faces with water shutoffs that the GLWA is not seeing this as an opportunity to address a major problem. This is a public health threat."

It appears the City Council will continue exploring the possibility of an affordability plan to reduce bills for poor people. The council has established an affordability task force that met for the first time on Friday. Council President Brenda Jones indicated she wants a public discussion on the topic.

"If there's a legal reason why water affordability cannot be done, then I think our citizens deserve to know what the legal reason is," she said at last week's council session.

Contact Joe Guillen: jguillen@freepress.com or 313-222-6678.

How to get help

If you have received a delinquency notice, the water department advises customers to call 313-267-8000 immediately to discuss a payment plan rather than waiting until service is cut off.

The Detroit Water Fund, operated by the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department and United Way for Southeastern Michigan, also provides assistance. For information on eligibility, call 313-267-8000. Those interested in donating to the fund or applying online for assistance may do so at www.detroitwaterfund.org.

Those with past-due amounts greater than $2,000 may apply for help through Wayne Metropolitan Community Action Agency at 313-388-9799.