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By Jody Mangum- June 1, 2026
NOTE BY EDITOR: This speech was given at the Press Conference held at the Flynn Center on June 1st before the City Council convened for the Hearing on the water/sewer rate increases. A copy of the video will be posted soon.
I am here to speak on behalf of myself and all the other hardworking citizens that do not want to pay for expansion and growth of our city. The State of California’s constitution asserts current rate payers do not pay for development. PERIOD!
We, the citizens have not had a 100% increase in income and we should not be expected to provide the water and sewer fund with a 100% increase in income per month. For people on water and sewer this equates to almost $10,000 every four years after 2031. $10,000 every four years – that’s some serious taxation, when the beneficiaries are the developers and the city in seeking Grants. It is interesting to me that our Grant writer and City Manager both live in Gasquet and are not affected by the agenda.
In would like to remind the City that we are not responsible for their ability to seek Grant Funding and we are not responsible to pay for the infrastructure needed for developers to benefit from Grant Funding. The City wants us to pay for community growth for which we do not have services to provide for – doctors, dentists, veterinarians, mental health, healthcare and more.
I am here to remind the City Council they are the representatives of us, the people. Four our of five have voted to double our water and sewer bills without evidence and put the burden is on the ratepayers and not the developers. It is not fair or appropriate to call us a DAC – Disadvantaged Community and then further disadvantage us with a doubling of our rates.
I want to remind the City Council that this is coming to us on top of a 17% increase by Pacific Power to pay for the generators required during the Smith River Fire Complex.
There are legal standards that are required and they hired a financial company that does not address the expansion component as evidenced by the community growth.
We can all look around and see incredible growth – estimated at 8% last year alone. Since Phase 1 of the WWTP, conservative estimates on development include:
- 64 units at Summer Park behind Walmart
- 80 units at Hidden Creek Apartments behind Walmart
- 56 units Roosevelt on property sold by California Auto Image
- 27 units at Harbor Point
- 14 units at 708 J Street
- An additional 8 units on J Street
And the behemoth 162 units called Battery Point by Joe Hamilton School – this is 411 units and not a comprehensive list of hook-ups since the Phase 1 upgrade.
Phase 1 was purported to be 11.8% expansion would be 454 units. The City says the hook-ups are not the reason we are in default.
The fee to hook into the WWTP is $9,682 and water hook-ups are $2,700 per Single Family Residence. We, the citizens, would like to know where these funds have been allocated with so much new development and then to be told we will be bankrupt, as was mentioned multiple times during the last Harbor District Board meeting. These funds should be directly paying down the 11.8% expansion to reduce our debt. There were millions that were collected for sewer hook-ups that have not been accounted for that should have been applied to reduce the loan debt.
WE WOULD LIKE A FULL ACCOUNTING ON BOTH THE WATER AND SEWER SO THAT WE CAN TRANSPARENTLY SEE:
- Measure S funding for the “Storm Drain Project Play St. through L St. and K St. to 2nd St. AS THIS PROJECT WAS COVERED BY A COMMUNITY DEVERLOPMENT BLOCK GRANT (CDBG) AND CLEAN CALIFORNIA GRANT. THE GRANT WAS $4 MILLION.
- In 2013 there was a Grant for $1.5 million for “general water and sewer improvements.”
- Another of an unknown amount of CDBG fir B St, residential sewer main replacement.
- Front St Re-design Phase III funding has been secured for $3.3 Million to extend storm water, sewer and water improvements on Front and 2nd St.
- Was there a study of inflow and infiltration in 2025 for $350,000? What are the results?
THESE ARE THE CONCERNS WE HAVE – THE INFILTRATION HAS BEEN A 20+ YEAR PROBLEM….
The 2019 Operations Contract with Jacobs Engineering was “aimed to reduce long term costs” by an estimated $1.5 million, but in the budget allocation for WWTP operations jumped UP $1.5 million between 2020 and 2025. I appreciated that Linda Leaver, Finance Director, clarified during the budget meeting that the value of the water and sewer enterprise fund was liquidation value BUT she failed to address my next concern voiced at the City Council Meeting – THAT THE JUMP IN THE COSTS WAS IN THE SERVICE CONTRACT FOR OPERATIONS. We just want transparency – if the contract has jumped that much, SHOULD WE NOT PUT THE CONTRACT OUT TO BID? At this rate increase, our operations will be $4 million by 2031. IS THE CITY CONTRACTING THE DESIGN OF PHASE II ON THE SEWER ENTERPISE FUND? I HEARD CITY MANAGER, ERIC WIER STATE PHASE II HAS TO BE “SHOVEL READY” TO APPLY FOR GRANTS.
During a March 2026 City Council meeting, Eric Wier is quoted as saying, “Treatment plants cost a lot of money” and “if you have a 100,000 connections…. the more people we have to spread this around, the more people we can spread it around.”
Even with fines, for some reason we are not under a cease and desist…. is the North Coast Water Quality Control Board culpable in not capping continued hook-ups in to a plant that is not processing correctly?
We have been told this is a coliform issue caused by stricter state guidelines. So, the question is disinfection vs filtrations. An MBR is certainly one of the most costly ways to deal with coliform in consideration that our plant has not met requirements to sell our discharge, which former Public Works Director, Jim Barnts said would be clean enough to drink and could be sold for irrigation purposes and the income would help payoff the loan, none of which happened. We were also told the $2 1/2 million Lab would pay for itself in 2 1/2 years. Never happened.
With the State Revolving Loan Fund at $100 Billion, do they set standards that indebt small communities like ours? This is happening across the State of California, where the State is mandating standards that are unaffordable for most.
