Clearing the muddy waters

As the Saratoga-Carbon County Impact Joint Powers Board (SCCIJPB) continues its pursuit of extremely delinquent accounts, potential changes to the municipal code may help streamline that process.

During the April 13 meeting of the joint powers board, Director of Public Works Jon Winter presented the board members with changes to Saratoga Municipal Code 13.60.010 and 13.60.020. These two sections of the code pertain to delinquent charges and termination of services. When the SCCIJPB began to actively pursue accounts that were in arrears, however, Winter pointed out several discrepancies.

In January, Winter had asked both the joint powers board and the Saratoga Town Council to review both sections of the code. At the March 3 meeting, the public works director discussed the differences between the two sections and the confusion it could cause when it came to delinquent accounts and turning off service to a property. At that meeting, he stated he would attempt to rewrite the sections to make the process clearer going forward.

“What I’ve done is I’ve gone back and looked at 13.60.010 and 020 and I think there’s enough in them to make them somewhat confusing,” said Winter. “One of them says we can do this immediately starting to disconnect, the other one says we have to send out a letter and wait for so many days.”

The resulting changes combined the two sections into one. According to Winter, however, there was inaccurate language that would require decisions from either the joint powers board or the town council to change.

“Basically, there’s going to be a decision that’s probably going to have to be made by either recommendations from the board and from the council on whether we want to change those in the current ordinances such as how many days delinquent, how many days before we shut off, stuff like that,” said Winter.

Currently, 13.60.010 reads that one-third of delinquent billing along with the current billing is due on the 15th day of the month immediately following the month of billing. So, for example, a bill that was issued for April with a delinquent amount could be paid on May 15 as long as one-third of the delinquency and the current amount were paid. Winter advised the board, however, that billing was done on the 26th day of each month and not the 15th.

Other changes needing to be made included removing language related to landfill billing as the Upper Platte River Solid Waste Disposal District took over billing for the Saratoga area on July 1, 2020.

Winter added that, with the proposed ordinance, users of the water system would have three options; pay the bill in full, pay the one-third delinquent balance along with the current bill or have their water service disconnected.

“I looked at ordinances in various towns and this one is pretty lenient in terms of getting it done. Other ones; bill’s due on the 21st, you’re getting disconnected on the 26th. Plain and simple, first month,” Winter said. “You’re delinquent the minute it hasn’t shown up on that day, five days later we can disconnect.”

Councilmember Jon Nelson stated that he was in support of the joint powers board and the Town of Saratoga showing leniency to someone who was in arrears but working on settling their account. He added that the immediate focus should be on accounts that were several years past due and owed thousands of dollars.

According to Winter, of the 98 delinquent accounts on his list there were 13 accounts that were in excess of $1,000 and made up approximately 60 percent of the money owed. 

“There may be one that we just got to eat because they’re dead, they’re foreclosed on. A good example is the care center, the delinquent account on that is primarily associated with the previous owner,” said Winter. “The care center now is current on their bill but the debt that’s occurred is from a previous owner.”

As discussion continued, Winter stated that it was his recommendation to attempt to collect on the late accounts in sections rather than send out 98 letters if the proposed ordinance passed third reading. The letters would also be modified along with the two sections of code with a list of steps for the delinquent account holder leading up to termination of service.

“It wasn’t created in a week, you’re not going to fix it in a week,” said Russ Waldner, SSCIJPB treasurer.

Nelson requested that joint power board members and Winter provide him with additional thoughts over the following days to prepare an ordinance for first reading on April 20.

The next meeting of the Saratoga-Carbon County Impact Joint Powers Board will be at 6 p.m. on May 12 at the Platte Valley Community Center in Saratoga.