Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 8A
Opinion
Stormwater
utilities’ progress
By Brant D. Keller, Ph. D.
For the Forsyth County News
Across the nation and in
Georgia, progress in the creation
of stormwater utilities has been
remarkable and encouraging. It
was as recent as 1998 that the
city of Griffin became the first
government in Georgia to create
a stormwater utility, its intent to
hold property owners account¬
able for runoff and provide a
stable, equitable funding source
dedicated to managing a water¬
shed approach to water quality
and quantity challenges.
Curiosity recently sent me
back to my 2001 dissertation
and research to examine the
validity of my projections
through 2020 on the increase in
stormwater utilities. The nation,
according to my 2001 model,
was expected to see an increase
of 1,500 to 2,000 stormwater
utilities through this period. Just
four years later, the empirical
data indicate a rate of increase
on track to add nearly 2,500
utilities nationwide by 2020.
And time and again, the driving
force is reported to be the
National Pollutant Discharge
Elimination System (NPDES)
Permitting Program, established
by the federal government to
control point-source discharges
of water pollution.
In Georgia, pioneer Griffin
has been emulated by stormwa¬
ter utilities in Columbia County,
the city of Decatur, Rockdale
County, the Douglasville
Douglas County Water and
Sewer Authority, the city of
Fayetteville, Fairbum, DeKalb
County, Athens-Clarke County,
Covington, Stockbridge and
Conyers.
Local governments activat¬
ing stormwater utilities in 2006
are the Clayton County Water
and Sewer Authority, Gwinnett
County, Warner Robins and
Peachtree City. Feasibility stud¬
ies are officially under way or
have been completed in Cobb,
Cherokee, Fulton, Effingham,
and Fulton, Glynn, Henry and
Newton counties and in the
cities of Americus, East Point,
Gainesville, Logansville and
Perry.
Milestones along this road
include the defeat of the city of
Atlanta’s stormwater utility,
after the Fulton County
Taxpayers Association success¬
fully argued in court that the
city did not follow appropriate
procedures, and the court deci¬
sion regarding Columbia
County’s proposed stormwater
utility, in which the court agreed
that the stormwater utility was a
service fee and not a tax.
With the evolution to
stormwater utilities, the cycle of
the ‘Trilogy of Water” is com¬
plete: Stormwater utilities have
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COUNTY NEWS — Wednesday, November 23,2005
established viable roots along
with water and wastewater.
Water and wastewater at one
time were embedded in the gen¬
eral fund tax base, as was
stormwater. Conveyance and
treatment are now all equated in
the watershed process: Over
time the quantifiable unit of
measurement has proved to be
equitable in determining the
contribution of runoff from each
parcel of property.
Despite remarkable
progress, challenges remain for
stormwater utilities. One hurdle
is a movement to create legisla¬
tion to tag the fee onto the annu¬
al property tax bill. Water,
wastewater, electric, phone and
cable utilities bill monthly for
services provided, and rightfully
so. The concept behind a utility
is to establish a user fee data¬
base and bill users appropriately
for services rendered. Add a
stormwater fee to a tax bill,
however, and the implication is
that it is a tax and not a utility.
The Columbia County case
affirms that a stormwater utility
is truly a user fee-generated util¬
ity, based on services rendered
not on assessed value.
Supporters suggest that the
fee should be itemized in the tax
bill, just as a street light would
be. But a street light is assessed,
not a user fee. Utilities do not
place liens on property to
monies due. To be a utility, one
must act like a utility, do due
diligence, create a billing sys¬
tem and send bills on a regular
basis based upon consumption
or services used.
Another growing concern is
the premature entrance of con¬
sulting firms seeking a role in
the development of these
stormwater utilities.
Inexperienced firms will com¬
plicate the development and
implementation of a stormwater
utility. Privatization can help
toward cost-effective implemen
tation, but only when govern¬
ments operate cautiously, con¬
sidering firms with a proven
track record.
The process over the next
few years promises to be inter
esting as stormwater manage¬
ment evolves and improves. A
well-defined stormwater utility
is a priceless tool in managing
water quality and quantity in a
watershed. Not only can it
become a financial incentive for
environmentally responsible
property development and man
agement, it can also help gov¬
ernment create an informed
stakeholder in every resident,
contractor and developer.
Brant D. Keller, Ph. D,
director of Public Works and
Utilities for the city of Griffin,
wrote this commentary for the
Georgia Public Policy
Foundation.
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to the root of education woes
What is really wrong with
education in Georgia? No, I
don’t mean low test scores,
oversized classes or the state’s
decision to rip nearly a billion
dollars from the education
budget. Those are simply sur¬
face manifestations of a stum
bling and declining public
school system.
Let’s go beyond those
immediate problems and try to
find the root causes. Why
don’t many public schools
perform at even minimally
acceptable standards? Why are
so few schools turning out
graduates ready to cope with
an increasingly complex
world? Why aren’t teachers
rarin’ to go every morning to
pour knowledge into kids’
heads and inspire them to
greater achievements? Why
has an anti-intellectual attitude
infected so many students?
Why have so many leading
Georgia citizens abandoned
the idea that better schools
beget a better quality of life?
And what has happened to
Georgia’s formerly go-go
higher education network?
After all these years, have
Georgia’s colleges slipped
back into the tired old pattern
that defines the magnolia
lined campuses of other Deep
South states?
We recently invited Dr.
Craig Spinks of Evans, a well
known educator who retired
last spring, to give us an insid¬
er’s view of the basic causes
of the state’s seemingly eter¬
nal public education short¬
j comings. You may not agree
with his list, but at least it pro-
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Shipp
vides talking points for further
discussion — and action.
Unhappily, a number of his
wrongs are embedded in the
state’s social fabric. Quick
cures to these ailments are not
evident.
Here is what Dr. Spinks
sees as “the 10 most important
problems facing public
schools in our state:
1. Absence of responsi¬
ble, loving fathers in the home;
2. Non-instructional
demands upon teachers’ time;
3. Unsupportive admin¬
istrators, including principals,
superintendents and even
school board leaders;
4. The “CYA” mentality
of administrators, even to the
extent of violating state law
mandating the reporting of
certain crimes;
5. Presence of chaotic
and dangerous school environ¬
ments;
6. A dearth of passion¬
ate leadership dedicated to
helping kids learn to be pro¬
ductive and decent people;
7. A deficiency of
extensive media coverage of
school problems;
8. A lack of direct connec¬
tions between student learning
and student promotion, and
between the achievements of
administrators and teachers
and their compensation;
9. A shortage of courage or
willingness at administrative
levels to take managed risks;
and
10. No one in my 34-plus
year career was ever interested
enough to inquire of me and
my colleagues as to the long¬
term problems and possible
solutions to Georgia’s school
miseries.”
If you read Dr. Spinks’ list
closely, you might suspect that
he has a few old scores he’d
like to settle.
However, he has given us
valuable insights from an edu¬
cator’s perspective. His “10
most” list might be summa¬
rized with a catch-all 11th
item: “A deficit of leadership
at the top.”
Georgia education has lost
its good generals — men and
women with bright ideas and
an ability to inspire — people
who could make teachers
proud to be teachers, and top¬
flight administrators who
would promise that our col¬
leges would do more, than sim¬
ply raise more money next
year.
As for our public school
system, we have been saddled
for more than a decade with
mediocrity at the highest level.
Linda Schrenko, the state’s
first Republican and first
woman school superintendent,
vowed to increase exponen¬
tially the quality of Georgia
schools. Instead, she bounced
from one scandal to another
and now faces trial for stealing
a significant sum of federal
education cash.
Her Republican successor,
Kathy Cox, seems pitifully
lost. If she were not
restrained, she would immedi¬
ately introduce courses on the
supernatural into the
state’s science curriculum.
Qualitative improvement is
not on her to-do list.
For the first time in nearly
40 years, a Georgia governor
has abandoned upgrading edu¬
cation as a presumed goal of
the chief executive’s adminis¬
tration. Sonny Perdue did so
after watching his predecessor
crash and burn over a plan to
make teachers just like every¬
body else, accountable for
their job performance. 3
Recruiting and promoting
a fresh crew of commanders
for our education army may
not result in installing more
loving dads in homes (as Dr.
Spinks suggests is a necessi¬
ty), but it might get us back on
a track toward achieving pari¬
ty with the rest of the country.
One other thing: A few
years ago, the University
System could boast of a string
of chancellors who expanded
our colleges and universities
so that every Georgian could
pursue education beyond high
school. We had dreamers and
doers in the No. 1 higher-edu¬
cation slot.
It is hoped that the Board
of Regents will keep that pro¬
gressive history in mind as it
sets out to find a replacement
for the hapless chancellor it
just ran off.
Bill Shipp’s column
appears each Wednesday and
Sunday. His e-mail address is
shippl @ bellsouth.net.