Time to come clean
After attending all three town hall presentations by the CCWD staff,
there is a need to put some background to this effort to
substantially raise rates. First, we need to read between the lines
about what was not talked about. How we got here should have been
clearly spelled out by our district staff and it was not. The staff
said it was all about future connections that didn’t materialize and
a lower tax income. The districts yearly audited financial reports
say differently.
When I ran for this board in 1988, CCWD had $28 million invested in
current/restricted assets plus income from those investments. The
numbers presented in this letter are from the audited financial
statements of the district.
By 2005 those investments totaled $45 million with the districts
payroll of $4 million and director’s average pay of $21k per year.
Now it gets ugly, as you recall the markets fell apart. Back in 1988
CCWD was heavily invested in GMAC (General Motors) which as everyone
knows went bankrupt.
Fast forward to 2012, where we find the investment portfolio at $21
million with district payroll of $8 million and directors making $27k
per year. They just approved the new budget and gave themselves an
average $5K raise for next year.
My concern here is either the district financial officer wasn’t
listened to by your elected directors as the markets were changing or
this officer should be sued for not protecting our interests. Either
way, every other entity faced the same financial losses but most
chose to big boys about it and made adjustments to accommodate. My
business profile changed dramatically after the market fell.
The bottom line is your elected directors and staff at CCWD lost $21
million of your money in the financial markets between 2005 and 2012.
How much are they asking you to pony up over the next five years?
I understand there is time and emotion invested by your CCWD district
in making their proposal to increase rates. It is also clear in
watching the presentation and listening to the responses by staff and
directors, the individuals working on this effort are limited by the
business tools they have learned in their working careers.
Who am I? I recently retired from a national corporation with a
responsibility to put over $14 million per year on the table for
investors. If you need to pay for studies and consultants to do your
homework, time to get out of the business. If you have limited
business tools or proven business experience, what is happening now
with the district is exactly the result you can expect.
If the CCWD directors chose to vote no to rate increases on 10 July,
I will be shocked.
Dennis Mills Vallecito
