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In order to be diplomatic I have to say that the Mayor of Vernon is misinformed (I chose to believe that he would not be deliberately paying for misinformation).
By the year 2000 the City exceeded its water license and had no room to develop. Coldstream and NORD (North Okanagan Water Authority or NOWA) had significant excess water licenses. That is why the "have's" and the "have not's" joined forces and developed the Master Water Plan and established the Greater Vernon Water utility.
The agreement provided water for Vernon and they could go ahead with massive developments such as the Rise and Turtle Mountain. Homes on Turtle Mountain recently were advertised at "reduced rates" starting at around $500,000. Without water those lands were worth very little.
Vernon, in turn, agreed that all domestic and industrial customers of the utility will pay the same domestic rate. Agriculture users would be provided with rates that would continue to make their products competitive with other agricultural establishments within the Valley. It's quite easy to understand that all the infrastructure improvements were needed only by domestic customers as farmers were quite happy with the raw water for their crops.
Domestic rates immediately begin to rise in 2002 and all customers paid the same. At present the rates are set at about $110 per year fixed plus $0.84 per cubic meter consumption rate. All water quality and all infrastructure improvements benefited Vernon to date. None of the Regional District and very few of Coldstream customers got any improvement. Thus, one can say that Coldstream and "B" and "C" subsidized Vernon for the last seven years. When we add to this the value of the water licenses Vernon received, any reasonable observer can see that the greatest beneficiary of the agreement was the City of Vernon. The tax benefits from those developments must be huge. Yet the Mayor of Vernon claims that the City is subsidizing the rest of us. Is black now turned white and white is now black? The “Nouveau Riche” turned on those who made the riches possible.
It was not Coldstream and Areas “B” and “C” that requested the devolution arbitration: it was the City and any claim that the continued increase in legal and arbitration costs are the fault of Coldstream and the electoral area’s is bogus. If two people (let’s call them Joe and Bill) sign a contract and Bill wants to break that contract and goes to court it is not Joe’s fault that there are court costs, it is Bill’s.
If your Council would agree to Vernon’s demands that they be allowed to pull out of water distribution the result would be that a domestic water customer in Vernon using 400 cubic meters of water per year would pay about $290 while a Coldstream domestic customer using the same volume of water would pay almost $700! A resident of Area B or C would pay almost $1000 for the same amount of water!
It’s a hell of a way to repay the gift of water Vernon received from Coldstream and NORD. In many states of the USA farmers make huge profits not from growing agricultural products but from the sale of their water licenses. It’s proven that water licenses have great value. The Mayor of Vernon should realize this simple truth.
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