Raleigh probably will follow Durham’s lead and raise water rates this year — in part, ironically, because conservation is working — city officials said Tuesday. - article

Hmmmm… so we claim we are “selling less water” and that “conservation works” and despite the drought being over we still get to do what we wanted in the first place – raise the price of water. Why do I get the feeling that this was the point in pushing the so called drought as an extreme emergency in the first place?

In Raleigh, “there will have to be a reckoning at some point,” (Dale) Crisp said. “Our turn is coming.”

Perhaps the “reckoning” needs to be finding a new Pubic Utilities Director? First the sky is falling – I mean the lake is empty and we are going to run out of water, then we blame the garbage disposals, and now we have to raise prices because people took me seriously? Come on Dale – enough. I wonder how much of the shortfall we could cover with that one salary? Unfortunately probably not enough.

Maybe I am a bit cynical but I think the city needs to act like the rest of us. If the water rates started going up I would have to cover the cost increase out of other things I like to do (going out to dinner, beer, watering my grass) – my boss wouldn’t give me a raise to cover it. Perhaps the city should look for programs that they can cut to cover their loss – after all it was the city that decided we should all use less in the first place.

New slogan? Welcome to Raleigh where we encourage you to conserve and charge you more to do it. Actually – once the prices are increased I imagine we will go back to no restrictions pretty quickly. It only seems fair we give the city the opportunity to make as much money as possible off of their windfall drought.