This month’s utility bills are out and we’ve heard several complaints already.  It seems that there is a $12 charge on many of the bills for garbage.  The City has jumped the gun on this deal since the County has never approved letting the City collect for garbage.  You might thank the BOC for delaying this.  The City is notorious for raising rates whenever they want to raise more money.  Your $12 garbage fee could easily rise to $14, $18 or more in the near future.  The people we’ve heard from had already paid for garbage through June when they were billed for the quarter. Another problem is an ongoing problem.  Some people, especially certain city employees, don’t pay their bills and don’t have their utilities cut off.  We’ve heard some really disturbing accusations that bills are even written off when an employee complains. We are checking these rumors out.  We do know that if you pay your bill, you are certainly paying higher rates to make up for a ploy that happens frequently in the City.  Here’s how it works—someone runs up a utility bill for several months and they don’t pay it. The bill finally reaches some big amount (such as $2500 or more), and the City cuts the utilities off.  Within an hour or maybe the next day, a family member comes up and pays a deposit to have the bill put in their name.  The utilities are turned back on and the $2500 bill becomes uncollectible.  Even though the same people are in the house and using the utilities, the City seems to make no effort to collect.  This ploy has been going on for some time, and it is costing all good citizens that pay their bills.  You also need to continue to monitor your utility bill from the City of Monticello. There seems to be serious problems with the meter readings.