August 3, 2004
Kamloops Daily News


What is free but everyone pays for it?  You guessed it - -
water.

No one is forced to pay for water.  You could go down to the
river and haul it to your house.  You wouldn't be arrested
for theft.  But it would be a lot of work.   Each
Kamloopsian uses 600 liters a day (about 100 buckets).

If you want water delivered to your house there is no
practical alternative but to pay for it.  How you pay for it
was fiercely debated three years ago preceding a referendum. 
Some wanted water meters, others wanted a flat rate for all.

At the time, I thought water meters were a good way of
saving tax dollars.   "We can save millions of dollars in
building our new water treatment plant by reducing water
consumption with universal water meters," I said.

But a lot of water has gone under the bridge since then.  
Water meters were rejected by voters.  The city went ahead
with a more expensive water treatment plant to meet our high
demand.  And our water bill went up.

Now water meters are a hot topic again since Mayor
Rothenburger floated the idea in his column in The Daily
News.   City council wants to proceed with voluntary water
meters on a trial basis.

The new controversy has generated a lot of letters to the
editor, ranging from social issues to water conservation.

Geraldine King worries about the plight of low-income
families.  "They cannot afford air conditioning, so their
little ones cool off in the sprinklers on the lawn, when
their water bill comes in and they can't afford to pay and
their water is turned off until payment, what then," 
wonders King.

Others suspect water meters are a sneaky way to fleece the
public by adding costs for the "distribution, delivery,
meter reading, billing, monitoring, franchise technological,
outsourcing, disconnection and connection, late, and other
service charges to numerous to mention, to the water bills
instead of Terasen," says  P. Frehlick.

He raises an interesting point.  Terasen doesn't  sell
natural gas, they just deliver it.  So when your bill goes
up, Terasen pleads "don't shoot the messenger."  They are
just passing their costs on to you.

Unlike water, which is free, natural gas is a commodity with
a market value.

Water is free for the time being.  There are many
corporations who want water to be made a commodity so it can
be commercially traded.  That worries some Canadians. 
Commodification of water would mean that the floodgates
would open to the U.S.   Once the taps are turned on they
can't be turned off, according to the North American Free
Trade Agreement.

As in the delivery of natural gas, the market value of water
could be added to the cost of delivery.  Or  worse, our
water system could be privatized.  That's what happened in
Bolivia where the cost of water skyrocketed.  After the
World Bank imposed privatization in the 1990s, the cost of
water rose to as much as one-quarter of a family's income.

Imagine the protests from Kamloopsians if they had to pay
one-quarter of their income for water - - exceeding $10,000
a year.

If we don't want water defined as a commodity, what should
it be?  The Council of Canadians says "Water is a public
trust; it belongs to everyone. No one should have the right
to appropriate it or profit from it at someone else's
expense."

Canadians strongly feel that clean water is basic right. 
When asked whether "Canada should adopt a comprehensive
national water policy that recognizes clean drinking water
as a basic human right,"  97 per cent of Canadians agreed
according to a Ipsos-Reid survey.

Water is more than a basic right for Kamloopsians.  We have
a strong geographical connection to water.  The city sprawls
along river valleys.  The meaning of the city is derived
from the Shuswap word for "meeting of the waters."

Despite all our lofty feelings about water,  we are
remarkably ambivalent.   Why do we treat water so badly if
we feel so zealous about it?

We contaminate large amounts of water with human waste.  We
divert large amounts of water for industrial purposes.  We
dump chemicals down our drains and on our lawns that end up
in the river.

The water meter debate raises the paradox of water: 
Precious but free, essential but disposable.

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