BILLINGS - A frustrated public demanded answers and action on hefty water bills, with some seeing those charges triple.
Many showed up at the Billings City Council work session to hear from the public works department about the water bills.
Some say that their bills do not match their water usage.
“Of course, we don't want to fail or have mistakes,” said Chris Kukulski, Billings city administrator. “But I'm confident with the character of the employees that we have working on this problem, we will be able to work through this.”
The city explained that the calculations and charges are accurate and the new software and meters are working together properly.
But after about 90 minutes the public had a chance to respond.
“If you can't do your job, all of these upset people should start recall and recall every one of you,” Tom Zurbuchen said to the city council.
And he also directed that sentiment to the city workers.
“Things will happen when people lose their job,” Zurbuchen said.
“And I want some accountability all the way to the top gentlemen, all the way to the mayor,” said Jennifer Klatte.
Some people are saying they are seeing bills as high as $1,000, saying it's impossible to use that amount of water for which they're being billed.
Kelly and Mike Brady say this summer was like most others at their Billings Heights home.
They watered the lawn like they normally do and used no more water than usual.
But they say their water bill doesn't reflect that.
“We've brought Roter Rooter out here, so we know darn well, there's no dripping on the faucet over there, externally or internally,” Kelly Brady said.
The Brady's water bill soared from $102 to about $225 and they hoped for clarification.
“Hopefully tonight at City Council could give us some answers,” Kelly Brady said.
But many did not seem to like the answers.
And even some in the city council still have questions.
“I can imagine that some people feel like we're just trying to sort of baffle them with a lot of data and calculations,” Council member Jennifer Owen said.
Sen. Chris Friedel, R-Billings, who is also a former city councilman, said he won't pay until it's fixed.
“Not blaming anybody,” Friedel said. “This is an issue we need to figure out and we need to get to it an we need to find out fast because I'm even having a problem. And I'm glad I'm not on auto pay because I ain't paying this bill until you all figure it out.”
“One of the steps we need to take is to get that independent analysis to help regain the confidence in the accuracy,” Kukulski said.
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