The Marin Municipal Water District just announced that it was considering a substantial rate hike. The proposed tab will increase water rates 14 percent over the next two years.
The district is under fiscal pressure due to escalating costs.
The proposed rate hike is more about out-of-whack public employee pensions than it is about water.
There are valid reasons to oppose the increase in water charges, but the fact that Marin is awash in water isn’t one of them.
Some contend that our recent blessed wet winter should make raising rates unnecessary. The costs to operate MMWD, and for that matter all water districts including North Marin Water District, are fixed. Labor necessarily consumes a major portion of all their budgets.
Water districts aren’t factories that need to expend cash to purchase parts to create a product. The water is essentially free. What costs money is building and maintaining facilities, including miles of water lines, and running the operation. For MMWD, a major part of their expenses is maintaining their magnificent 21,600-acre watershed, which provides multiple amenities to all Marinites.
Rain or no rain, its costs are essentially the same.
MMWD’s financial dilemma isn’t unique. Like every public agency in Marin it’s saddled with unsustainable obligations to fund its employees’ generous pensions.
To explain to the public why the rate increase is justified, MMWD needs to level with its ratepayers by disclosing how much it annually spends to sustain the current level of pension payments. MMWD’s union contract provides that not only will its employees be members of the famously generous California Public Employee Retirement System, but, unlike most other local agencies’ workers, they receive full Social Security benefits.
The Marin-based Citizens for Sustainable Pension Plans calculated in its “Pension Tsunami” report that presuming the district’s sequestered retirement funds earn an unrealistically high 7.5 percent annual return, the water agency’s long-term employee pension liability is approaching $100 million.
The water board is between a rock and a hard place when it comes to increasing costs, but the truth is, the bulk of those expenses are pension-related.
Water users are entitled to know if they are really paying for water or pensions. They are also due a detailed explanation of how the agency will economize to avoid a never-ending string of rate increases.
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After practicing law in California for over 40 years, I feel qualified to comment on recent efforts by a few Democratic legislators to pressure the highly regarded Tani Cantil-Saksuye, chief justice of the California Supreme Court, to lower standards necessary for budding attorneys to pass the state bar exam.
Recall that the state bar, overseen by the chief justice, exists to protect the public, not attorneys. This year, the pass rate of those who took the multi-day examination fell to 43 percent. This is particularly frustrating to law school deans who use their school’s pass rate to recruit students.
The contention is that the current standards prevent worthy applicants from becoming attorneys.
Cutting bar qualifications is reminiscent of Benito Mussolini, who supposedly “made the trains run on time.” He didn’t do anything to the track, equipment or crew discipline; he simply lengthened the schedule. Likewise, lowering standards will not create a better class of attorneys; it’s just feel-good window dressing to aid the less competent and take law school deans off the hook for breaking promises to gullible students.
Some claim that current bar qualifications discourage the poor and disadvantaged ethnic groups from becoming attorneys. This patronizing and racist view unfairly diminishes the standing of all applicants, members of the bar and the public’s right to competent representation.
Columnist Dick Spotswood writes about local politics on Sundays and Wednesdays. Email him at spotswood@comcast.net.
