Isn’t there a better way for the city to persuade people to pay overdue bills than to have Sun-Times reporters call them?
In spring, Sun-Times reporters Tim Novak and Mitchell Armentrout helped recoup $1 million in payments after they placed calls to businesses responsible for $1.3 million in unpaid traffic control bills. (Those unpaid bills were among $6.4 billion in unpaid fees, fines and other debts accrued by the city since the 1990s, Novak and Armentrout reported in December.)
Now, two alderpersons have paid their overdue water bills after Sun-Times reporters asked about them.
Shouldn’t City Council members be the first in line to pay city bills, unless there are extenuating circumstances, which one alderperson claims there are in his case?
Only after calls from the Sun-Times did Ald. William Hall (6th) pay the utility bill of $1,769.53 dating to June 2023 on his Chatham home (he says the timing of his payment was a coincidence). Ald. Ruth Cruz (30th), after being quizzed by a reporter, ponied up $416.85 for a delinquent water bill for her Belmont-Cragin home dating back to December. Hall said he forgot to update his payment information after his debit card with auto-pay was hacked. Cruz said she and her husband were busy and lost track of the bills.
As of mid-June, Ald. Derrick Curtis (18th) owed $532.04 on his Ashburn home’s utility bills that were delinquent, dating to last September. Another water user who is in arrears is the brother of Alfonzo “Randy” Conner, who heads the city Department of Water Management. The brother says he is now on a payment plan.
The number of unpaid bills is not minuscule. Thousands of people and companies owe City Hall more than $770 million for water and sewer bills that haven’t been paid, and many of which are unlikely to ever be paid, the Sun-Times found.
Even Mayor Brandon Johnson was late in paying more than $3,000 in delinquent water bills last year, although he has caught up now.
Collecting bills isn’t easy. Some people just don’t have the money. Other bills are owed by companies that have gone out of business or people who have left the country.
But it’s up to the City Council to ensure the city is collecting as much as it can, enough to operate and maintain the water system and pay for important capital projects. Council members could help by ensuring they stay up to date on bills, without being nudged by reporters.
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