On my block, and much of my neighborhood, the ONLY buildings being charged the proper amount is probably the Ecuadorian families who have cemented their entire back yards for volley ball. This true for block after block. The problem is that the statistical model over-weighted those single family houses you speak of. Even a mathematically challenged person with ANY experience with the City could easily see so. Unfortunately the slant favored the neighborhoods with more political power so the people in charge turned and looked the other way.
So I will leave it to the readers to determine the blame. Was in gross incompetence on the part of those who created the billing system, or a more devious plan to discriminate against poor neighborhoods? Perhaps what is called for is a little leadership from City Hall to tell us which option is more viable. Was it incompetence, or was it discrimination? Or could it be that the people who devised the plan were from outside the City and could not believe that everyone did not live in single family houses with three car garages and long driveways? So in their ignorance of the real world they simply could not comprehend there being any variance to account for in their "Plan"? This is a perfect example of a good idea being screwed up in execution, and no executive oversight to protect from it, and no executive courage to correct the problem when it is brought to their attention.
An even better question is why no "leader" has addressed the problem and put forth a solution. Right now you can appeal, but we all know about it and if they do that many do not believe it, so most will be victimized. ( I assume that Chris is more informed than the average poor family and he seems to have trouble believing that the City is so grossly overcharging poor neighborhoods.
My real question is why the heck it is so difficult to convince some people about what happens in poor neighborhoods. When someone describes a situation in their own backyard, like real crime with drug dealing and twenty-five gangbangers with guns threatening a single block, (and overcharges for stormwatergate) we have some who seem to delight in saying, "oh that can't be true. It just is not that bad! Perhaps in my next post I will have time to explore and explain another concept that some have difficulty wrapping their brain around. The difference between Constitutional guarantees of "Equal Protection Under the Law" and equal numbers of police. The difference between "Equal Safety" and equal numbers of manpower.
Until then,
Jim Graham,
Still on the porch stairs in Ventura Village
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