LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Editor:

A growing community like Whitehouse is bound to have some issues. Most would simply call it growing pains. The thing that all of our citizens should remember is that the school system in Whitehouse is our attraction. Simply put Whitehouse is a great place to grow kids, and make sure they have a quality education. There are people all over Smith County that would love to move to Whitehouse simply because of our schools.

The latest concern over the water issue in what is clearly a battle lost with the City of Tyler is our latest challenge. A city without water has a serious problem. Problems cost money to fix and I suspect this one is going to cost a bunch. I am very disappointed in Tyler treating their neighbor so poorly, but I assume they have their reasons. It does seem amazing that Whitehouse could not get a contract better than Walnut Grove, a rural provider that many residents are on. It is also perplexing that our city council did not have a better plan in place before the contract actually expired, but I think the reality is that everyone was optimistic things would work out.

In my mind a city government's #1 goal is to provide basic services, sewer, water, trash collection, maintain streets and roads, police and fire protection, and to look to the future growth of the community. The secondary goal is to protect property through rules and regulations. Unlike the federal government in that when money is needed it turns on the printing press, local government only has our tax dollars to work with to pay for all infrastructure.

My concern as a citizen is solely about cost. I am originally from West Texas and I can tell you from experience that not having water is a big deal. Not having water will assure that your grass dies, your flowerbeds die, and that you could be using city water only for bathing and flushing. Many of us may have to purchase drinking water from somewhere else. I grew up with that kind of mentality and it is hard. I can tell you what it does to your property values, it makes them go down. People do not want to buy in an area that water, sewer, or any other services are not abundantly available to all residences.

Drilling wells is part of the answer and the city has done that. The question now is that without Tyler's water are there any other options beyond the Lake Striker proposed project? I have not seen the numbers but I would suspect it is going to cost millions of dollars to build a pipeline, treatment plant, and everything else necessary to get that water to Whitehouse.

My understanding of Whitehouse water funding is that this is a service that is basically paid 100 percent by your monthly bill, at least it has been in the past. If that is the case how much is going to be added to the bill to pay for the millions in dollars of bonds to pay for these pipelines? Is it possible that the city would consider just adding this as a bond to be paid from general revenues? If that is the case, I would think many would have issue with that as I suspect many would simply just cut back on water usage and pave their yards as opposed to paying for anything extra. In West Texas, a cactus garden can be very attractive.

I guess the real question that I have is would the citizens prefer to just pay the extra money to Tyler and not worry about it and just see their monthly water bill go up, or would the citizens prefer to build all of this infrastructure.

Certainly, this is going to be a much-debated issue by the city council in coming months. The council has shown every indication that they think it best to pursue the pipeline and treatment plant. I am not convinced that is what is best and that what Tyler offered, although expensive, might have been the bet- ter course. I wonder if the council let this get away from them and just let emotions get in the way of making a difficult decision.

In the end, this is about a bunch of money. Everyone should keep in mind that this is the same community that even though schools are a priority here the community has a hard time passing bonds for better schools, or for parks, or for anything else to make this an even better place to live. I just have to wonder what the voters really think of spending a bunch more money and going into debt further when this community has proven time and again it does not like to spend money on anything. In addition, spending that huge sum of money is certainly going to limit any other projects such as street improvements and certainly the muchneeded full-time fire department. Then again, if you don't have water it is hard to put out a fire. Getting bonds to pay for all of this is relatively easy. Making payments to pay all of it off is hard.

The citizens should remember that all it would take to hook back up with Tyler is to increase your monthly water bill by signing a contract.

As a citizen, I personally would like to see so many things in our community. I would like a new stadium for football with turf (especially now that there is no water available, although maybe the school has their own wells), and enough seats to hold more people, and one of those scoreboards that show pictures. I would like to have a cement pond so that the kids could swim, (need water for that too). I would like to see soccer fields and parks, and have streets that do not ruin my car's suspension to drive down. I want the kids and families that live here to have plenty to do and be a part of and I would rather see my tax dollars go toward those things. The reality is that we all live here because of the great community. The other reality is that it costs a lot of money to solve problems or to make it an even better place to live. All of this money comes from you. You do have choices - no water no property value, no money no water.

Elections are coming this spring for a couple of council seats and the mayor. It might be a good time to reevaluate who serves you if you don't like what you are getting from your city. I guess the other alternative is to petition the City of Tyler for annexation. They have a lower tax rate and all the water.

One fact I will point out is that during this year's budget cycle one council member demanded a decrease in your property taxes. He managed to get a few pennies decrease that amounts to about $10 for the average homeowner. I hope you enjoyed that responsible look at the future as I would suspect that the increases coming down the road will erase that decrease, and you will see taxes go way up. After all it is not as though the city council didn't know this day of reckoning with Tyler was at hand. I would have thought a responsible council would have looked to control expenses and started allocating money now for a rainy day fund. In our case, we better hope and pray for regular rainy days or your Saint Augustine grass is just not going to make it. I am taking my $10 and buying some bottled water.

Sincerely, Charles Parker Whitehouse