In Deep Water: How Cleveland W-H-A-A-A-T-E-R Department Set The Standard For Incompetence

Sometime during the past couple of years, a local TV station aired a story about the mind-boggling level of incompetence at the Cleveland Division of Water. In the segment, reporters interviewed water division sources from the Denver area as a model of efficiency. Since Denver had its act together, the reasoning went, what could we in Cleveland do differently?

I’ll never forget the Denver water spokesperson’s response, “No, we've never seen any division of water anywhere operate at such a dysfunctional standard.” The reporter went into detail to establish that there is no reason why Cleveland’s Division of Water has to operate at such pathetic level.

Fast forward to late 2011 and, not only have there been no water department improvements for hundreds of thousands of Cuyahoga and surrounding counties residents and businesses, but a sewer bill has been added, essentially doubling quarterly bills.

Plus, betcha didn’t know the customer “dis”service charge of $7 is also about to double.

But setting the bar for new levels of incompetence isn't this writer’s biggest gripe. That honor is saved Cleveland Water Department’s so-called “Water Affordability” program, administered through Cleveland Housing Network (CHN).

Supposedly available to eligible homeowners in Northeast Ohio, the Water Affordability program requires submission of basic income and other financial data to determine eligibility similar to that of HEAP and PIPP discount utility programs. It’s pretty cut and dry.

But after we sent in the application October 19 via certified mail -- the same address spelled out on the application and confirmed by a postal worker as viable and regularly visited by Cleveland Housing Network employees -- it came back “undeliverable.”

This is where things got hideously ugly. Dozens of phone calls to various CHN offices, Cleveland Division of Water and what is fondly referred to as Cleveland Mayor Jackson’s “In”action office, have yielded zero confirmations regarding the simplest of all questions: “What is the correct address?”

Three weeks later, it’s Thanksgiving Day, and we still don’t have an answer.

Thanks, Mayor Jackson, for your “In”action office that refuses to take my calls, and for your office’s other high-level workers who’ve refused to reply to desperate emails. Thanks Cleveland of Division of Water, for your Scrooge-like (feigning?) incompetence tactics.

At least the City of Cleveland got one thing right by temporarily evicting those pesky “Occupy“ protesters, in order to put up holiday lights.

Oh, and one last thing City of Cleveland: next time I get a parking ticket when visiting MetroHealth and I can’t afford even the $3 to park in the garage, I’m spitting on it before I put the check in the envelope.