Latest / Austin Signal / Kyle water bills skyrocket after rate hikes

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Kyle water bills skyrocket after rate hikes · Austin Signal

0:09
Accessing reliable sources of water
0:10
is becoming more difficult for some
0:12
Central Texans and more expensive
0:14
to boot.
0:15
In Kyle, residents facing high water
0:17
bills are carefully considering any
0:18
way that they can limit their costs.
0:21
We're going to hear from some of
0:22
them. An Austin firefighter has
0:23
been granted workers' comp rights,
0:25
but that decision this week granting
0:27
the benefits came after a long fight
0:29
with the city.
0:30
Why she had to fight for benefits
0:32
and why she's hoping her fight will
0:33
make it easier for others.
0:35
More about these stories coming up
0:37
on today's show.
0:38
The Austin Signal is a production
0:40
of KUT News, hosted by
0:42
Jerry Kehanel.
0:43
Plus, we've got a little Texas music
0:45
history heading into your weekend.
0:47
And we're going to chat about the
0:48
work being done to bring together
0:50
central Texans of all religious
0:52
backgrounds.
0:53
Those stories coming up next.
0:55
That's right here on Austin Signal.
1:07
Howdy out there, you are listening
1:09
to Austin Signal here
1:10
on Community Powered Public Radio.
1:12
This is KUT News,
1:14
it is finally Friday,
1:16
April 24th.
1:18
Thank you for tuning in.
1:20
Well despite the rain, over the past
1:22
week or so, Central Texas remains
1:24
in a serious drought.
1:26
Water access is becoming more
1:28
difficult and more expensive.
1:30
In Kyle, water rates jumped
1:31
considerably last fall, leaving
1:33
some residents struggling to keep on
1:35
top of their bills.
1:37
KUT's Hayes County reporter Lee
1:38
Walden has the story.
1:40
Carol Dagens and her husband are
1:42
constantly thinking about water
1:44
when doing the laundry.
1:47
Wash our clothes.
1:49
We load the washer more
1:51
than we normally would have done in
1:54
the kitchen maybe once or
1:56
twice a week.
1:57
We really load the dishwasher and
1:59
then we run the dishwasher.
2:01
And of course in the bathroom we
2:03
time our showers.
2:05
8 to 10 minutes.
2:06
They aren't flushing their toilets
2:08
after they pee.
2:09
She isn't shaving as often.
2:11
They don't let the water run while
2:12
the shower is heating up.
2:13
Then there's family.
2:15
They were considering having all
2:16
five grandkids come visit.
2:18
But then we thought way
2:20
Wait a minute.
2:22
We will be using a whole lot
2:24
of water if we have them
2:26
all at one time.
2:28
Doggins isn't some sort of hardline
2:29
environmentalist.
2:30
She's worried about her water bill.
2:32
Okay, in January,
2:35
our bill was $222.84.
2:39
Doggins and her husband moved near
2:41
Kyle from Dallas last year.
2:43
They're thinking about retirement,
2:45
but they wanted to get out of the
2:46
big city, a little bit more
2:48
into the country, quieter and
2:50
a slower pace.
2:51
They were not thinking about what
2:52
their water bill might be.
2:53
Coming from Dallas.
2:55
Our average water bill was under
2:56
$100.
2:57
In the summer,
3:00
high heat, you know, high water
3:02
usage, $125.
3:04
And to pay no
3:06
sprinkler,
3:08
no grandkids,
3:10
all of that, to pay over
3:12
$200 for water
3:13
is outrageous.
3:16
Doggins jokes that their timing was
3:18
terrible.
3:18
They signed on their house on
3:20
October 2nd of last year.
3:22
That was the day after Kyle
3:23
adopted new, higher water
3:25
rates.
3:26
The new rates raised the cost of
3:28
water in the Doggins' neighborhood
3:29
by 77%.
3:31
They're just outside Kyle's city
3:33
limits, but they still get water
3:35
from Kyle's municipal utility.
3:37
Rates for people inside city limits
3:39
increased by 20%.
3:40
Residents both inside and outside
3:43
the city are struggling to keep up.
3:45
Maybe your Santos is a single mother
3:46
within the city limits.
3:48
I'm afraid to see what the bill is
3:50
going to be every other day, every
3:51
other month.
3:51
Because I don't know.
3:52
It's not normal.
3:54
Sharon Thompson is another resident
3:55
outside of Kyle City limits.
3:57
I use paper plates.
3:59
That's one big thing.
4:00
Is I bought cheap paper plates at
4:02
the grocery store and I don't use
4:04
my regular, just, you know.
4:06
You know, everyday dinnerware,
4:07
because that would make more dishes
4:09
for the dishwasher.
4:11
They're changing their habits,
4:12
letting their lawns die, giving away
4:14
houseplants.
4:15
Part of the reason for the growing
4:16
water costs is simple.
4:18
Water in central Texas is drying up,
4:21
aquifer levels are going down,
4:22
surface water is becoming scarcer.
4:24
Kyle is also one of the
4:25
fastest-growing cities in the
4:26
nation.
4:27
More people means more water.
4:29
It also means more poop.
4:31
So this is where it all comes in.
4:34
We're at Kyle's wastewater treatment
4:35
facility.
4:37
It smells like, well,
4:38
I bet you can imagine what it smells
4:40
like. Take whatever you're imagining
4:41
and double it.
4:43
A lot of people's favorite place.
4:45
Maybe even triple it.
4:47
Robert Defredis is the chief
4:49
operating manager at the facility.
4:51
He shows us a room where two steel
4:52
conveyor belt type machines mimic
4:54
what the digestive track does inside
4:56
our body.
4:57
They dry out and dispose of the bad
4:59
stuff, collect the water, and the
5:00
good stuff.
5:01
From there, the wastewater flows
5:03
into huge tanks to get treated.
5:04
So we don't do anything that
5:06
doesn't happen in nature already,
5:09
you know.
5:10
Everybody, you're going to see these
5:12
big basins of brown water and
5:13
everybody's like, oh, look at all
5:15
that poop. It's not poop, it's
5:17
sludge.
5:17
There's a lot of sludge here,
5:19
but they're running out of room for
5:20
all that crap.
5:21
Uh, sludge.
5:23
And they don't have much time, so
5:24
they're expanding, building more
5:26
space to treat the growing volume of
5:28
wastewater coming into the facility.
5:30
The city approved money to add a
5:31
little extra capacity while they
5:33
work on larger-scale expansion.
5:36
Took a small part of the project,
5:38
the engineers put it out
5:40
there so that buys us the two extra
5:42
years.
5:43
Two extra years that they'll need to
5:45
finish that large expansion, which
5:47
will double the facility's capacity.
5:49
A bigger wastewater facility is just
5:51
one of the projects pushing up water
5:53
and wastewater bills in Kyle.
5:55
Water services are expanding too.
5:57
The city is building new storage
5:59
facilities, pumping stations, and
6:00
pipelines.
6:02
Alice and Kelly as the Assistant
6:03
Communications Director for the City
6:05
of Kyle.
6:06
There is no cheap water anymore.
6:09
We're all in central Texas in the
6:11
same boat where we need
6:13
to provide safe, clean drinking
6:15
water for our residents.
6:17
Still, residents outside of Kyle's
6:18
city limits appear to be paying some
6:20
of the highest water rates in the
6:21
region.
6:22
Their average bill is around $260
6:24
a month.
6:26
Down in San Marcos, the average bill
6:28
less than $50 a month,
6:30
those huge bills have some city
6:31
officials concerned.
6:32
I wasn't sure that it
6:34
was proven sufficiently
6:36
that it costs us that much more
6:38
to supply them with water.
6:40
Courtney Goza is a newly-elected
6:42
Kyle City Council member.
6:43
She wasn't on the council when they
6:45
voted on the hikes.
6:46
The city made the changes based off
6:47
of recommendations from Austin-based
6:49
consulting firm, Roftellis.
6:51
The firm declined to comment for the
6:53
story.
6:54
Roftelis's report to the city
6:55
included recommended rate increases
6:57
every fall for the next five
6:59
years.
6:59
Rates for customers inside Kyle
7:01
City limits were recommended to
7:03
increase another 20% this October.
7:06
Rates for all Kylewater customers
7:08
would increase another 20%
7:10
the following year.
7:11
Residents don't know if they'll be
7:12
able to keep up.
7:13
Carol Dagens wonders if they will
7:15
stay.
7:15
I will be moving if that happens,
7:18
because I can't, I barely
7:20
can afford this
7:22
rate kite.
7:23
What, I mean, I don't
7:25
get the purpose.
7:27
From Kyle, I'm Leigh Walden.
7:36
An Austin firefighter has been
7:38
granted workers' comp rights while
7:40
she is battling cancer.
7:42
And as we hear from KUT's Andrew
7:44
Weber, the decision this week
7:46
granting those benefits came after
7:48
a long fight with the city.
7:51
Austin firefighter Suzanne
7:52
Lafollette didn't feel particularly
7:54
heroic when she was injured on the
7:56
job a few years ago.
7:57
A crew had just knocked down a fire,
7:59
she was helping clean up, and she
8:00
took a tumble.
8:02
Really unheroic.
8:04
I really wish I was walking out
8:05
of the house with a
8:07
baby in one hand and a dog in the
8:09
other But I wasn't I just stepped in
8:11
a hole and I was carrying a club
8:13
Clipboard that ankle sprain was
8:15
fully covered by workers
8:16
compensation strictly because she
8:18
was in her full uniform If she
8:20
hadn't it wouldn't have been covered
8:21
she says then last year
8:23
just a few weeks after she married
8:25
her wife, Sarah Suzanne was
8:26
in excruciating pain.
8:28
She thought it had been UTIs
8:30
Maybe paramenopause Lafollette
8:32
says as a 19 year firefighter
8:34
you learn to live with pain You
8:35
learn to leave with other people's
8:37
pain, but one night her pain
8:39
was too much.
8:40
She started bleeding.
8:41
It wouldn't stop After an ER
8:43
visit, an oncologist told her
8:45
she had cancer, late stage cancer.
8:48
It was, in a weird way, La Follette
8:50
says, kind of a relief.
8:51
When you finally get a confirmation
8:53
that yes, there is something going
8:54
on with you.
8:56
Yes, there's something in your body
8:57
that shouldn't be there was
8:59
a relief. I was like, okay, now
9:00
we're getting somewhere. Now I know
9:02
what it is and now we can do
9:04
something about it.
9:05
Then Lafollette got in touch with
9:07
the union, tried to file another
9:08
workers' comp complaint, one that
9:10
argued she was exposed to
9:12
cancer-causing chemicals over her
9:14
nearly two decades on the job.
9:17
They didn't send a city employee,
9:19
a city representative, anyone
9:21
there to say, yes, I made the
9:23
decision that Suzanne's
9:26
worker's comp was not covered and
9:27
this is why.
9:28
They didn't do that.
9:29
Unlike that unheroic sprained ankle
9:31
from a few years ago, this time
9:33
facing a terminal cancer diagnosis,
9:35
she wouldn't have the safety net of
9:37
workers' comp.
9:38
That's because of a gender disparity
9:39
in state law.
9:40
It allowed Austin to deny
9:42
Lafollette's workers' camp.
9:43
The state's labor code includes
9:45
reproductive cancers for male
9:47
firefighters to be covered,
9:48
testicular cancer, prostate cancer,
9:50
but not female reproductive cancers.
9:52
So, without any other option, she
9:54
decided to fight the city's denial
9:56
in a state court, and she
9:58
started posting on Instagram.
9:59
Facebook.
10:00
At first, to update her friends.
10:02
Chemo day number one.
10:04
Day two after my first chemo round.
10:06
I'm starting to feel it.
10:07
Day three chemo, walking on the
10:09
treadmill today.
10:10
Post-chemo round three, day 18.
10:13
I think today's the first day I
10:14
didn't take a nap.
10:16
Then she realized she could
10:18
weaponize the platform to put
10:19
pressure on the city.
10:21
The Austin Fire Department has
10:22
denied my claim at the benefit
10:24
review conference.
10:25
That means we're continuing on,
10:26
y'all. They claim that.
10:29
And it worked.
10:31
La Follette successfully got the
10:32
attention of the city, city council
10:33
members, and the mayor, and this
10:35
week, she got the backing of the
10:36
courts. A state judge who was
10:38
reviewing her case ordered the city
10:40
grant her workers comp.
10:41
Lafollette also got the attention of
10:43
Donna Howard, a state lawmaker who
10:45
says she wants to close this glaring
10:47
gap in coverage for female first
10:49
responders.
10:49
This is absolutely something my
10:51
office is going to want to be
10:52
focused on.
10:53
The Austin Democrat said, despite
10:54
deep divisions in the Texas Capitol,
10:56
bills to get more coverage for first
10:58
responders have garnered support
10:59
from both sides of the aisle in
11:01
recent years.
11:02
One was even backed by now House
11:03
Speaker Dustin Burroughs.
11:04
We're talking about first
11:06
responders, which are highly valued
11:08
on a bipartisan basis here at
11:10
the Capitol, especially
11:12
in light of the fact that I don't
11:13
think that my colleagues
11:15
want to appear to be
11:17
anti-woman when we're talking
11:19
about first-responders and
11:21
cancer.
11:22
For Lafollette, none of this
11:23
experience has embittered her.
11:25
She wears a hat made by a friend,
11:27
emblazoned with I am alive.
11:29
She wears it to remind her whatever
11:31
she's going through, whatever she is
11:32
feeling, is part of a messy human
11:34
experience.
11:35
Part of being alive.
11:37
She says after nine rounds of chemo
11:39
treatments, she's lucky to have had
11:40
the strength to fight.
11:42
Not just for her, but for future
11:44
women who want to risk their lives
11:45
fighting fires.
11:47
Because she's just one of scores
11:49
of women in firefighting.
11:50
Women who fought for bathrooms and
11:52
firehouses, gear that actually
11:54
fit them, even coverage
11:55
for breast cancer treatments.
11:57
I absolutely benefited from a lot
11:59
of those changes.
12:00
So this gives me an opportunity to
12:02
maybe help make this change so
12:04
that the women behind me
12:08
will forget that reproductive
12:10
cancers weren't covered because
12:12
if they get sick, they just are and
12:14
they never really had to think about
12:15
it. And that's the kind of future
12:17
that we really hope for.
12:23
La Follette jokes that her misery
12:24
is going to benefit someone, but
12:26
right now she is alive,
12:29
and she is loved, and she says she
12:31
is still fighting.
12:39
And we're going to have links to
12:40
Andrew and Lee's stories in
12:42
the podcast show notes, and you can
12:44
find more at kut.org
12:47
slash signal.
12:48
We're coming up on a short break.
12:50
We'll be right back.
12:51
This is Austin signal.
13:00
This is Austin Signal, welcome back.
13:02
We've got some Texas music history
13:04
to share with you on this Friday.
13:06
Today we're learning about Cliff
13:08
Bruner, a prolific fiddler who
13:10
became a pioneer of the western
13:11
swing sound more than 100 years
13:13
ago.
13:14
Jason Mellard from the Center for
13:16
Texas Music History at Texas State
13:18
University tells us about his
13:20
legacy.
13:27
This week in Texas music history,
13:29
Western Swing tunes in to Twin
13:31
Fiddles for the first time.
13:33
On April 25th, 1915,
13:35
Western swing fiddler Cliff Brunner
13:37
was born in Texas City.
13:38
Bruner went to high school in
13:39
Tomball, where he started playing in
13:41
the Twin Fiddle style with Jasper
13:42
Heaton. The two developed a
13:44
reputation around East Texas,
13:45
supplementing their farm work with
13:47
dance gigs in Houston.
13:49
When Brunar was 18, he received an
13:51
invitation from Milton Brown, a
13:53
founding father of western swing
13:54
with the light crust doughboys and
13:56
musical brownies.
13:57
Brown wanted his band to bring in
13:59
twin fiddlers, pairing Brunner with
14:01
Cecil Brower.
14:02
Bruner jumped at the chance.
14:03
Riding high despite the Great
14:05
Depression, Bruners recorded four
14:06
dozen sides with Brown over two
14:08
years before the band leaders'
14:10
untimely death in 1936.
14:19
Brunner, now 20, moved to Houston
14:21
and launched his own group, Cliff
14:22
Bruner and the Texas Wanderers.
14:24
Bruners' Wanderer's had a few claims
14:25
to fame, a hit version of the
14:27
standard It Makes No Difference Now,
14:29
one of the earliest truck songs with
14:30
Ted Daffin's Truck Driver's Blues,
14:32
and Leo Rayleigh, among the first to
14:34
perform with electrically amplified
14:36
mandolin.
14:51
Bruner moved the Wanderers from
14:52
Houston to Beaumont and settled in
14:53
as one of the Golden Triangle's
14:55
premier dance bands.
14:56
He also rossened up his bow in the
14:57
political arena, supporting the
14:59
campaign bands of Texas Governor
15:00
Papi O'Daniel and Louisiana Governor
15:02
Jimmy Davis.
15:03
Bruners told historian Gene Boyd
15:05
that, I never tried to copy
15:07
anybody's style, never in my life.
15:09
I created my own and I had to live
15:11
with it, good or bad.
15:12
But his playing also echoed Western
15:14
Swing's jazz influences.
15:16
Bruner named both Joe Venuti
15:18
and Stuff Smith as role models.
15:20
And he paid those influences
15:21
forward.
15:22
As Gene Boyd wrote, Bruno was a
15:24
powerful jazz violinist whose
15:26
earthy grassroots musical language
15:28
identified him with Texas and made
15:30
his style easy for younger
15:31
violinists to understand and
15:34
emulate.
15:34
Save my soul, save my
15:36
soul. My mortal soul.
15:37
You can hear music from the Lone
15:39
Star State 24-7 on the
15:40
Texas Music Experience at TMX.fm.
15:44
My mama's baby boy
15:46
Ain't no use you kids to
15:48
keep on hangin' round,
15:50
hangin round and up here and
15:52
I Dear Anna, I hate to turn you down
15:55
Acts of kindness can go a
15:57
long way here in our community,
15:59
especially during trying times.
16:01
One Austin organization hopes to
16:03
bridge gaps between others through
16:05
service.
16:06
Joining me now to talk more about
16:07
that is Simone Talma Flowers.
16:09
She is the executive director of
16:11
Interfaith Action of Central Texas,
16:13
also known as IACT.
16:15
Welcome to the show, Simone.
16:16
It is wonderful to be here.
16:18
Thank you, Jerry.
16:19
So for our listeners who might not
16:20
be familiar with interfaith action,
16:22
can you tell us a little bit about
16:23
what y'all do?
16:24
So Interfaith Action of Central
16:26
Texas, our mission is to cultivate
16:28
peace and respect through
16:30
interfaith dialog,
16:32
service and celebration.
16:33
So everything that we do is about
16:35
breaking down the barriers that
16:37
divide us.
16:38
So in a nutshell, it's about
16:40
reducing prejudice.
16:42
Working in the news, we hear a
16:44
lot about divisions
16:47
among Americans, among people over
16:49
a variety of issues.
16:51
When you're out working with the
16:52
community, do
16:54
you see that division or do you see
16:56
unity? What do you when you're
16:57
working with people who come from
16:59
a variety backgrounds?
17:02
So we believe that you need to
17:03
be in proximity of each other.
17:05
So everything that we do, we have
17:07
service projects where we
17:09
repair homes for low income
17:10
homeowners, where you can
17:12
come out and volunteer and maybe
17:14
paint, do some minor repairs, and
17:16
you get to work alongside others.
17:18
People from different faiths,
17:20
different cultures, different
17:21
backgrounds, world views, and
17:23
you're working on a common task,
17:25
right? You have a common goal and
17:28
you focus on that goal because...
17:30
It's to beautify or to
17:32
make somebody's home safe.
17:35
And you put aside the
17:37
differences because you're working
17:39
for that common goal.
17:40
And we get to see people
17:42
putting their compassion into
17:44
action, you get to
17:46
the goodness of humanity.
17:48
You get to seed the beauty
17:50
that we all share,
17:53
that we will bring to this world.
17:55
I am humbled like
17:57
almost daily.
17:59
By the generosity of spirit,
18:02
that I.
18:04
If they're curious and wanna know
18:05
more about iACTA, how can they
18:07
get involved and what sort of events
18:09
do you have coming up soon?
18:11
So we have our major fundraiser
18:12
called the Hope Awards, and that's
18:14
coming up on April 28th.
18:17
And the Hope awards honors people in
18:19
our community who put hope into
18:20
action. So they exemplify the
18:22
mission of IACT.
18:24
So this year, we
18:25
are honoring Mike Blair, who
18:27
was the former creative director
18:29
of GSDNM.
18:32
And he, during the pandemic,
18:35
he wrote, well,
18:37
he started writing poems, every
18:39
day to lift people's spirits.
18:40
And he's still writing it every day
18:42
today.
18:43
Yeah, we still need it today.
18:44
Exactly. And then we're also
18:45
honoring the Baha'i community
18:47
of Austin.
18:49
And this is a community that believe
18:51
in the oneness of humanity.
18:54
And one of their tenants is,
18:57
you know, everyone is
18:59
beautiful, right?
19:00
And so they combat prejudice
19:02
of any forms.
19:05
And so for us, it's like, again,
19:06
this is another community that
19:09
lives out our mission, and
19:11
we want to highlight them.
19:12
And that's what we do in so many
19:14
different programs, our Red Bench,
19:15
we go out to different communities
19:17
to learn
19:19
about how we can have civil dialog.
19:22
We do this passport program
19:24
where we go to different
19:26
communities to
19:28
experience what it is like to
19:29
worship in a mosque, in a synagogue,
19:32
in the Buddhist temple, in Hindu
19:33
temple, in the plethora
19:36
of Christian faiths.
19:39
We work with many refugees
19:41
who have been resettled here in
19:42
Austin.
19:43
We teach English language
19:44
instruction, youth mentoring
19:47
and health and wellness.
19:48
So we always need volunteers to
19:51
support our refugees, well,
19:53
support refugees as they transition
19:54
into this community.
19:56
How has that changed as things
19:58
have been playing out with
20:00
immigration and customs enforcement
20:01
here in Austin and just across the
20:03
country generally?
20:06
So one of the
20:08
treasures of our community is
20:13
diversity.
20:14
And when refugees come
20:16
here into the US,
20:19
these are people who have
20:21
lived through so much.
20:23
They are strong people, they are
20:25
survivors.
20:26
And they come here to start a new
20:28
life.
20:30
So One of the big
20:32
issues that we have been facing
20:35
So many are fearful to leave their
20:37
homes.
20:38
We have been doing a lot of
20:40
adapting in our programming
20:42
where we have more online classes.
20:46
So people are not fearful.
20:49
It is a sad situation
20:52
because we
20:54
want everyone to
20:56
feel safe and
20:58
be able to send their kids to school
21:00
because they came here to have
21:02
a better life, to have new
21:03
beginning.
21:04
And we are in a situation where
21:08
many are getting this message
21:10
that they're not wanted here.
21:12
And we're like, no, no no,
21:14
we value you, we want you here.
21:16
We are here for you and we will do,
21:19
we are here to stay and
21:21
we are going to support you
21:23
as you transition into
21:25
life here in the US.
21:27
And it is a very difficult time,
21:29
has it rejuvenated your
21:31
passion for the work that you do?
21:33
So our work is always about
21:35
humanity.
21:36
It's about our shared humanity.
21:39
And that's always our priority.
21:42
So regardless of what happens,
21:45
we'll always be working with
21:46
refugees.
21:48
We'll always working with people who
21:50
need our support.
21:52
And that core to
21:54
who we are.
21:56
We have been speaking with Simone
21:57
Talma-Flowers, the executive
21:59
director of IACT, that is
22:01
Interfaith Action of Central Texas.
22:03
The Hope Awards happening April
22:05
28th, that is Tuesday.
22:06
We're gonna have a link to more in
22:07
our podcast, show notes, and at
22:09
kut.org.
22:11
Simone, thank you again for talking
22:12
with us on Austin Signal.
22:13
Thank you so much for having me.
22:16
And thank you for spending your
22:17
Friday here with us.
22:18
That is it for today's show and for
22:20
this week here on Austin Signal.
22:23
We're going to have links to the
22:24
stories we featured today in the
22:26
podcast show notes, and you can
22:27
always find more from us
22:29
at kut.org
22:31
slash signal.
22:33
Rayna Sevilla is our technical
22:34
director.
22:35
Alexa Hart is our producer and
22:37
Kristen Cabrera is our managing
22:39
producer. Special thanks to Jake
22:40
Perlman for his help with today's
22:42
show.
22:43
I'm your host, Jerry Quijano.
22:44
Austin Signal will be back on
22:46
Monday at one o'clock.
22:47
We'll talk to you then. Be safe out
22:49
there. Have a wonderful weekend.