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Mayor and city council:
Thank you, Councilman Hagen for voting against another fee increase. The rest of you should practice some fiscal restraint. I am for fixing the infrastructure in Victoria, but enough with raising the water and sewer rates already.
Use the sales tax for these infrastructure improvements that benefit the retail businesses along Sam Houston and Main Streets. That makes more sense than using these taxes for the new schools access improvements.
And raising these fees to raise what amount of money to fix these lines? What happens after these increases pay for those improvements? Will you then lower the fees?
You need to bond your capitalization of these and other projects and let the ad valorem support these long term projects and not fees.
Lastly, making these improvements are necessary, but I do not appreciate that most of these dollars continue to go to the north side of Victoria. I suggest that the south side also needs infrastructure improvements and that your attention focus on those needs too. Examples: North, Water, Juan Linn, Ben Wilson, and Red River streets, street light maintenance, drainage, open ditches in residentials, poor lighting, policing, parking, curb and gutter improvements, just to name a few.
I hope that finally fixing Lone Tree Street, while a very important project, does not set the example for other streets like North Street that’s in dire need of replacement right now and that it will not take 20 years from now to get it fixed. I might remind you that there are also schools on North Street.
I challenge all of you to make south Victoria look as good as north Victoria in your and my lifetimes, or at least give it equal attention.
Emett Alvarez
Victoria