LAHARPE — LaHarpe residents will have a new timeline to follow when paying their utility bills.
City Council members approved a plan Wednesday that bumps up when the bills are printed and sent out to customers.
Doing so will allow the city to bump the due date to the 10th of each month before a 10% late fee is added. If bills are not paid by the 25th, the utilities then are subject to disconnection.
Problems arose with the old policy, which offered a later due date on the 15th of each month, but also made it more difficult for the city to send follow-up notices to residents in danger of seeing their service disconnected.
Up to now, the bills were printed and mailed near the end of the month.
City Clerk Michelle Altis told Council members she will begin printing the bills on the 20th of each month, giving residents about three weeks to pay before the bills are past-due, then another 15 days before they are disconnected.
The new timeline was approved with a 4-0 vote; Councilman Danny Ware Jr. was absent.
FOLLOWING A brief debate, Council members voted, 3-1, to give away for free one of the city-owned lots to a person who inquired about the property, provided the recipient buys an adjoining lot from the city for $635, and agrees to build a home there.
“I don’t think we ought to make them pay, because if they build a new house, the taxes eventually will make up for what we paid for the ground,” Councilman Ron Knavel Sr. said.
Councilwoman Cynthia Carr, who cast the lone dissenting vote, disagreed.
She noted when the city acquired the lots at a tax sale a few years back, it did so while bidding against a local resident in the process.
“It’s hard for me to say we’re going to give this away, when we had somebody in the city who wanted it,” Carr said. “I have a problem with that.”
Knavel was unmoved.
“We bought it at a tax sale,” he noted. “Whatever lots came up for sale, we were the highest bidder” and thus earned the right to do whatever the city deems fit with the land.
Councilwoman Sharlyn Thompson proposed the compromise; give the recipient the first lot, and ask them to buy the other at market value. The two lots altogether are appraised at $1,270.
Splitting the price in half gave the Council its asking price.
