Richmond Hill councillors grapple with mysterious water bill problem
Homeowner believes problem may be with replaced meter

YorkRegion.com
June 24, 2014
Kim Zarzour

It’s the $8,000 question: where did all that water go?

A Richmond Hill homeowner – and town councillors – are still no closer to solving the mystery of an enormous water bill after nearly two hours of debate last night.

Discussion about Igor Sapojnikov’s $8,200 water bill meandered a myriad of topics, from math to plumbing to “Newton’s Laws of Motion”, but the question of why the bill was so high in the first place remains unanswered.

By 11 p.m., council had voted to send the mystery back to staff for more study.

Sapojnikov first brought his sky-high bill to councillors’ attention two weeks ago when he complained about an invoice charging him for using about 27,000 litres of water per day for 103 days last winter, for a total of nearly 3 million litres.

At last night’s council meeting, he displayed two photos he said showed that the meter that was removed from his home for testing was not the same one that was returned.

“As you can see, there’s corrosion all around,” he said, pointing to one photo he said was his original meter. “And look at this one. It’s a totally different meter. I don’t know who made mistake and substituted from my meter to someone else’s meter” but, he added, even the address on the meter was incorrect.

Staff told council, however, that the 11-year-old meter was within its normal lifecycle of 17 to 20 years and there was minimal, if any, corrosion on the meter. If it were corroded, the impact would be to slow the meter down in the homeowner’s favour, council heard.

The meter was tested in March and showed an accuracy of 99.4 per cent, and again in June, by another testing facility, showing an accuracy of about 98 per cent, the staff report said.

A long discussion ensued as councillors and staff mused on what could cause such high water use without a flooded home or neighbourhood, but finance commissioner Dean Miller said if the meter is accurate and the water had somehow leaked down the drain unnoticed, the town would still be billed and taxpayers would have to foot the bill.

A majority of council voted to send the issue back for further study and a staff report offering “a higher level of certainty”.

“We’re going to pay the homeowners the respect they need to get to the bottom of this,” said Ward 4 Councillor Dave West.

“I understand it’s unnerving to get to another week to get to a decision, but I think that to get all the facts, we can make a more certain decision,” said Ward 6 Councillor Godwin Chan.