ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (WFLA) — Months after St. Petersburg residents first raised concerns about sky-high water bills, many say the problem still is not resolved.
City documents reviewed by News Channel 8 show the scope was much larger than originally acknowledged. A February report to City Council flagged more than 1,000 abnormal bills just weeks after last year’s hurricanes. The same report listed more than 3,000 accounts corrected for overreads or delayed meter readings, and nearly 7,000 adjustments overall since September.
City staff said some of the charges were “catch-up bills,” months of estimated usage that were finally added all at once. But other bills were simply wrong, requiring corrections that the city itself admitted to.
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To help sort through the billing spikes, city leaders hired outside consultants, Stantec. But their role was limited. Earlier this month, Public Works Administrator Claude Tankersley told council the firm only counted how many customers experienced abnormal bills, not why it happened.
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“Stantec did the analysis to figure out how many of our customers experienced that spike,” Tankersley said. “But the data did not allow them, and nor did they do an analysis of what caused it.”
At the same meeting, City Administrator Robert Gerdes told council the problem was tied directly to the storms and that billing has since returned to normal…