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Dear Editor:

Below is an open letter I sent to the Antioch City Water Finance Department and all the city council members.

To Antioch City officials,

I received a letter dated June 5, 2015 with my last water bill. The letter provided a personalized water conservation goal table showing, by billing period, the actual usage from 2013 and the water reduction goal for this year, a 28% reduction. Apparently, a letter was sent out several months ago, that I missed, which asked for input from the public prior to the water restrictions being set. Please forgive my tardiness, but here is my input, now.

I have two issues with the water usage plan, neither of which are mentioned in the letter. First, the way the water usage is calculated is flawed. The usages are by billing period. This can be a very inaccurate way to compare actual water consumption because the number of days in a billing period in any year, but specifically 2013 and 2015, can be quite different. For example, looking at my water bills for the past two years there is a range of 23 to 36 days in a billing cycle. It would be nearly impossible to reduce the water usage by 28% if the number of days in 2015 is 36 days and in 2013 it was 23 days. Since the billing statements already include the gallons/day consumption, why not use this figure for the reduction goal? Also, the number of people in a household may also be greatly different from what it was in 2013. How can a comparison be valid without this factor?

The other issue I have, also was not mentioned in the letter. After multiple phone calls I learned that the charge per unit in my zone is increasing from $2.64 to $2.69 for the first 13 units. I have no problem with this. But, for usage in a monthly billing cycle that exceeds 13 units, the charge will be $4.35. As stated above, the number of days in a billing cycle might up to 13 days longer, which could be up to a 56% increase in the number of days in a billing cycle. The higher charge is a nearly 65% increase in the cost of water. It is possible citizens of Antioch could be charged 65% more for water usage in a billing cycle that was 56% longer than it was in 2013. Citizens could be charged a much higher rate for water even though their usage per day may have been less than the goal. A much fairer way to impose water restriction would be to base the tiers on gallons/day. If 13 units of water is consumed in a standard 30 day billing cycle the target would be 324 gallons per day (13 units x 748 gallons per unit / 30 days). The billing amount for consumption exceeding 13 units in a 30 day period would be $0.0058 per gallon ($4.35 / 748 gallons per unit). This does not address the household size problem but it does fairly address the problem of varying lengths of billing periods.

If no change is made in how the over 13 unit per billing period rate is administered, I request all my summer month billing periods be 23 days and all my winter billing periods be 36 days. I know this is an “unusual” request but, when compared to the current billing practice employed by the City of Antioch Water Department, it is quite reasonable. Also, if the usage in a billing period is less than 13 units, will this be credited against a later billing period where the usage is more than 13? If not, why? Isn’t the goal to save water? Why would it matter in which billing period the saving occurred? After all, your calculation method treats all billing periods as the same.

Striving to become the best version of myself,

Wayne Steffen

By Acting Sgt. James McMurry #2384, Antioch Police Field Services Bureau

On Wednesday, July 1, 2015 at 11:01 PM, Antioch Police Officers responded to numerous 911 calls of shots fired in the 4100 block of Rogers Canyon Road. Upon arrival Officers discovered that several vehicles and a residence had been struck by gunfire. Four residents, ages 19, 26, 37 and 47 were home at the time. Luckily no residents were injured.

Officers located numerous items of evidence at the scene that included spent shell casings and bullet fragments along the street. It appears the 19-year-old victim was the intended target but he was not cooperative with providing any information that could lead to identifying the shooter(s).

There were no witnesses located at the scene. If anyone has information that is related to this case, they can call the Antioch Police Department’s non-emergency line at (925) 778-2441.

Concerned citizens may also send a tip anonymously to: 274637 (Crimes). Make sure to include the word “Antioch” in the message so your information will be forwarded to us. All text messages are encrypted and your number cannot be traced. Thank you in advance for your assistance.

Following is the text of the Declaration of Independence in celebration of Independence Day, July 4th, 2015:

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

---

The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:

Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton

Column 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton

Column 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton

Column 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean

Column 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark

Column 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton

From the website: www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration.html

Happy Independence Day from the Antioch Herald!