To the editor:
The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District will have a $500 million bond proposal on the Feb. 3 ballot as Proposition Y.
The proposal clearly does not deserve the support of voters, especially for such a large amount of bonds.
No one questions that sewer improvements are needed. But voters should trust the current Board of Trustees, which was installed last year, about as far as they can sail a sewer lid. In particular, I do not trust board Chairman Robert J. Baer.
Baer said last year the district would be “good stewards of the public’s money.” Yet the board spends tens of millions of dollars for questionable contracts and projects.
Baer even admitted during an open meeting he didn’t understand a $1.5 million consulting contract he was voting on. No doubt, the same was true of other trustees.
They approved it anyway.
It also should be remembered that the MSD is already taking in hundreds of millions of dollars of additional revenue due to rate increases imposed without voter approval. The sewer district is now collecting about $115 million from these increases each year. The total amount will surpass $1 billion later this year.
Last year, General Manager Bill Milligan wrote in the Call that the new MSD board behaves as bad as the previous one.
Actually, they’re much worse.
Approving a large bond issue for the MSD will only lead to more outlandish spending and the sewer district being even less accountable to the public.
Voters would be wise to vote “no” on Proposition Y.
Tom Sullivan
St. Louis
