Update, Monday, 7:23 p.m.: The mayor's office emphasized that it has established no timeline for resuming new residential water shut offs, but plans to aggressively go after commercial accounts.
John Roach, the mayor's press secretary, said in an email to Deadline Detroit:
"The Mayor has made it clear that his first priorities are to go after the more than 8,000 residential accounts that were previously shut off and have illegally restored service, as well as stepping (up) the current level of enforcement on commercial accounts that are in shut off status.
"While residential shut offs were halted during the winter, commercial cut offs have continued
and will increase."
"The Mayor also has made it clear that he wants a full review of our water assistance programs, and to modify them if necessary, to make sure they are being effectively helping customers in need before the water department proceeds with residential shut offs."
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From earlier today
Here we go again?
Gurt Guyette, an investigative reporter for Michigan Democracy Watch Blog, which is run by the American Civil Liberties Union, writes: :
The question isn’t if the city of Detroit is going to again start ramping up water shutoffs to residential customers.
That’s definitely going to happen.
What remains unresolved is exactly when that will occur, and how many people will be affected.According to draft minutes of a meeting held March 9, Gary Brown – Mayor Mike Duggan’s chief of operations – presented details of the city’s plans to a group working on issues involving the Great Lakes Water Authority, which is slated to take over much of the regional system now being operated by Detroit’s Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD).
Brown told the group that the first step is to launch a “media campaign” informing customers of their options before re-starting mass residential shutoffs on May 1. Because of snow and frozen ground, those shutoffs, which increased significantly last spring, had to be curtailed during the winter months. In all, more than 33,000 customers had their water service cut last year.
