Council splits responsibility on one disputed utility bill, denies another appeal after meter test

Two customer appeals over large water bills drew extended council discussion and differing outcomes.

An owner representing a commercial building at 456 Brazosport Boulevard asked council to cancel about $3,500 in charges after staff said the account had been disconnected in June 2022 but later showed continuous water use from April–May 2023 while the building was vacant. The owner said the meter and valve are under city control and that the property had been secured; staff said the meter was turned off but not locked and that someone had reopened service while the account was inactive.

City staff told council the period of anomalous use totaled about 293,400 gallons and generated roughly $3,500 in charges. Staff also said the municipality’s monitoring flags anomalous use only on active accounts; because the account was inactive at the time the usage occurred, the system did not automatically flag the event. Council members discussed whether the city should bear some responsibility for not detecting the use sooner and whether the meter infrastructure can be secured against tampering.

Council voted to charge the water usage to the property owner but to credit or reduce the sewer portion of the bill to reflect the city’s share of responsibility for not flagging the inactive account. A motion recorded by council specified the water charges remain the owner’s responsibility while the sewer portion would be reduced; council voted unanimously.

Separately, a hotel operator appealed a separate high bill he said was caused by a faulty meter. Staff said the meter had been removed and tested by an independent company in October 2023 and that the test showed the meter was accurate. Staff told council that the recorded usage passed through the meter and that council policy and municipal ordinance require property owners to pay for water that registers, even if where it went after passing the meter is not known. The hotel operator said he had plumbers inspect plumbing and disputed where the water could have gone; council members pressed him to mitigate losses and accept offered payment plans. Council concluded the evidence supported the city’s billing and required the owner to make payment arrangements; the chair said the council had already decided in a prior session and repeated that decision at the meeting.

Both appeals included extended exchanges about meter testing, where water recorded by a meter might go (for example, into a sewer or a pool), and what constitutes adequate notice when anomalous usage appears on an inactive account.