Village council had its highest attendance rate in months as about half a dozen residents came to the meeting to hear why some had received no warning of the change from a ten month payment plan to a five month payment plan.
At the end of December, any utility arrears are rolled over into property taxes and interest is applied. Two residents made up a delegation requesting the penalties be dropped and the amount owing be kept separate so it doesn’t affect either billing for 2017 or property taxes.
They also asked that residents be given a chance to pay the overdue bills, working with the village on a case-by-case basis.
In her report, Laurie Taylor, chief administrative officer for the Village of Nakusp, said she wished she had a simple explanation for what happened and that she was at a loss over how something like this could have happened. There were 833 utility bills generated and she was assured by staff these bills were mailed out along with the notices about the change in the payment period.
Taylor suggested writing off the penalties applied to the 47 accounts previously on the payment plan.
She then assured council she would be implementing safeguards to ensure something like this never happens again.
NACFOR holds board elections
During the annual meeting for the Nakusp and Area Community Forest (NACFOR) held an election for its board. Three officers were elected by acclamation.
Kathy Smith will continue on as president, Geoff Grout as treasurer and Tom Zeleznik as secretary. Three directors consented to acting as directors until the next annual general meeting. They are Laura Latter as the RDCK representative, John Cann as director, and Walter Posnikoff as director.
