It's pretty common for utilities to cross-charge usage. Fire fighting would have to a be an estimate, of course, and I don't know if Detroit does that. But I wouldn't be surprised if they did.

Chaqa, I doubt it. But if they do, then the city might want to change their billing policy. The larger point is the difference in treatment between large customers and small customers.

"What will we do then when the water company goes out of business, and no one has water?"

Chaqa has no idea how water gets to his house. The Culligan Man isn't responsible for city water.

As I said 2WL, I didn't mean literally. The water company has a budget and running at a huge deficit is not much different than going out of business.

"Joe Louis Arena/Red Wings Hockey $80,000"

This is just mind boggling. Not only are the Detroit Red Wings one of the most valuable franchises in the NHL, the city of Detroit is giving them $285 million in tax free bonds and for a new hockey arena. This tax money is coming from the same pot that is used for school funding but has been earmarked for this bogus "economic development".

And now the city is cutting off drinking water while making shitty deals to scumbag sports team owners at the city's expense.

I don't like the idea of the UN intervening here, it reeks of political grandstanding to be honest. Surely they have something more urgent to attend? But this whole incident speaks to some badly misplaced priorities. It seems self-evidently obvious that faced with the choice of cutting off water supplies to some people or reducing/eliminating a subsidy for a professional sports franchise, the latter should always get cut first.

Of course it's political grandstanding. Nearly everything the UN does is political grandstanding. That shouldn't matter, though, as I think you alluded to - cutting off water is a huge mistake and in my opinion (of course, the execs would never agree with this), the sports teams ought to be telling the city to change this. The Red Wings have more than enough money from tax deals that steal from other important parts of the city and the Lions probably have the same kind of inside privileges with the city.

Well, frankly when governments become too corrupt and start abusing human rights, then it is proper for the international community to step in.

Wait a minute, we've been had. This is from WorldNetDaily. These guys peddle birther shit on the reg, I don't trust this story for a second.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/26/united-nations-detroit-water-shutoffs_n_5533901.html

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/6/22/detroit-water-un.html

"And now the city is cutting off drinking water while making shitty deals to scumbag sports team owners at the city's expense."

This is just pure ignorance. Mike Iltich has almost single-handedly been the largest driving force for positive change in Detroit for the last decade or so. He was one of the main people who organized the other large corporations to fund housing projects, clean up campus marshes, and other large regions of the city. Nearly any improvements in the city in the past 5-10 years can be tied to private business owners investing the city. The new hockey arena is actually going to help draw people into the city, which is a huge problem because people run in fear at the word Detroit. Now the fact they owe money on their water bill is stupid, but I have no doubt that if the city actually tried to collect it would be paid. To use that as justification to call Ilitch a scumbag sports team owner though is just a gross insult to all the positive changes he's propagated in his life for Detroit.

Literally one of the biggest, if not biggest economic benefits to the city is the fact that Detroit is known country wide as HockeyTown. That would be due to the fact that his team is the winning most team in the history of any sport...ever. While you can argue that this isn't an intentional benefit to the city, the point remains that the hockey success of the Detroit Red Wings has produced massive amounts of profit for local businesses in Detroit.

Additionally, his purchase of the Tigers back in 1992, and his success with the team thereafter has lead to an unprecedented turnout at Tigers games, regularly drawing in 40,000 people to the city who then spend large sums of money assisting the economy of Detroit, the local restaurants and shops, hotels, etc.

Anyways continue with the UN conversation.

I am a great believer that access to clean water is a fundamental right of every citizen. The convenience of getting out of your kitchen tap, however, far less so. If standpipes were erected in the streets in which the cutoffs have taken place I'd have no problem with it.

I'm in agreement with Octavious here. If there's access to potable water nearby, then I think it's well within the rights of the companies to shut off the pipes that run directly into homes.Of course, in urban and suburban areas, actual access is probably more difficult to manage than one would think.

Here's a random thought though, since some of the people whose water has been shut off are likely on food stamps or other government aid, then why not let that aid apply to their water bills? You can buy bottled water with food stamps, but can't buy tap water access. If these are people who literally cannot afford to pay their water bills, then why can't the same programs used to feed and house Americans in need also be used to provide drinking water. (Granted, by far the lion's share of a water bill is NOT directly used for drinking.)

I don't know about you guys, but we don't drink the tap water. It tastes like crap.

Sucks for you, tap water is great.

Tap water is the best.

Taste isn't necessarily a factor where a human right to water should be concerned. The water might taste like crap, but if it's clean, then the "human right" part of the problem should be satisfied.

I generally run my tap water through a filter before I "like" the taste, but that's absolutely a paid-for preference rather than a rights issue. Still, bath water, toilet water, dish-washing water, laundry water, irrigation, and the like AREN'T human rights, and that's where the vast majority of a water bill comes from. Drinking and cooking water is the only human rights issue as far as I'm aware, and while it may not always be convenient, that should always be accessible.

Most bottle water in the US comes from tap water. The companies found they could stick it in a bottle, slap a label on it, and make a profit.

If you ever watch the movie "Water" with Michael Caine, you can see how over priced it is when an oil company executive quotes what bottled water sells for barrel quantities compared to the cheaper crude oil. Their dry well that's gushing water is more profitable than if it had oil and they can skip the refinery.

jmo, the fact is that this deal to publicly finance 2/3 of a new arena for one of the wealthiest business owners in the state not only reeks of public officials bending over backwards to line the pockets of a sports owner (see also: Miami, New Jersey, Buffalo, any major city) but it also diverts funds from the same pot of money that goes to fund Detroit Public Schools, which is supposedly being reimbursed by the state, which would come out of the *state's* school aid fund. No matter how you look at it, schools are taking a hit to pay for a new hockey arena. Doesn't sound like a great tradeoff to me.

Cincinnati did it the smart way. They went in with the county and put a county sales tax that covered the new stadiums and some other works plus the city and county gets rent from the teams *and* they get to rent the stadiums out in the off season. Long term income even after the stadiums were paid for from the sales tax.

Well and good if you like your tap water, but ours is cloudy and tastes like rocks.

Cincinnati financed their stadium the worst way possible. Cincinnati residents severely resent how they were asked to fork over so much money for that stadium.

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748704461304576216330349497852

Ignore Putin. I live in Cincinnati. Trust me, we don't severely resent it. It was a sales tax, so the entire region contributed. If you shopped at a Hamilton County store, you helped pay for them. And Cincti residents of the city proper actually liked it because it meant the money was coming from Butler, Warren, and Clermont county people who shopped at TriCounty, Northgate, and Kenwood as well as the downtown commuters who ate lunch at downtown restaurants and the folks who went to ballgames and the theatre and the symphony, ballet, & opera.

Which is why Bengals fans were boycotting the games, even when they were winning.

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/story/16625802/bengals-ticket-problem-isnt-shortage-of-fans-its-the-owner

Also, Putin, how many Cincinnati residents do you know? Me? I have a few hundred friends and acquaintances from throughout the entire region including Cincinnati, Hamilton County, the other three counties I mentioned, Northern KY, and SE Indiana.

I know you defend corporate fatcat greed and incompetence whenever possible Draugnar, but even the slavishly pro-business WSJ called the stadium deal the worst sports deal by a local government in history.

"Also, Putin, how many Cincinnati residents do you know? Me? I have a few hundred friends and acquaintances from throughout the entire region including Cincinnati, Hamilton County, the other three counties I mentioned, Northern KY, and SE Indiana."

I don't really care.

I've listened to Cincinnati sports radio since I've lived in Columbus which is going on 10 years now, and have innumerable friends from the area but I don't count them like postage stamps, so I couldn't tell you. I remember the Bengal boycott very well. Only somebody living under a rock could claim Bengals fans were happy with the stadium deal.

So you believe everything you read in the newspapers and don't believe there is any political motivation behind it? Hahahahaha....... What a joke. A few hundred season ticket holders is really "the residents of Cincinnati". Most of those people don't even live in Hamilton County and those that do don't love within the city limits. Seriously, the typical resident of Cincinnati (within the city) couldn't afford a Bengal's ticket.