INKSTER, Mich. – Geneva and Eric Goldston have lived at their house on Andover Street in Inkster for 46 years. Having raised their four kids there, they lead a pretty simple life on a fixed income.
Which is why when their water bills suddenly spiked from $77 per month to $284 starting in July, it sounded alarm bells.
“We don’t use any extra water,” Geneva, 75, said. “It’s just the two of us. There are no children, no grandchildren that live here. We don’t water our grass. I’m very concerned. How are we going to do this?”
The high water bills have become a source of confusion and downright anger.
Residents have been posting about it for months on the community’s Facebook page.
They say the trouble started when the city installed new water meters earlier this year and started doing sewage pipe work.
“Two hundred dollars a month just for water. I mean, that’s a lot,” Eric, 73, said. “We don’t have no swimming pool or river.”
Despite that, the bills continued to go up for the Goldstons – including a bill that is due on Dec. 31 for nearly $825.
“I just think it’s sad that no matter who you are, we’re just ordinary people, that they could do this and get away with this,” Geneva said.
Local 4 reached out to Inkster’s public service director, Jerome Bivins, on Wednesday (Oct. 22) morning.
Not long before we arrived at the Goldstons, someone from the department arrived at their home asking to check their meter.
He later directed us to a statement from Inkster Mayor Byron Nolen, which came out as we were making other calls to the city.
The statement said that the issue is not the meters.
“The issue stems from an error during the migration of previous account data,” the statement says, adding that it will “permanently solve the issue of incorrect balances and errors” once it’s done.
The city also said that they’re suspending all late fees.
If you receive an inaccurate bill, do not pay it until the meter readings are corrected and the correct balance is squared away.