If you value your sanity

Don't call to inquire about your utility bill from the City. Learn from my experience and don't waste your time. There was a seemingly interminable hold, complete with inane music and mysterious clicking sounds. A person came on the line, eventually. That person transferred the call to another person and another wait ensued before the line was picked up. When asked why the water-usage amount, which was astonishingly high, had been marked "estimated," the person reported that it was because there was a vicious dog on the property. There was no dog of any kind. When asked why the amount estimated was so inordinately high, yet another person, reached after a considerable period holding the line, reported that the estimate was based on prior usage. Another person elaborated and said it was based on usage for the month of October in prior years. This was not so. The amount is not at all like any figure from any prior October and in fact surpasses the amount used when the water-heater went kerblooey and was overflowing for at least 24 hours before discovered. I possess the usage records going back for years and years. Then I was told that the meter could be read again. First the read date was said to be in five days, then in ten. The call was transferred to the water department itself (the billing questions were being answered by the electric department, first line of defense against questioners of their utility bills). The billing people in the electric department said that the call would be connected directly to a person and that the person could give a credit on the water bill. The call was disconnected after a lengthy hold. Starting over again in the electric-department billing office, after yet another lengthy hold I spoke to someone and had my call transferred to the water department, where again there was a long wait. The person who picked up the line said that she wasn't authorized to give credits, but that I could file a claim form. From this person, I learned that there was no dog entered in her records as a reason for estimating. The glass on the old mechanical meter was reported to be clouded, and the reader had put in a request for a new meter. The glass on the meter has been clouded for thirty years and has never been readable by a person standing up. A person must kneel down and actually look. But of course, since the City outsourced meter-reading, neighbors report that there's somebody new every single month, wandering around forlornly trying to find the water and electric meters in people's yards and then seeking shortcuts through people's flower beds to get to the next yard, sometimes leaving gates open as they go. Additional information received from the water department clarifies details about the appearance of the digging crew on Friday. The shut-off valve was scheduled for replacement before a meter would be installed. When the meter-replacement crew had shown up, unknown to us, it had reported an unusable valve. The valve is shown in City records as having "rotted away." It didn't rot away. As a valve it was still working, and had two knobs in opposition, forming a handle that could be moved by a person standing up who had a long-handled metal tool or by anybody kneeling down. It was sturdy cast-iron, probably from the Tips Iron Works. No doubt someone with the City broke it. It's old and temperamental but was usable the last time a plumber inspected it. When the City sent a crew to replace the valve, our sprinkler was removed from the end of the hose and the hose was removed from the hose bib. Judging by the caliche stains, torrents and torrents of water went running down the sidewalk and also down the gutter to the end of the block and around the corner. That crew did read the meter, but only after the water had been run, not before and then after, so the water used by the City will go onto the household bill, and it's a large quantity if what the water-department person told me is true. The meter has still not been replaced.