Members of the Cortez Sanitation District board reached into their own pockets Tuesday night to loan money to a family whose sewer was scheduled for disconnection.

During the busy meeting, the board also voted to lift restrictions on sewer-tap sales from the district’s southern plant, extended a moratorium on sewer-line disconnections, and had a preliminary discussion about whether to end the practice of cutting sewer lines for delinquent accounts.

Terry and Cathy Turner of Cortez, who have two children, came to ask to be allowed to make minimal payments to the district until their financial situation improves.

Terry Turner said he was injured on the job working for a garbage-collection company a year ago and has been unable to work since. He said the company fired him because, under doctor’s orders, he refused to return to full duty. He is in the process of suing the company, he said, and the family has begun receiving welfare in the meantime.

The Turners had gone before the sanitation district’s hearing officer June 5 asking to pay just $10 a month to the district while Cathy Turner obtains job training. They were turned down because $10 a month would not even cover their current payments to the district, which charges $14 a month for residential service.

The board asked if the Turners could pay the $14 instead, and they said they were willing.

"At the hearing, they said $18 to $20 a week," commented Maxine Carton of the Southwest Center for Independent Living, a disabled-rights advocacy group, who had come to support the couple’s request. "This is a good compromise."

However, the family was still $128 in arrears after making a payment of $10 on Monday, and board President Stan Pierce said the Turners’ record showed a history of late payments.

"When you are low-income, sometimes the money isn’t there when the bill needs to be paid," Carton responded. "Sometimes you have no control. If the kids need food or something happens, that is going to be a priority before the bill."

Cathy Turner said she found the sanitation district’s quarterly bills difficult to remember. Board member G.W. McCutcheon said the district saves about $2,000 a year in postage by billing quarterly, and district manager Bill Smith said anyone who wants to can pay monthly.

But board member Jim Bridgewater pointed out that the family had owed $152 in 1999, before Terry Turner was injured.

"I don’t consider $152 being late," Bridgewater said. "It’s just not paying the bill."

Cathy Turner said the family had always paid eventually and that they did not want charity, just more time.

Pierce then said he would donate to the family’s account his $75 director’s fee, a sum that each board member receives for each sanitation-district meeting up to a yearly total of $1,200.

The board members eventually decided to split the $128 sum among them and said they expected the Turners to pay them back.

Member Sam Jarvis wondered whether the action might set a precedent. "Next meeting, are we going to have four more people in the same situation?" he asked.

But member Bob Diederich said there was no precedent set by giving their own money.

The board thanked the Turners for following appeal procedures. McCutcheon said he hoped the Cortez Journal would take note that, if a woman who had her sewer line cut in March had come to the board first instead, "probably the same thing would have happened."

The woman’s case sparked considerable adverse publicity, including a column in the Denver Post, after she sold her wedding rings to pay the reconnection fee.

Partly because of that, a recall effort is under way against board members Pierce, Jarvis and Bridgewater.

The sanitation district’s policy of severing the sewer lines of delinquent customers has prompted considerable discussion. Tuesday morning, the board met with the Cortez City Council to talk about the possibility of an agreement that would allow the city, which provides residential water service, to cut the water off if a sewer bill were unpaid.

That would mean the sanitation district could avoid sewer-line disconnections and the resulting reconnection fees, which are $500 for the first offense and $4,000 for the second within five years.

But sanitation officials reportedly told the council that their attorney, Kent Williamson, had advised them such an arrangement would not be legal.

Williamson said Wednesday he could not confirm that because it would be a violation of attorney-client privilege.

Cortez City Manager Hal Shepherd said the council suggested the sanitation district place liens on properties with delinquent accounts. Even if nine accounts were in arrears a year, it would probably cost the district less than $1,000, he said, adding, "We certainly got more than $1,000 worth of bad publicity" from the Denver Post column.

Tuesday night, sanitation-board member Diederich argued that the district should end disconnections. "I think we ought to investigate liens again," he said, noting that fewer than 1 percent of the district’s customers are on the disconnect list. The liens can be levied against county property taxes and the money will be paid in two years or less, he said.

"If we do that, this (disconnect) list will mushroom," Pierce said.

"I’m sure it will, possibly, Stan," Diederich replied, "but I think if any business had 5 percent of their debts or less in arrears, most would be happy." He added, "We’re in business and we’ve got to expect people to be in arrears."

Smith noted that state statutes allow for sewer-line cut-offs.

"You go out and start painting green marks on the street, these people are going to pay their bill," Smith said.

But Diederich said the policy was causing the district "a lot of heartache."

"It caused heartache in one case in five years," Pierce responded.

The board agreed to put the issue of sewer disconnections on the agenda for its July 17 meeting.

The board also voted 4-1, with Pierce dissenting, to suspend sewer-line cut-offs until after that meeting.

There are 10 customers on the disconnect list, Smith said, owing amounts ranging from $163 to $39. The district normally sends disconnection notices when a customer is two billing cycles behind.

Board members questioned how someone could owe just $39 and be on the list, as one cycle’s payment is $42. Smith said people make partial payments, and late fees sometimes carry over. Smith said he would have that customer’s account history printed out and provided to the board.

The members pleased some local developers by voting unanimously to rescind rules adopted Jan. 8, 2000, that restricted sewer-tap sales at the district’s southern plant. The rules had limited annual tap sales to one per individual, six per homebuilder, 16 to subdivisions with 30 or fewer lots, and 20 to subdivisions over 30 lots.

Smith reported that an analysis by Arber & Associates, a Denver engineering firm, had shown that the southern plant had the capacity for 260 more taps rather than the 144 Smith had estimated.

But he said at the rate at which taps are selling, approximately 35 a year, either number would allow for tap sales up until the start of construction of the new southern plant, which is expected to begin next spring or summer.

If the sales restrictions were thrown out, Smith said, "The risk you run is somebody with deep pockets will come in and buy all the taps, but it’s a pretty remote risk."

Jim Kreutzer, developer of the Southern Bluffs subdivision, said he would be seeking 30-70 taps. Eugene Zubrzycki said he expected to need 32-37 for a motel he wants to build, and Don Etnier, developer of Sedona Estates, said he would want 5-10.

The board said there should be plenty of taps left until the new plant is begun.

Kreutzer, who has been an outspoken critic of the sanitation district in general and Smith in particular over what he said were unnecessary delays and red tape in his project, told the board he had had lunch with Smith two weeks ago and "it was a good lunch."