[mike31154]

I think water meters are a good thing. Just like any utility, you should be paying for actual use, or what you 'choose' to use. I lived in a condominium townhouse (that's strata for you BC folks) in Ottawa for 13 years and cost of water use was included in the condo/strata fees. Most of the buildings had from 5 to 7 units per building, but I was in a smaller one with a 3 unit building. All other utilities were pay per use but as mentioned the water bill was included in the condo fees, which of course kept going up year after year. In addition to water, the fees covered things like landscaping, winter snow removal, management company renumeration and of course contribution to the reserve fund. The reserve fund is there to pay for major maintenance such as roof replacement and any other maintenance to the exterior of the building. Essentially you owned the inside of your abode and anything exterior, including the exterior walls, belonged to the corporation. This can be good or bad, depending on the situation. Our corporation had a good handle on the financial situation and was able to replace all the windows and doors one summer without having to collect extra fees due to lack of planning.

Anyhow, back to the water thing. At one time there was talk of installing water meters in the corporation as well but it never got off the ground. Being single and using relatively lttle water, I was subsidizing the family of five or seven with their water use and was definitely in favour of metering and paying for actual use. One of my neighbours was out washing his car every second day. I couldn't believe it, the guy was pretty anal about his car and it wasn't even anything special, just a standard GM family ride. The plan was to install a meter in one unit of every block and one of the issues that eventually sunk the idea was who's going to read the meter since the city wasn't going to start reading individual meters in a condo corporation. I suspect another factor was the water wasters in the community were quite happy to have guys like me help foot their bill. I owned my unit, but the majority of them were rented and I imagine the landlords didn't much care since they could just pass increases in condo fees on to the tenants in the form of higher rent. The turn out at the annual condo meetings was always less than stellar often with barely enough participants (owners) to have a quorum for an official meeting. One of the things I promised myself is I would never ever live in another condo corporation or strata whatever we call it here in BC. Thankfully I was able to make that a reality when I moved to Vernon.

Water is a precious resource and we're spoiled here in Canada. Since moving to the relatively dry Okanagan, I've come to appreciate this a little more and there is certainly an increased awareness of that in this area.