We hear the same complaints around Auburn.

The person who has a good job is often struggling to pay his utility bills.

This is not someone who has seven kids and a wife who are taking showers twice a day. He’s not the guy who’s watering a half-acre of grass. He doesn’t have a swimming pool and he doesn’t have a leak in front of his house that’s flooding the street.

He’s part of a family who uses an average amount of water each month.

When he talks to his friends who have homes in other states, no one ever mentions high water bills. They never complain about any of their utility bills.

Do people in Auburn have a right to complain about their water bills? You bet they do.

A small group of people in Auburn have come with a solution to high water bills. Instead of putting about $30,000 a year into artwork on streets that people don’t have the time or even the inclination to look at, our mayor and City Council need to consider the pocketbooks of ordinary people.

If you take away expensive travel for the mayor and council, and the useless waste of money on communication systems, private council office space and perks for elected officials, it should be possible to put together a funding package that will maintain all of Auburn’s water systems.

Why can’t people we put in office put together a budget that just benefits ordinary people like us? The people we talk to believe our elected officials should be putting at least $40,000 a year into a utility that will help subsidize our high water bills.

We all appreciate art, music and culture, but enough is enough.

Give us a budget that uses common sense and compassion for the residents. Stop making the utility rate payers victims of the mayor’s budget.

– Virginia Haugen and Jeanne Herold