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    GABEO
    Legislative Building
    Suite 511
    18 Capitol Square SW
    Atlanta, Georgia 30334
    Phone: 404.656.6372
    Fax: 404.656.0238

    info@gabeo.org

“November 5, 2003

Letter Sent to Members of Congress
RE: Atlanta Sewer Issue

This comes to request your active support in securing funds to help Georgia’s capital city pay for federally mandated sewer repairs. The cost of the mandate is 3 billion dollars, and the citizens of the city of Atlanta cannot afford to pay this bill alone.

Unless you help us receive federal support in repairing this system, sewer rates for our citizens will increase by 45 percent in 2004, another 45 percent in 2005, and by 11 percent in 2006, 2007 and 2008. Thirty-one percent of Atlanta families earn less than $20,000 per year. Many are senior citizens who are already struggling with high health care costs, some of whom already have to choose between buying food and medication. Are they now expected to have to choose between paying for water, food and medicine? Our citizens simply cannot afford these increases.

Atlanta has been described as the center of business and commerce in our state and the economic engine of the Southeast. For years thousands of people from throughout this state, who do not live in or pay taxes in Atlanta, commute to Atlanta on a daily basis for work and recreation. Their continuous use of Atlanta’s sewer system on a daily basis is another contributing factor to the dilapidation of this system. Therefore, this is not just an Atlanta problem – it is a state of Georgia problem as well. Citizens of Atlanta are not the only people using our sewer system – so why should we be the only ones who are paying for it?

Many citizens who cannot pay these bills will have no recourse but to leave Atlanta. Businesses faced with this crisis in sewer rates will also leave – taking the jobs of thousands of people in the metro Atlanta area with them.

Other cities in the nation which have had similar problems have been able to successfully turn to the federal government for help – Boston, San Diego, New Orleans, Baltimore, and New York City to name a few. What makes Atlanta different and less deserving of federal support? Every city which has faced similar problems have received one third support from the federal government, one third from state government and one third from rate payers. Atlanta rate payers cannot and should not be expected to bear all of this expense alone.

This is your capital city and it will be unconscionable for you as an elected official, mandated to serve all the people, not to take a strong stand in securing these vital funds for Atlanta. If Congress can find a billion dollars a week to send to Iraq, a country with whom we are at war, We are sure you can find one billion to send to Atlanta to help an American city and its tax paying citizens.

We hope you will find it in your heart to do the right thing about Atlanta, because so goes Atlanta, so goes the state of Georgia. Thank you for your consideration.

Peace and Justice,

Tyrone Brooks

TB:mdo

cc: The Honorable Shirley Clarke Franklin
Mayor of Atlanta

Members of the Atlanta City Council