[Engaged] The Case of the Disappearing Water

[Cooperix]

Fascinating to think about....

I agree with Allan's solution.
Living in the desert SW, water is a scarce and precious commodity. LA and California has its own water issues. I hear occasionally that the next big wars will be water wars!!
I'd try to find the 'thief'. Clearly someone who doesn't have access to running water? Maybe help them find low income government assistance. Clean water for everyone is a right or should be. But I'd not be keen on a free running tap in my front yard, not knowing if the spigot is turned off or water wasted.
my two cents.

bows.
Anne
~st~

[Shinshi]

Well, for me the volume of water is an issue. People are using more water than your family. That might suggest more than one set of people drawing your water. The odd thing to me is that sounds like this is a daily occurrence.

I would want to know more about what was actually happening so I would try to set up some sort of video camera (trail cam / security cam) to learn more about what was going on. That would help me decide what to do. I would want to try and talk with whomever was doing this and understand the situation.

For me I would pretty quickly secure my hose bib. It is important to be generous, but that is an awful lot of water.

So if I had to choose among your 3 options I would try to catch the person who is doing this, but not automatically turn them over to the police. I would want to understand better the circumstance first - heck I would like to know if is more than one group! And work from there. Looking to find a solution that doesn't involve you providing that much water for free.

Gassho, Allan

SaT-LaH

[Shoka]

The Case of the Disappearing Water

Hey everyone,

I had something happen recently in my life that I thought might be an interesting discussion topic for the Engaged Center. Below is a real story of what happened and most of the circumstances that I took into consideration to make a decision as what direction to move. But I’m leaving without telling what we have actually determined and how we decided to move forward, because that’s where the discussion comes in.

Your assignment (if you choose to play):

Read the situation and comment as to what you would do and why. What comes up for you when you think about the situation and what factors play into how you would move forward.

This is meant to be a fun intellectual conversation about how you would react and what action you would take.


The Situation:

While paying bills this month, I noticed our water bill was super high. Like more than double last year! I looked further into the charts and stats and found the following. In July, our water usage suddenly spiked going to more than double what had been typical for the past years. It has stayed that high through the current bill. On average in previous years we were using 70 gallons a day, now the average was 190 gallons!

There were a couple of typical options leaks in the house or change in water usage, both have been checked and proven not to be the culprit. Additionally, we do know that water was used when we weren’t home because we checked the meter after we had been gone all day and it had shown use.

Where is the water going? The only clue is that we do have a hose bib (spicket) on the front of our house. Our running theory is that someone is using the water from the hose.

Additional Facts that weight in the decision making:

I live in a lower middle-class neighborhood, where most people work hard and make ends meet; but times are getting harder for everyone. There is a large homeless and transient population developing in and around where I live. And people living in RV’s/trailers and moving around the area is also high.

The Question:

What do you do?
Should you but a lock on the gate and/or on the hose bib cutting off the water supply?
Should you try to catch the person doing it and report them to the police?
Should you do nothing, because you’ve been paying the bill for 6 months without it causing a hardship?


As I said at the beginning, this is a real situation and is currently happening in my household. We have come to a solution so I don’t need suggestions as to what I should do.

Instead think as if this was your house, your water bill, and what you would determine to be the right course of action. If you need more information to make a determination as to what you would do, then fill in the blanks for yourself and tell us what your thought process was.

Gassho,

Shoka
sattoday