JT weighs fee on overdue utilities

Jim Thorpe Borough Council will vote Thursday on whether it wants to extend the number of days someone has to pay a utility bill before being assessed a late fee.

During a council workshop last week, Councilman Robert Schaninger requested the item be put on Thursday’s agenda. The freshman councilman said he’s hoping to see the time period to pay a bill go from 15 to 30 days.

“Everything else is set up on 30 days, I don’t know why our utility bills wouldn’t be,” Schaninger said. “It’s not an exorbitant amount of time. I know we say well just budget for it, but I’ll tell you there are a lot of people that live hand to mouth. I see it every day.”

Before the ordinance was updated to give people 15 days to pay a utility bill before penalty, Jim Thorpe residents used to have just 10.

Schaninger said the $15 late fee that would have been assessed on his recent bill had he not paid it on time would have equated to a 30 percent penalty.

“This doesn’t affect me, I want to make that clear, but putting a 30 percent penalty on anyone is higher than just about any credit card you can find,” he said. “That takes a lot of moxie on our part.”

Borough Manager Maureen Sterner said the 15-day time period seems to be working well. The number of delinquent accounts in the borough, she added, has dropped dramatically.

“For water and sewer, we have $24,389 due and of that, $18,754 is from eight accounts,” Sterner said. “So that leaves us at $5,635 for the rest and that’s pretty good.”

Delinquent garbage accounts, Sterner said, are a little higher because the borough doesn’t shut off water service for nonpayment of garbage bills.

“This would be the extent of it for me,” Schaninger said. “I’m not going to ask to go to 60 days down the line. Going to 30 would give people two paychecks.”