Letter: Let’s take care of our struggling neighbors

<p>Let’s take care of our struggling neighbors</p><p>To the editor:</p><p>As many Greenwood homeowners know, our sanitation bills can be expensive. For my family of four, including two adults and two elementary school aged children, here is the breakdown of my December 2020 bill:</p><p>Sewer base rate — $22.47</p><p>Sewer usage rate (3,100 gallons) — $15.93</p><p>Trash — $15.70</p><p>Total: $54.10</p><p>Let’s compare this to what it would cost for my family’s identical situation in Carmel, where they have more than twice the median household income of Greenwood:</p><p>Sewer base rate — $18.33</p><p>Sewer usage rate (3,100 gallons) — $9.36</p><p>Trash — $12.20</p><p>Total: $39.89</p><p>That demonstrates that the Greenwood Common Council has negotiated a pretty bad deal for us, but that’s not what I would like to talk about today. I live in a community that was built in the mid-late 1950’s. Many in my neighborhood are on social security, disability, or unemployment due to the recent pandemic.</p><p>These rising costs cause real problems for my neighbors who are on fixed incomes, and by no fault of their own are now choosing between paying this bill and presents for their grandchildren, or worse choosing between paying this bill and eating. If they choose not to pay this bill they could deal with legal issues and collections, or incur a lean on their property that their next of kin will have to deal with when they pass.</p><p>I recommend that the Greenwood Common Council should exempt any homeowner on social security or disability from the sewer base rate and trash rate. As someone in the prime working years of my life, I would gladly pay slightly more so that my neighbors can have a better quality of life. $38.17 for some people is a week’s worth of groceries.</p><p>Some may criticize this idea by saying that is what charity is for. I would take issue with that characterization because it’s their money, we would just be letting the most vulnerable people in our community keep more of it. Leaning on charity is also antithetical to the value that drives the ongoing need for social security; dignity.</p><p>I imagine that if I gathered up $50 and went next door to my 90-year-old neighbor and Korean war veteran and offered it to him as a way to offset a charge he received that I believe is unfair, I would receive back a well deserved door slammed in my face. People like my neighbors are owed dignity in their golden years; they are not charity cases. In my religion, we are commanded by our creator to respect our elders, and I see this as an extension of those values.</p><p>Others might criticize this plan as being part of a slippery slope into socialism. To that, I would say that if wanting to take care of the elderly and disabled makes me a socialist then you can just call me Eugene Debs.</p><p>Matthew Smith</p><p>Greenwood</p>