Sacramento County strikes back

Out of the blue, I get an email from Sacramento County Consolidated Billing and Service:

Dear Customer:

This is a confirmation email that your Curbside Collection Cart Delivery appointment has been scheduled for 10/23/2023 at:

XXXX XXXXXXX XXX, ORANGEVALE 95662

Confirmation Number: 304XXXX

For cart repair requests, place your broken cart(s) at the curb by 6:00 AM, on your scheduled appointment date. Note: Cart(s) must not be overflowing. Reported lost or stolen cart(s) will be delivered on the scheduled appointment date.

Cancel or Reschedule: You must call Customer Service at least one business day prior to your appointment. Call (916) 875-5555, Monday - Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. to speak with a representative. Do not leave a voicemail or send an email.

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Customer Service - (916) 875-5555, Monday - Friday, 8:00 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., closed holidays. Hearing/speech disability, call 7-1-1 for CA Relay Service

www.sacutilities.org

Thank you.
Consolidated Utilities Billing and Service
Please DO NOT REPLY to this email.

Since I have not requested any carts, I have no idea what this is about, so I call customer service, talk to billing, and find out that because I built a new structure on my property, the country requires me to get (and pay for) additional set of refuse carts (garbage, recycling, green waste). They were supposed to start charging me when the ADU got built, but they forgot. They would not back charge me (thank you very much), but they will start charging me as soon as the carts get delivered. And, by the way, Sacramento county also requires me to pay additional sewage fees, for which they also forgot to start charging me, but since the law allows them to back charge me for up to 3 years, they will, and my next utility bill will be a few hundred more than usual. Oops!

It does not make sense to me (I do not need any extra waste bins, they will just collect dust, and I am not producing any more sewage with the ADU on the property than I did before building it because we have the same number of household members). But I'm not sure what to do. I talk to several support representatives from billing, but they all keep repeating that there is no way around it.

A few days later, I get two letters in the mail. The letters have a few bits of additional info:

I do a bit of research and find out that, yes, Sacramento county ordinance 6.20.120 Mandatory Service requires that "[e]ach business and/or residential building with a separate address and each separate business unit and each separate residential unit with a common address located on such parcel shall subscribe, or participate in the subscription, to [solid waste, recyclable material, and organic material collection service]"; however, according to Article 6.20.145 Exemption from Mandatory County Residential Service, the county allows for an exemption provided that the unit is not rented out.

So, I call billing again, talk to multiple people again, hear the same story that there is absolutely no way out of paying additional waste collection service fees, finally get transferred to someone who is willing to listen, and point them to the article explaining the exemption criteria. After going back and forth for a while, I get a confirmation that there is a way to get an exemption, but I must submit a paper application. I ask for the form, get it via regular mail in a few of days, fill it out, and send it to the address listed in the application. A month passes and I do not hear from anyone, so I call back again. No, they did not get my application. I guess it was lost in the mail. Can't prove that I sent it, so ask for another one. Fill it out again. Take a photo of the envelope and a video showing how I drop it in the mail box. A few weeks pass, and I do not hear from anyone. I call billing again. Yes, they got my application. No, it has not been reviewed, yet. No, there is no ETA. The code enforcement team that is supposed to process it is busy. Very busy. Once they get a chance to review it, I will hear from them. So, I wait. In the meantime the new collection bins are collecting dust in my backyard.

A couple of months later, I am working from home and hear the doorbell ringing. It's someone from the code enforcement team who needs to check my ADU to make sure I did not lie in my exemption application. A very nice gentleman, might I say. It would be nice if we were told in advance to make sure someone is home (I had no idea an inspector would come), but I am home, I have nothing to hide, we take a look at the ADU, all goes well, the inspector leaves, and in a few days, I get a letter informing me that my application has been approved.

Next week, the county will pick up my new collection bins, adjust my billing for the waste collection services (supposedly, from the date of my second application), and my life will get back to normal. The exemption is valid for 3 years, after which I will need to re-apply but for now, as far as waste collection services go, I am set.

Now, what about the sewage charges? That one took a bit longer to resolve because I could not find anything in the Sacramento county ordinance about increased sewage fees related to ADUs. The only article I found stated that there should be no additional sewage charges, but that article referred to the permit fees before the construction, not after. So, I call billing, get bounced between different customer support representatives, hear conflicting stories (one day, one representative says that the new charges were a mistake and they would be removed, I do not see any reductions on my bill, call again a couple of weeks later, talk to a different representative and hear that the charges would stay). Finally, after multiple calls, I reach someone willing to listen and find out what is going on. Well, apparently the notification letters messed up: the new charges are not for sewage, they are for storm water drainage, and according to the SacUtilities' Drainage Rates page, they are legit. There is one problem, though: they back charged me to the date when my permit was approved (September 2020) and they should've back charged me to the date when the construction was finished (May 2021):

The difference is less than $60 (it's about $6 extra per month), and I would let it go, but at this point, it's a matter of principle, so I ask why they back charged me from the permit approval date. That's because this is the only date they can see in their system. But that's not the right date: it took nine more months to finish construction. We understand, but unless we get a document showing a different date, there is nothing we can do. What kind of document? We do not know. Who should I ask? Call code enforcement. But what does code enforcement have to do with billing? Call code enforcement. But I'm sure that code enforcement will send me back to you, so what... CALL CODE ENFORCEMENT! AND STOP ARGUING WITH US! So, I call code enforcement, and guess what: they have nothing to do with it and send me back to billing. So I call billing again. Talk to a different person who actually tried to listen, and she suggests I contact Building Permit Services. It takes me a few attempts (calling, emailing), but I finally reach someone who tells me that I can submit a request for public records relevant to my ADU construction, which I do. A couple of weeks later I get the documents including the record containing the date of the final inspection. I send a copy to billing, call a few times, talk to a few people, and my back charges get eventually adjusted to the correct date.

And this, boys and girls, was the story of my extraordinary journey through the whimsical landscapes of the billing services provided by Sacramento County, where every twist and turn led me to discover the magic within the ordinary moments of life. To summarize: if you build an ADU in Sacramento County, you will need to pay a few bucks per month more for the storm water drainage (and if you do not want to be hit with back charges, do not wait, call billing right after the construction is done, and make sure they use the correct date for the fee increase). Also, be aware that the county will want to hit you with additional waste collection service charges, but assuming that your ADU is used by your own family, you can get an exemption.

P.S. And as if Sacramento County weren't done mocking me, I got this in the last bill:

Since I do not receive paper bills, there's obviously no insert, and I'm not sure where on www.sacutilities.org I can find the explanation, but I'm pretty sure that not renting out any properties, I should not be hit with any rental compliance fees (and, btw, let's assume for a moment I do, why does it list two units? does it assume that I rent both my primary house and the ADU?). And Sacramento County should be aware of this because I just had an inspection by code enforcement just a couple of weeks before.

Anyway, I call billing (need to get them on my speed dial). They tell me that I need to submit an exemption form on the SacCounty Act Online site. Since I am already registered at SacCounty.gov (that's how I access my utility bills), I try to use my SacCounty credentials at the Act Online login page, but it does not like them (I get the Invalid Username or Password error). I know that my username and password are correct, at least, for other parts of SacCounty.gov, so I think that Act Online may need a different registration. I try to register, but it tells me that my email address is already used at SacCounty.gov. I try the reset password option, but it requires me to answer a security question, and, instead of a question, I get a word that looks like my really old username (not the email address). So the Act Online site is totally not working for me.

I call billing and they tell me that if I cannot or do not want to use the form, I can for an exemption via an email directed to actonline@saccounty.gov. I send an email, do not hear form anyone in two weeks, and call billing. They tell me that the Act Online department may be busy, so I should send another email just in case. I send another email, do not hear from anyone in two weeks, and call billing. Again. Now they tell me that the only option is to fill out the online exemption form. They tell me that according to my records, that's what I was repeatedly told when I called before. I guess, I was hallucinating and may have heard voices giving me the actonline@saccounty.gov email address, but I'm too tired to argue, so I tell them that I have no luck logging in. They tell me that I do not need to, which is weird because the login page explicitly says: "With the exception of "FBN Search"; Use of this website requires REGISTRATION and LOGIN."

But the good people from billing are correct: I can fill out the RHIP Registration/Exemption Application without logging in, which I did, and now, I need to wait another 30 days for it to get reviewed. Let's see how that goes.

While talking to billing, I ask, why didn't I get a refund for the waste collection, since I had been told that I would get one from the application date. Now they're telling me that was wrong, so I will not be getting any money back.

P.P.S. It took over 2 months, but I finally got my rental exemption application approved:

P.P.P.S. This was a month ago and I expected to get a refund in the next billing cycle, but I got my next utilities bill today and guess what: no refunds. So, called billing again (I almost missed them). They asked me to forward the approval email which I did. Got another case number and a promise that I would get a refund. We will see.

P.P.P.P.S. It is beginning of July. I called Sac Utilities a couple of weeks ago to check the status, and was told that I would be getting a refund for one unit because only one unit was exempt. WTF? At this point I have a serious suspicion that someone is messing with me. How in the world would you go from never renting anything to a two-unit rental? How did my property turn into a two-unit rental? Anyway, Sac Utilities gave me the number of the rental enforcement office (916) 876-9020 and told me to call them. I did, but the call went right into the mailbox. I left a message, but at this point, I do not expect anything good to come out of there.

P.P.P.P.P.S. It's the middle of September, and after a few more phone calls, I finally got my final $16 refund. Yet, for some reason, I have a feeling that Sacramento County billing is not done with me.

NEXT: TBD (COMING SOON)

PREVIOUS: ABOVE GROUND POOLS FOR DUMMIES (PART VIII): POST POST SCRIPTUM

FIRST: INTRODUCTION