HOUSTON – A Vietnam veteran and his wife say a heavy weight has been lifted off their shoulders.
Friday, June 7, the Emanuel and Cynthia Traylor learned they no longer owed a $7,439.54 Houston water bill.
“Oh my God! Thank you, Jesus,” Emanuel Traylor said. “I feel relieved right now, but I’m hot now, but I feel like going in and taking a cold shower.”
The Traylors received a $7,439.54 water bill in March. For weeks, they worked with Fifth Ward community advocate Sandra Edwards, trying to figure out why they owed so much.
“They got to their wits end,” Edwards said. “[Cynthia] said [Emanuel’s] chest is starting to hurt. She doesn’t know if he’s having a heart attack, it’s stressing him out over the bill. I said, ‘we can’t have that.’”
Edwards said she reached out to city officials trying to get someone to help but didn’t get anywhere.
Edwards reached out to KPRC 2′s Rilwan Balogun after the Traylors received a shut-off notice call on June 5.
“He was in a frantic,” Edwards said, describing Emanuel’s reaction to the call. “They called and told him, ‘If you don’t pay this $7,000, we’re cutting your water off, point blank.’”
A customary part of a journalists’ workflow includes reaching out to city officials. Balogun reached out the public works department spokesperson before meeting with the Traylors.
The spokesperson told Balogun to have the couple reach out to the department’s customer account services to get information on their account.
While with the Traylors, Balogun called the customer account services with them. Together, they learned the couple no longer had the $7,439.54 balance.
RILWAN: Okay. And then the bill previously had for 7,000 has that been adjusted? Or—
CITY OPERATOR: That’s inaccurate.
RILWAN: Okay. Thank you for your assistance.
EMANUEL TRAYLOR: So, I don’t owe $7,000?
CITY OPERATOR: No.”
“We’ve been working on this for three months, y’all come along and we got it done,” Traylor said to Balogun and photojournalist Michael Lemons.
But it remains unclear why the Traylors were told they owed $7,439.54 or that their water would be shut off June 17.
The public works spokesperson said they were investigating it.
But they added, if anyone feels their water bill isn’t accurate to reach out to Customer Account Services at 713.371.1400 or visit HoustonPublicWorks.org to set up a virtual or in-person appointment.
HOUSTON PUBLIC WORKS STATEMENT:
Houston Public Works manages 500,000 water accounts within the City of Houston and Customer Account Services is committed to providing accurate water bills to each customer. Houston Public Works encourages customers to reach out to Customer Account Services at 713.371.1400 with any questions they have about their water bill. Our team has set up virtual and in-person appointments to help improve our customer service.
The Water Bill Improvement Plan was announced on April 4, 2024. Since the announcement, Customer Account Services has brought on additional staff to help with the accelerated installation of remote reading devices (RRDs). Customers can track to see if their remote read device is working on when it’s scheduled to be replaced on a dashboard at improvewaterbills.org. The website also provides more information about the Water Bill Improvement Plan.