HOUSTON -- It's a program that was supposed save millions of tax dollars. But the KPRC Local 2 Troubleshooters have uncovered the city's new automated water meter system is costing millions of dollars more than anticipated and is years behind schedule. So, why are taxpayers footing the bill for manpower missteps and troubled technology?

In 1999, former Houston Mayor Lee Brown trumpeted Houston as the first city to have a completely automated water meter reading system.

The goal of the program was to save the city millions of dollars by eliminating a small army of employees who physically read the meters. Instead, radio transmitters beam the information from the meter to a computer in a van as it drives by.

The project was supposed to cost $50 million and be complete in 2003. Instead, it's now costing approximately $75 million and won't be complete until 2008.

"The failure rate is beyond anything that we should have experienced," Houston City Controller Annise Parker said.

The Troubleshooters started asking questions about this program last summer. That prompted Parker to do her own review. She found the radio transmitters on the water meters have a 47 percent failure rate.

"(That's) completely unacceptable," Parker said.

"That's something that we're not really proud of," said Wes Johnson, with the public works department.

Johnson said part of the problem is the new meters did not stand up that well to Houston's climate.

"This is cutting edge technology. Nobody has ever done this before in a city this size," he said.

The Public Works Department believes that it has turned a corner on this part of the problem. The new transmitters being installed are sealed to protect them from the elements and each transmitter now comes with two batteries.

The other part of the problem came when the city first started installing the transmitters. Initially, city employees did the work.

"A significant number of these were damaged. Some of our guys and gals didn't exactly know how to install them and damaged them during installation," Johnson said.

But that's not the end of it. There are still at least 55,000 of the transmitters that are not working, are out of warranty and the city has no idea why they won't work.

"It almost reminds you of the $700 toilet that the Air Force bought years ago. It's sort of like, 'How bad can it get for the taxpayer?'" Houston City Councilman Michael Berry said.

How bad? So far, it's cost more than $3 million just to replace bad transmitters. And the city can only hope it's finally worked out all the kinks out of the system.

Officials with the Public Works Department say another reason for delay in completing the project is Houston's growth.

City officials say there are 50,000 more water meters in the city than when the project began.