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September 20, 2011

MSWD Study Session - September 15

The audio recording of this study session of the Mission Springs Water District Board of Directors is available here. This meeting was held in the newly renovated Carl May Center due to water damage in the MSWD offices on 2nd Street.

Public Comments

Richard Cromwell talked about the Clean Energy CNG station which is on MSWD property. The site has been upgraded. A new agreement between MSWD and Clean Energy will be ready in time for the October board meeting. In the new agreement, the MSWD will be eligible for a discount rate if they ever decide to convert some of their vehicles to CNG. Mr. Cromwell added that in any case, the cost will always be less than diesel.

He said the Mary Gibson Memorial Fountain plan has been going on for nearly a year and now it's gotten entangled with a community garden suggestion. He said the community garden may be a good thing, but it doesn't need to be sandwiched in with the Gibson fountain.

Contract For Well 28 Uranium Treatment

This would be not to exceed $150,000 for another year of rental of uranium removal equipment for this well, which is used part time. This is considerably less than last year.

Vice President Bowman asked what it would cost to purchase the whole filter operation rather than renting. General Manager Wallum said that one of the savings associated with renting the equipment is that the cost of rental includes the service that removes and disposes of the resulting hazardous waste. If the district owned the equipment we'd have to have personnel certified to handle the hazardous wastes, and the district would have to haul the waste to Nevada itself. Mr. Wallum said the last time they made the comparison they concluded that owning would roughly double the cost.

Gary Brockman said that the well needs to be replaced anyway. Owning the equipment would cost as much as a brand new well after only about 2½ to 3 years. Well 42 is designed. Once it is online, Well 28 will be closed.

Belt Press Purchase for Horton WWTP

This would authorize the previously discussed 3-year lease/purchase plan for the belt press at a cost not to exceed $403,979.

Change In New Employee's Contribution To CalPers

This is only an approval in principle, which would authorize the staff to proceed to do the work on this. When that is finalized, then it will be brought back to the board for the real approval. The district has been paying its 8% plus another 7% for the employee's share, the employee pays only 1%. Under this proposal, applicable only to new employees, the district would pay 8% plus another 4% for the employee's share, and the employee would pay 4%.

President Brown said that employees may now want to consider a private retirement plan rather than paying into CalPers. Mr. Wallum said that a requirement of CalPers is 100% participation. No cafeteria plan on retirement options is permitted.

Director Wright asked if there are any plans for new hires. Mr. Wallum said that, yes, they are looking at hiring one new field employee.

ACWA Committee Appointments

Mr. Wallum suggested that the directors consider whether they wish to be nominated for any of the committees. Mr. Brown said he was considering asking for a nomination of himself for one of the committees.

Financial Master Plan

Matt McCue presented this item. He said the financial consultants had made an in-depth tour of the district. They are now getting into the district's databases and accounting systems which they will use to develop models.

John Soulliere provided a handout on the public outreach part of the master plan, specifically the citizens advisory committee. (PDF version here.)

Proposed Citizens Advisory Committee Outline

PURPOSES OF THE CITIZENS ADVISORY COMMITTEE:

Because of the important issues being evaluated, the District has decided to form a citizens committee to provide advice to the Board on its Financial Master Plan Project. The general reasons for creation of the committee is to help refine the Plan, test it with customers, and hone language and outreach methods before taking the message to the broader public.

Specifically the goals of the Committee are to:

  1. Achieve a deeper understanding of the District, its current and projected fiscal condition, progress to-date in resolving fiscal challenges, and proposed solutions.
  2. Review the Master Plan as it is underway to help refine the program by providing input to the consulting team, management and the Board as the District develops the plan.
  3. Help the District identify how best to explain the issues facing the District, progress to-date and proposed long-term solutions. This includes suggesting outreach methods, messages, and audiences, as well as how best to obtain input from the district's customer base.

Some Details About How the Committee Will Work

  1. The group will meet about four times over five months. Meetings last about 2% hours, and will be synchronized with progress of the FMP. As a result, the pattern and . scheduling of meetings may change over time.
  2. The time of meetings will about 5:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. A simple dinner, such as sandwiches or pizza and salad, along with light refreshments like coffee, water, soft drinks and cookies will be provided. The meetings will start with the dinner to provide some time for people to arrive.
  3. The meetings will be chaired by a District director appointed by the Board who will welcome the group on behalf of the District, participate in the committee, and call the group to order. Other members of the Board may attend as desired and listen to the discussion.
  4. Meetings will be planned and facilitated by Martin Rauch and John Soulliere in coordination with the District Finance manager and lead consultant of the Master Plan. Participants in the committee will be encouraged to share their views. Questions will be answered, where possible, during each meeting. Additional information will be provided between meetings and any open questions or those requiring greater research will be answered through e-mail during the time between meetings.
  5. Each participant will be provided a binder. Each meeting will include an agenda, outline, presentation and background materials, as well as a tabbed divider to help keep it all organized
  6. This is an open meeting, so members of the community may attend. However, the meetings will focus on providing information to the committee members and obtaining their input. Input from any visiting public will be limited to the beginning and end of the meetings.
  7. Meetings will begin towards the end of October. Staff will provide a firm schedule to the Board and public through the website in the next two weeks.
  8. Staff is considering various locations of the meeting.

RECRUITING APPROACHES

Each Director is asked to nominate 3 candidates who will constitute half of the committee. They are encouraged to nominate from a wide band of the community as described below. All candidates should be open-minded and able to listen to the evidence and not stick to fixed concepts about the issues.

Nominations are also accepted from the community - invited by the newsletter, press releases and the website. Paid advertisements will also be considered. Staff will nominate the balance of the candidates required to make up the total committee and to ensure a balanced cross-section of the community is represented.

Ideas for nominations:

  1. Property owners of homes
  2. Property owners of businesses (Chamber)
  3. Renters of homes
  4. Property owners of rentals units
  5. Renters of apartments
  6. People with financial expertise
  7. People with engineering expertise
  8. People with local government expertise
  9. People with wide contacts within the community
  10. People representing Spanish speaking community
  11. Long established citizens
  12. Younger citizens
  13. Representatives of HOAS
  14. Representatives of Hoteliers
  15. City representative

Public nominations will close on October 6. Availability of nominees will be confirmed by October 13.

The committee will meet about four times, beginning in late October. Dinner will be provided. The meetings will be chaired by a director. They will be open meetings. Finance Director Matt McCue will attend. John Soulliere and Martin Rauch will facilitate. The finance consultant will attend. The very first meeting will be a tour of facilities. The district's board room, even when not water-damaged, is not large, so they are looking for a larger facility for the meetings.

Claim: 64580 16th Avenue, Palm Springs

An attorney has filed a claim on behalf of a Jorge and Analia Garcia. On March 12, 2011, there was a residential fire at their home. When the firefighters arrived, they found a lock on the hydrant. The MSWD worker with the key for the lock arrived on the scene 30 to 45 minutes later. The amount of the claim is not stated, but the attorney said it is greater than $10,000. Staff recommended denial of the claim.

Now, you and I know that firefighters show up at a fire with an array of tools to overcome just about any obstacle, including bolt cutters, so this claim seems a bit silly to me.

Mr. Bowman asked how quickly the fire department cut the lock. Mr. Wallum said that the firefighters showed up on the scene with full water trucks. They put out the fire with the water they brought. Then they used the fire hydrant to refill the trucks. Mr. Wallum said that by denying the claim, it will be kicked up to the next step, which is the insurance company. The insurance company will then ask all the technical questions.

Financial Report

Mr. McCue said that since the audit process has begun, the usual lengthy financial report was not provided. In the closed fiscal year the budget anticipated a loss of $1,068,000. The actual loss was $945,000. $122,000 better than expected. The cash balance on June 30, 2011, was $6.9 million. One year earlier it was $6.5 million.

General Manager's Report

Pipes in the sprinkler system at district offices on 2nd Street burst on September 7. There was serious damage to the ceilings and walls in the basement (where the board meeting room is located). No estimate of the dollar value of the damage was available yet, but they will be looking at this as an opportunity to upgrade ADA compliance and to improve audio-visual equipment in the board meeting room [especially after seeing the renovated Carl May Center!]. Repairs to the building may not be complete in time for the November 8 election, so the polling place may have to be moved to somewhere else.

Director Wright was elected as the Special Districts Representative on LAFCO. Jim Cioffi from DWA got the Alternate seat, defeating Corky Larson from CVWD.

Sarah Quinney, owner of several rental properties in the area, complained that MSWD had failed to collect a new deposit from one of her tenants after the water had been shut off for non-payment. It's MSWD's policy to collect such deposits, but the district has been showing leniency recently to people who have difficulty making the payments. Nonetheless, this renter will now be billed for the deposit.

Candidate for director Malcolm McLean has attended a "Water 101" presentation. Candidate Doug Sherman (initiative sponsor) is scheduled for a meeting for the same purpose later this month. "Water 101" is something like (or maybe it's identical to) the presentation that Mr. Wallum gave to the Chamber of Commerce earlier this year.

A Community Health and Wellness Fair is scheduled to be held at MSWD offices October 22, but that depends on the state of repairs after the water damage.

The district has been notified that a restriction has been placed on the expected loan from the State Revolving Fund to build new sewers in AD-12 Areas F and M. The funding will be on hold until the pending initiatives are resolved. If the district wins in court, or if the initiatives are defeated at the polls, then the money floodgates will open and sewer construction can commence. If the initiatives win at the ballot, then the loans will be withdrawn. You can all send your thank-you notes to Mary Stephens, Tim Brophy, Steve Sobotta and Doug Sherman for delaying and possibly jeopardizing sewer construction and the protection of our unique aquifers.

[I spoke to General Manager Wallum after the meeting and he confirmed that the recent story in the Desert Sun appeared to be accurate, as far as he could determine. The county registrar of voters has pulled the initiatives from the November ballot because of the pending court action. If the district loses in court, then the initiatives should appear on the ballot at a later election.]

$1 million of Prop 84 money has been approved to match $1 million from AD-12 for sewer construction. This is some of the fruit of IRWMP.

The district has submitted the request to annex Jack In The Box and Ballards in the Indian/I-10 area. LAFCO will consider this in October or November.

166 customers have signed up for electronic billing. There were 2,500 walk-in customers in August and 2,200 customer phone calls. Also in August there were 67 service line leaks (all on poly lines) and 5 main line leaks (3 on poly lines, 2 on steel pipe).

There were no new water connections in July or August. Water production was lower in those months than the same months a year earlier due to cooler [and more humid] weather. OTOH, there were two new sewer hookups in August (none in July). Sewage flow was up in July, but down in August [who knows why].

Finally, John Soulliere showed us a presentation on the two new big HD screens in Carl May of the water damage at district offices. It's dramatic! The primary break occurred where a plastic line was connected to a steel pipe as part of the sprinkler system. Staff said it sounded like someone had driven through the building wall when the break occurred at 5:05 PM. The force of it propelled some of the pipes through the ceiling and walls. Photos showed one pipe extending a few feet out from the wall. It took 8 to 10 minutes to find the key to unlock the valve to shut off the water to the sprinkler system.

Comments

Mr. Bowman commended Mr. Soulliere on his presentation at the Vista MontaƱa HOA meeting recently. All five directors showed up for the meeting. He expressed the hope that a representative from the HOA will volunteer for the Citizen's Advisory Committee. Mr. Brown said that every HOA representative that wants to be on the committee should be included. Ideally, the committee would include representatives from every HOA in the district. Mr. Bowman pointed out that the HOAs generally do not talk to each other.

Filed under Desert Hot Springs | permalink | September 20, 2011 at 11:50 AM

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