Page 3 of 3
December 8, 2011
Public Works Meeting
6:30 p.m. in the Village Hall
Trustees: Chairman Paul Elsen, Stan Maligranda
Guests: Dennis Noegel, Chad Insko, Todd Weegens, and Frank Eubank
The properly posted meeting was called to order at 6:30 p.m.
Paul Elsen began taking minutes and President Eubank was asked to take the minutes of the meeting.
1) Meeting minutes— Stan made a motion to approve the Minutes of November 15, 2011. The motion was seconded by Paul Elsen. Motion carried on a voice vote. Dennis Noegel questioned whether the minutes from the posted meeting of December 5, 2011, should also be approved, but the minutes had not yet been prepared and forwarded by Attorney Mary Gaziano. These minutes will be reviewed for the next Public Works Committee meeting.
2) Public comment—None
3) Clear Water Inspections – Todd Weegens provided attendees with handout. 1192 sewer accounts were initially provided to Fehr-Graham to inspect. 1129 were inspected. RRWRD provided an additional 27 sewer accounts likely were vacant, water turned off, or foreclosure. Total sewer accounts 1219. Results in about 93% users inspected. Final QAQC will need to be done by Fehr-Graham. 146 failures or 13% of those inspected. 90 sewer accounts not inspected. $60,200 not to exceed was bid by Fehr-Graham to initially inspect 1204 users. RRWRD quoted $60 per inspection. If we have RRWRD do the remaining inspections, they have set out a not to exceed amount of $52,037 for the remaining initial inspections, re-inspections of failed connections, smoke testing in target area, and smoke testing in Westfield Basin area. RRWRD would charge $13,560.00 for inspections and re-inspections. Fehr-Graham would charge approximately $4,500.00 for remaining initial inspections and $8,745 for re-inspections and would total $13,245. Recommended by committee to have RRWRD perform the rest of the inspections and re-inspections. Recommend that Fehr-Graham stops any further inspections and RRWRD will do the rest under the IGA.
4) RRWRD IGA – Stan raised a concern that maybe the Village may need to modify its ordinance to allow for shutting-off of water if RRWRD tells the Village that a customer has not paid its bill or is in violation of clear water ordinance. Need to review our current ordinance(s) to see the exact language and authority to turn off water in those scenarios.
We know our fixed top dollar is guaranteed at $11,400,000 if we have to pay on every item the 10% overage charge. $10,600,000 is the top cost to the Village without any overages. 2.5% is the top amount that IEPA would charge for loans. $636,000 per year to borrow $10,000,000 at 2.5% amortized over 20 years. $486,000 would be what the Village would have to come up with per year to pay off the loan, if we get $150,000 per year from extra 1% sales tax revenue.
Paul suggests that we bill the capital charge for the sewer on a monthly rate, so the Village sewer users don’t have a big quarterly bill. Village will likely change its water reading to go from first of month to end of month.
Dana Carroll of RRWRD updated Exhibit D to zero out four of the first five categories, but increase additional areas for costs that will not be incurred until much later, allowing us time to find out about the loan determination.
We need to let the media know about the IGA. RRWRD will likely have a press release once this agreement is passed by both boards and the sewer is turned over to RRWRD.
Village will get a percentage of basin (recapture) fees to help pay back some of these costs. We need to find out if the modification of Exhibit D changes the Village’s percentage of basin fees for those areas that were 15.35% and now are 0.00%.
RRWRD has requested the Village to provide to the IEPA ASAP (as soon as possible) a Notice of Transfer FPA Amendment. We also need to get the deed transferred for the McDonald’s lift station from First Rockford Group to RRWRD.
We need to set a date for turn-off of electricity, phone, gas, etc. at date of conveyance to RRWRD.
Village would be looking at minimum of $12,000,000 if it decided to upgrade waste water treatment plant, plus pay for upgrade of sewer lines and infrastructure, and cost of utilities to operate plant. Committee believes it is a much cheaper alternative to have RRWRD take over our sewer plant and operations, than for the Village to continue treating its own sewage.
5) Open action items
a. Clayton Court - President Eubank to notify Clayton Court owner of code violation for water softener back-flush not being metered. No action.
Kaney/Kiefer Cul-de-sac Agreement – nothing new.
6) Design Engineer Grant— No new word on it.
7) 2011 CDAP Sewer Lining Grant—Village should receive grant packet soon and will need to contact Fehr-Graham. Will need to have public hearing.
8) MS4 Implementation Status—Bill from Fehr-Graham will come and do what he can on his own tomorrow (Friday, December 9, 2011). Ben Ackert from Fehr-Graham will come back and schedule training with Village employees.
9) UDO— Community Development continues to work on reviewing the Unified Development Ordinance with Todd Weegens, Mary Gaziano, President Eubank and necessary employees and trustees. Some articles have had final review – mainly Articles 1, 2, and 3. Also, reviewed about 6 other articles so far with various stages of review.
10) Equipment— nothing to add
11) Budget 2012 – We expect to receive the CDAP grant money in the amount of $350,000 and we will set aside an additional amount of $120,000 for our required match for the program.
If we sign the IGA with RRWRD, committee believes the money in the budget should be enough to pay any expenses in the 2012 budget year. We have $1,650,000 in general fund and $1,000,000 in O & M as of November 30, 2011. According to our audit, we need to keep a minimum of 25% of our operating costs in savings for general and O & M. We need to include a transfer line item in the 2012 budget to be able to set aside a large amount to pay towards costs that may come up with RRWRD. It was suggested and recommended that we put in $1,000,000 budget of sewer upgrade and transfer in $500,000 in case we need to pay them now.
12) Islands – nothing new.
13) Employee input—Village should be receiving about 5 to 6 semi loads of salt. Hoping to get shed up soon - supposedly, next week. We have to order a minimum amount of salt, approximately 250 to 300 tons of salt, to get a good deal from the State. About 80% of what you ask for is the minimum that you have to purchase. A semi-load delivers approximately 22 to 23 tons per load.
Department got a good start on replacement of signs as required by federal reflectivity standards.
Meeting on December 19 with Village staff/employees and RRWRD staff at RRWRD facility to discuss sewer billing and other issues.
Frinks had tallied a lot of jobs and invoiced us once, instead of an invoice with each service. There is not any additional charge, but the main concern was that the individual trips would have been under the $1,000 ceiling for supervisor/director to approve the expenditure.
14) New items— Nothing
15) Executive Session- none
STAN MALIGRANDA made a motion to adjourn at 8:36 pm. The motion was seconded by PAUL ELSEN Motion carried.
Respectfully Submitted,
Franklin J. Eubank, Jr., Village President