I attended the Fire Board meeting on Dec. 14 and have a few observations on that at the end of this commentary.
December 17, 2009 PSWID Meeting
Next regular PSWID Meeting: Thursday, Jan. 21, 7 p.m. at the Pine Cultural Center.
Tetra Tech Contract
The board approved the contract with Tetra Tech. The contract is a $1000 per month retainer which covers a little over 8 hours of work a month. Additional work above that, up to a maximum of $5000 per task can be approved by the General Manager. Tasks with costs greater than that must be approved by the board.
Highland Water Resources Contract
The board approved a contract with Highland Water Resources. That contract is for the services of local hydrologist, Mr. Mike Ploughe. Mr. Ploughe will be performing water related tasks as they are identified.
The same per task cost approval as the Tetra Tech contract applies.
Decision to Issue “Seasonal” Water Meters Starting Now
Board approved the issuance of “seasonal” meters to all single-family requestors starting immediately. Water would be provided from October 1st thru April 30th and would be turned off the remaining time.
There would be no connect/disconnect fee for the turn-off/turn-on. There would be no monthly fee for the period that it is turned off.
When water capacity is judged to be adequate, the meters would be converted to full time at the district’s discretion.
If the board’s plan to have additional water sources by spring pans out, then the meters should be declared full time before the May 1st turn-off.
Board Initiates Search for CPA
Board approved the effort to hire a CPA. The CPA would do the annual audits needed to get ready to go for bonds. The board would also look to the CPA to help establish financial controls and expenditure tracking.
Comment: When asked whether this CPA would go back and fix the errors in the 2008/2009 audit, the board denied that there were problems with it. It is obvious that the numbers in the audit don’t match the numbers in the Treasurer Reports that the board produced and approved. PSWID will be taking a total of over a million dollars of property tax money over the last two and the next two years. It is not too much to ask that they care enough to get the numbers right that they make public.
Water Proposals
PSWID received four proposals:
i. Mr. Brent Weeks offered to sell two wells that are currently covered by water sharing agreements
ii. Solitude Trails offered to sell their entire system for $500,000
iii. Milk Ranch Well
iv. Strawberry Hollow Well
Board will be looking at starting negotiations for both the Milk Ranch and Strawberry Hollow wells.
Purchase of Backhoe
Discussion on the need to purchase a backhoe. New runs $98,000. Discussed various used options ranging from $48,000 to $80,000. Board instructed the General Manager to publish an RFP in the paper so that they can pursue a used backhoe.
Comment: A couple of observations from the Fire Board meeting:
In general, because government agencies are monopoly providers of service it is important to question spending decisions because that is the only pressure there is to keep spending efficient. If the various viewpoints are aired and considered and a reasonable justification for the spending is provided, then it should be acceptable.
I haven’t followed this closely, but my impression is that the reason this particular issue is getting so much attention is being driven by the rift between the Fire Board and the Fuels Reduction Board.
At the meeting itself, the proposal to create three Battalion Commander positions was withdrawn. The promotions that would have resulted would have cost $22,000 and was less than the savings to the budget from not refilling the business manager position. According to the discussions, these positions were planned for next year in the Fire Board’s five year plan. The need for the positions was presented as a safety issue as it would allow for better leadership coverage during multiple call situations and coordination with other supporting fire districts.
Ms. Terry Schleizer is a member of both the water and fire boards. She gave a long speech about her feelings on the issue. It was very ironic to hear her address the accusations that the Fire Board had made these decisions in secret with the defense that the decisions were made in a public meeting, but the public didn’t attend. The prior PSWID board was accused of negotiating a secret deal with Brooke for the K2 project by Ms. Schleizer and the rest of Rim Country Water, to which that board responded that it was all done in public meetings that the public didn’t attend. It was interesting seeing her make the argument that she didn’t accept from the prior board.
The irony continued when Mr. Tom Weeks and Mr. Ron Calderon, both PSWID board members, made the argument that the $22,000 expense should not be made so that property taxes could be kept down. Both have presided over the spending of over $700,000 in tax payer money over the last two years and approved a plan to use an additional $300,000 of taxpayer money over the next two years to subsidize water rates. They also requested that the business manager position be refilled, which seemed at odds with the desire to keep expenses down.
This article is from the group Water For Pine Strawberry. Water For Pine Strawberry is a group of residents who are concerned about the communities water issues and how they can best be resolved. Visit our web site, www.WaterForPineStrawberry.com, for more information. The website for PSWID is www.pswid.org .
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