MINUTES OF MEETING
CORAL
SPRINGS IMPROVEMENT DISTRICT
A regular meeting of the Board of
Supervisors of the Coral Springs Improvement District was held on Monday, April
18, 2011 at 3:07 p.m. at the District Office, 10300 NW 11th Manor,
Present and constituting a quorum were:
Robert Fennell President
Sharon Zich Vice President
Glenn Hanks Secretary
Also present were:
Kenneth Cassel District
Manager
Dennis Lyles District Counsel
Jane Early District Engineer
Dan Daly Director of Operations
Kay Woodward District Accountant
David Macintosh Wastewater
Department
Ed Stover Water Department
Randy Frederick Drainage
Supervisor
Steve Siegfried Field
Manager
Carl Easton CH2M Hill
Michael Bone Lanzo Construction
Krista Smith Resident
FIRST ORDER OF BUSINESS Roll Call
Mr. Cassel called
the meeting to order and called the roll.
SECOND ORDER OF BUSINESS Approval of the Minutes of the March 21, 2011 Meeting
Mr. Hanks stated on the bottom of page 19, instead
of “a lot of board chemical pipe” it should be ‘bore’. One page 14, the third paragraph, I think I
was talking to Ms. Early when I said, “I am not just looking to nail it to you
guys.” It is ‘nail’ and not ‘mail’.
On
MOTION by Mr. Hanks seconded by Ms. Zich with all in favor the minutes of the
March 28, 2011 were approved as amended.
THIRD ORDER OF BUSINESS Supervisors’ Requests and Audience Comments
Mr.
Fennell stated let us get to our report on construction.
Mr. Bone stated I am sorry I did not
make last months meeting. We got the
interior demolished on Plant F as far as the concrete grout. We have a good part of the welds replaced. We have the submittals coming in for the
grout replacement. I have been reviewing
the grout topping design mix. That
should be available in approximately a week.
It should be ready for painting in two weeks. The radiographs we have taken on the wall
replacement have looked good.
Mr. Fennell asked how did you handle
the welds?
Mr. Bone responded HMT is a tank
rebuilding and re-welding company out of
We redid the x-rays of the
horizontal welds on more than half the tank ourselves. Between our x-rays and the ones the District
had, there were six spots totaling no more than five to six feet that needed to
be replaced. I cannot tell you if those
have been started or done. We should be
ready to go maybe a month from today.
Then we will be able to put the grout back in.
Mr. Hanks asked so when you say
“ready to go” do you mean the shell?
Mr. Bone responded yes. We are still looking at some time in late
June. We are having the air header
designed and built outside. We released
the drawings three or four weeks ago. We
have some other testing we are doing out there.
Lanzo is footing the bill for all of this. If we have to go against Intrastate’s bonding
company, we will have to have a position of our own. Their contention is the old air header is
similar to the new air header and you have never had any trouble with it. We are going to TV some of the joints and
x-ray them. We have to have a good
position on this. It will be probably
two months before we get the air header.
We will submit that and it will take about ten days to get. It should be ready to go up by the end of
June.
We had some concerns about the other
plant with it being hot and having power in there. I just got off the phone with our electrical
sub-contractor. They are going to be
ready in two to three weeks to petition the City of
Mr. Hanks asked are you looking to
have power in the building in the middle of May?
Mr. Bone responded a month from
today. They said three weeks to a
month.
Mr. Fennell asked how is the roof?
Mr. Bone responded they are putting
up the metal on the backside. There is
25% area up there that is still a concern to the building department. We initially put the peel and stick on
there. We had a rain event that caused
some non-adhering of the material. Some
of the board underneath it got wet. We
had to get Beamo out here to take a look at it.
We had to get assurances from them that it was a warranty issue and
there was no problem. That took place
last week. The problem arose that the 30
on the NOA from Miami Dade, 30 days from when it is up it is supposed to be
covered. We could not cover it and the
30 days lapsed. The City of
Ms. Zich asked when are we going to
have a plant that is usable?
Mr. Bone responded we are talking
about start up in May. We are going to
have power to start the testing.
Mr. Cassel stated I guess Ms. Zich’s
question is with regard to when substantial completions are projected.
Mr. Bone stated I was thinking the
last time we were here that it was sometime in late June or early July.
Mr. Fennell stated if you start
testing in May, I bet it is at least two months worth of testing.
Mr. Hanks stated which puts you in
July.
Mr. Fennell stated that is if
testing goes right.
Mr. Bone stated the problems I have
seen with testing in the past have to do with programming and wiring. With the effort CH2M Hill is putting into the
programming it will hopefully cut some of the time out of it. We will not know until it is fired up. You were gracious enough to reduce the
retainage to five percent on the water plant.
You withheld the five percent on the wastewater plant. I believe there was a second motion to help
us out since we were paying for all of it to reduce the retainage on the
wastewater plant side.
Mr. Hanks asked did we split that up
into two components? You originally
requested five percent covering both of those.
We were not comfortable because of the issues on Plant F. We were not comfortable reducing the
retainage on that; however, we agreed to reduce the retainage on the nano plant.
Mr. Cassel stated the nano went to
five percent.
Mr. Hanks stated we also provided
some kind of relief or direction to management to expeditiously work with them.
Mr. Cassel stated on utilizing the
retainage to help pay for the remaining work being done on Plant F.
Mr. Bone stated this month there is
$276,000 or $278,000 worth of retainage left on Plant F; plus there is some
schedule of value items left to do. We
have gotten about $125,000 worth of work done this month. We would like to be able to work with Mr.
Cassel to reduce a portion of the retainage on Plant F on that $125,000 worth
of repairs.
Mr. Hanks asked District engineer or
manager, have you heard of this request before now?
Mr. Cassel responded Mr. Bone sent
it to me earlier today to look at it as to what we are doing. It is based upon the conversation at the
meeting where we would utilize that to start paying, not that we are going to
reduce it, but we are going to use the retainage to start paying for some of
these things as they came in a piece at a time.
This would be the first piece that would be presented to us. I guess it would require authorization to the
manager to utilize $125,000 of the retainage to pay this piece of the work.
Mr. Hanks asked counselor, do you
have any input?
Mr. Lyles responded that is
consistent with my notes at the time. I
think what the manager has just recited is consistent with the authority you
gave during the meeting of February 28, 2011 regarding retainage that would
otherwise be held on Plant F.
Mr. Hanks asked engineers, have you
had an opportunity to establish any opinion on this?
Mr. Easton responded I have not.
Mr. Cassel stated I will work
through the actual amount with Mr. Easton because it will be coming in as part
of the pay request. We will work out the
details within the next couple of days as to the exact amount.
Ms. Zich asked how much retainage
are we going to have left in the end with Plant F? I am concerned with Plant F. I want to make sure it is up and working.
Mr. Bone responded there is $278,000
worth of retainage in there now. We will
have about $150,000 remaining after this
month. There is a remaining schedule of
value amounts that add up to a total, including the retainage, of about $406,000.
Mr. Cassel stated there is $407,000
left on the total contract of Plant F.
The total contract remaining with retainage is $407,000. They are asking for approximately $125,000 of
that at this point to continue moving forward and paying the people actually
doing the repairs.
Ms. Zich asked are you comfortable
with that Mr. Cassel?
Mr. Cassel responded I think with
where we are at in the project and how it is proceeding now, they are trying diligently
to get it closed up properly, I would be comfortable with continuing down this
path the way we are at this time.
Mr. Hanks stated I would say we can
go that route provided we have the engineer’s consent or agreement as well.
Mr. Cassel stated I am not going to
jump too far without Mr. Easton being there with me.
Ms. Zich asked Mr. Easton, are you
comfortable with that?
Mr. Hanks asked are you comfortable
with that mechanism to go forward with the pay request? I know you just said you did not have the
chance to review this particular request.
Mr. Easton responded I will
cautiously say yes.
Ms. Zich stated that is where we are
all at. We are cautious.
Mr. Easton stated I am not totally
opposed.
Mr. Hanks stated Mr. Bone; we want
to work with you on this.
Mr. Bone stated I would be happy to
come in here each month and request that portion of work I think is due and
have you approve it each time and let me know your feelings on how comfortable
you are or are not.
Mr. Fennell asked will you handle
this Mr. Cassel?
Mr. Cassel responded yes.
FOURTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Consideration of Request for Appeal of Staff Denial of
Fence on District Property
Ms. Smith stated I live at
Mr. Cassel responded yes. We have a copy of your email.
Mr. Smith stated we have three dogs
and trying to contain them within my property is very challenging with my one
year old Golden Retriever, who really goes to the canals and swimming pools. I also have other dogs constantly coming onto
my property. I have a 12 year old Jack
Russell who tends to be territorial. A
couple days out of the week the little dog from three houses down comes running
in and a little girl comes chasing behind the dog. I am always out there with them because I am
afraid she is going to go pick up her dog and the two little dogs are going to
get into a fight. I have a substantial
amount of property from my enclosure to the canal. We measured it. It is 50 feet from the door of the screen
enclosure to the canals. I apparently
only own about 14 or 15 feet of it.
Mr. Fennell asked is that our
right-of-way or do we actually own the canal?
Mr. Frederick responded we own that
property.
Ms. Smith stated the contractor I was
working with said if there was anyway we could put in a large gate for you
guys, in case you ever needed access to the property. I would certainly not be opposed to
that. It is really so hard for me with
the dogs and it is so hard for me to keep the other dogs out of there.
Mr. Fennell asked why not just fence
your property up to your property line?
Ms. Smith responded because that
would be kind of silly. That is the
property line. If I fenced it, that is
what it would look like.
Mr. Fennell stated the problem is
this is not just a right-of-way. This is
actually owned in common by the people of the District. You would be fencing in public land.
Ms. Smith asked how did my neighbors
put their fences in. Everyone on my side
of the canal that has dogs have fences.
I know some of them went up prior to Hurricane Wilma, but a lot of them
went up within the past year.
Mr. Frederick stated there is one of her neighbors that does have a fence almost all of the way down
to the canal. I checked our records and
we do not have anything on file saying we approved this fence. I called the city permit department. They have given them a permit for a fence,
but not the fence installed. They had a
permit to put a fence up within their property line on their side of the
house. They exceeded that and went into
our property, almost to the canal, across the back and up the other side. I brought it to their attention. They were going to send code enforcement out
to take care of it.
Ms. Zich stated we feel badly about
this because we understand your position, but there are so many people in this
District who live on canals and everyone would want to fence them out.
Mr. Fennell stated the misconception
is that somehow you paid for that property.
You did not. The property is
actually owned by everyone in the District.
Everybody in the District pays the same amount for the canals. You do not pay anything more to the District
for living on the canal. It is public
land and I cannot see fencing in public land for private use.
Ms. Smith asked even if I put an
eight foot gate?
Mr. Fennell responded no. You would essentially be taking land from the
public.
Mr. Hanks stated if this was a
situation where your pool deck encroached a foot into the right-of-way and you
needed to put a fence around it for security, that would be a situation where
we might consider it.
Mr. Fennell stated there are
easements, where we have the right to come in.
This does not only have a right-of-way, but the land is owned by the public. It is public land and we do not want anyone
fencing in public land.
Mr. Hanks stated I can appreciate
the situation that you are in. My house
is on the C-14 canal. We have beautiful
wide open space, but SFWMD looks at us and says, “No, to the property line.” Our position has always been with everyone
who comes before us requesting to encroach onto the right-of-way, it is
no. I think you do have a solution
here. It may not be the most
aesthetically pleasing to you, but it will provide you with a situation where
you can close your yard and keep the neighborhood dogs out and keep your dogs
in.
Ms. Smith asked what is that
solution?
Mr. Hanks responded running it along
the rear property line, which it looks like in this survey is somewhere around
14 or 15 feet from the back of your house.
In that situation if you are on your own property, you do not have to
come to use for approval. That would
just be a building permit with the City of
Ms. Smith asked I cannot go any
farther?
Mr. Hanks responded no.
Ms. Smith asked what about all the
other people that live on the canal?
Mr. Hanks responded they have done
it incorrectly and what we have been doing is when we notice a situation where
someone has built on an easement or right-of-way that we need reserved for
drainage purposes, we go after them and ask them to remove it. We had several instances where we forced them
to move their stuff out of the right-of-way.
It is not a situation where we could make an exception because we have
enforced our rules in the past. We would
not be enforcing our rules evenly.
Mr. Fennell asked does the Board
concur with the denial of the fence?
Mr. Hanks asked do we need a motion
on this?
Mr. Lyles responded for the record. You had an appeal.
On MOTION by Mr. Hanks seconded by Mr.
Fennell with all in favor the appeal was denied.
FIFTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Distribution of the Proposed General Fund Budget
for Fiscal Year 2012 and Consideration of Resolution 2011-2 Approving the
Budget and Setting the Public Hearing
Ms.
Zich stated Mr. Daly, Special Consulting
Services, we budgeted $30,000 last year.
We did not use anything in fiscal year 2010 or fiscal year 2011 and now
we are budgeting $50,000.
Mr. Daly stated we talked about this
a month ago or the month before. Mr.
Fennell brought up the fact that we may have some battles ahead of us.
Mr. Fennell stated this is in case
we need to hire people who are going to help us influence laws. When you need the money, which will be around
this time next year, it needs to be in the budget in order to do it.
Ms. Zich stated okay.
Mr. Lyles stated it will actually be
at the end of the summer and leading up into the local delegation public
hearings, which are in late September, early October, which gets you in line
for legislative changes that will be acted upon in March or April.
Mr. Fennell stated we were also
thinking of reintroducing that one bill we had a couple of years ago.
Ms. Zich stated okay. Now I know exactly what that is for.
Mr. Hanks stated it seems like we
are basically the same as we were last year with the exception of a carry
forward balance of $566,800.
Ms. Woodward stated the reason we
put that in there is because this grant money we will be partaking of and this
drainage project we have scheduled going forward, our portion of the payments
on that $2.7 Million project is roughly $650,000. Not knowing exactly how much of the project
might occur at the end of the current fiscal year, I basically said we are
going to use some of the designated funds we accumulated previously and carry
them forward.
Mr. Fennell stated one of the things
I was talking about prior to the meeting was the need to spruce up the canals
in some ways. There are dead-end places
where junk has grown into the bottom. We
have culverts where the dirt is starting to come up around the inputs and
outputs of those things. We need to be
cutting down trees wherever we can on our own property. Do we have enough money here to cover this?
Ms. Woodward asked how much money
are you talking about?
Mr. Fennell responded I am thinking
$300,000 to $400,000.
Ms. Woodward stated yes. If you look at the last page of the actual
computations in the budget, under the section titled Reserves, you will notice we have reserves for designated projects
and emergencies in the amount of $300,000.
This happens to be the amount we are funding every year. You will be in a position to use that. We also have money left over from prior
years. We fund it every year not knowing
what projects you will need.
Mr. Fennell stated we need to get
these canals in better shape. Maybe part
of this is doing an inspection of the canals to figure out what we need to
do.
Ms. Zich stated Mr. Frederick; you
know more about these canals than any of us.
How many places that you know of are in dire need of help?
Mr. Frederick responded on a
situation like that we only have a few areas that are dead end canals.
Ms. Zich asked where is this
located?
Mr. Frederick responded that is in
Ramblewood.
Mr. Cassel stated one of the items
all of the districts fight is if a branch falls off someone’s tree, they kick
it into the canal instead of hauling it away.
It then becomes our problem and our issue. That is part of his ongoing trash pick up. He has guys not only spraying, but when they
are going down the canals they are loading the boat with trash on a consistent
basis. In some places it does get ahead of us and we
will need to do a concentrated effort on it.
It is one of the ongoing issues you have to deal with.
Mr. Fennell asked do you think we
have sufficient funds in here to handle this?
Mr. Cassel responded I think so.
Mr. Frederick stated a lot of these
areas that have culverts are going to be coming up.
Mr. Daly stated that is coming out
of this year’s budget.
Mr. Frederick stated we will be
presenting the bid tabulation sheet next month for culvert cleaning.
Ms. Zich asked Ms. Woodward, do you
want to discuss the proposed budget with regard to the different levels of
assessments?
Ms. Woodward responded we went
through and made a secondary computation as to what would be involved in a
reduction of total expenses in order to reduce the individual assessments by
$10 per unit or by $20 per unit. Hopefully
everyone received that today. In order
for each unit to pay $10 less in assessments it would require us to budget
$117,300 less in operating expenses. In
order to reduce an assessment by $20 it would require roughly $235,000
reduction in expenses. One of the
reasons I am bringing this up is because several years ago we had initially
bumped up our O&M assessments because we wanted to build into our reserves
for expenses we were going to have to incur for general maintenance. I did not want us to consider this a
permanent bump without giving the Board an opportunity to go back and address
it to make sure you are still comfortable with the $186 per unit or if you
wanted to drop it back in anyway.
Ms. Zich stated I have a problem
with dropping it back. You know we keep
trying to build up in case there is a hurricane. This is where all of the money would be.
Mr. Hanks asked where do our
reserves stand right now?
Ms. Zich responded they are in good
shape.
Ms. Woodward stated they are in very
good shape.
Mr. Fennell stated I am thinking of
cutting down on taxes next year, but this year I want us to clean out the
canals, get them in good shape, get the trees cut down and then at that point
when I can say the canals are in really good shape we can lower the expenses.
Mr. Hanks stated once we get into to
it we can see where we are really falling on that amount.
Mr. Fennell stated I have a bad
feeling some of the older canals near Ramblewood area half filled in. I know some people who live in that area and during
the dry season some of them can almost walk across the canal without getting
their feet wet. I am starting to think
there are some issues with flow. That is
the same area I am afraid of flooding.
The canals are almost 40 years old in that area.
Ms. Early stated I have a map in my
office that has all of the depths and elevations.
Mr. Fennell stated I do not want to
raise taxes. We should keep them the
same. I think it is time we put them in
good shape while we have the financial means to do it.
Ms. Early stated I can run a copy of
that month and we can look. I do not
think it was the entire District, but we might want to take a look at the other
canals and do the same thing.
Mr. Fennell asked is there anything
else we should be looking at from a flood standpoint?
Ms. Early responded typically the
engineer’s reports always say you should survey the canals once every five
years in case there is something building up.
I know Mr. Frederick has the culverts checked.
Ms. Zich stated these are not
natural canals. They could be silting up
and we do not know.
Ms. Early stated I will bring in a
copy of that map and we can look at it.
Ms. Zich asked how long ago was that
map done?
Ms. Early responded I think it was
ten years ago. I am just guessing, but I
know we have a map showing the depths of the canals.
Mr. Fennell stated my feeling is we
recovered from the disaster of the hurricane.
We are in fair shape. We have taken
care of the pumps. Now we have to make
sure the canals are still going to be there for the next 20 to 30 years.
On MOTION by Mr. Hanks seconded by Ms.
Zich with all in favor Resolution
SIXTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Consideration of Modification to Permit 1984-23
for the Coral Springs Auto Mall
Ms.
Early stated they are just making some changes to their parking. It will actually decrease the
impervious. We did not have to do any
drainage calculations based on what they were submitting.
Mr. Hanks asked how are they doing
with the maintenance of their shrubs and trees along the right-of-way?
Mr. Frederick responded they are
keeping it up pretty good. If we have a
problem, we call code enforcement and they get on them.
Mr. Fennell asked was this needed?
Ms. Early responded yes. Anytime they do anything.
Ms. Zich stated so they want to take
out part of their parking lot and rework it.
Mr. Hanks stated they have parking
facing one way. They want to flip it
over and swap the position of the median with the parking.
Ms. Early stated that is right. We like them to always come in when they are
doing anything.
On MOTION by Mr. Hanks seconded by Mr.
Fennell with all in favor modifications to Permit 1984-23 were approved.
SEVENTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Consideration of Work Authorization 60
Ms.
Zich stated this is the final version that has been approved by FEMA.
Mr. Hanks asked where do you have in
here the parts I wanted; construction dewatering?
Ms. Early responded I put in there
anything regarding permitting. If you
get the permit, it is fine. It will be
part of the SFWMD permit anyway.
Mr. Hanks stated I want to make sure
that is something that will be covered.
The last thing we want to do is get out there and bid construction, it does
not show up on the bid documents and then we get a huge surprise later on where
they cannot build it because it cannot be dewatered.
Ms. Early stated that will be
discussed when we meet with the SFWMD.
Mr. Hanks stated dewatering plan is
something that is going to be on there; whether or not SFWMD wants it. We want it as a Board.
Ms. Early stated okay. It will be done.
Mr. Lyles asked does anyone want to
indicate if the Board is in favor of approving this work authorization, as part
of the motion, indicate it is contingent upon the inclusion of the dewatering
plan.
On MOTION by Mr. Hanks seconded by Mr.
Fennell with all in favor Work Authorization 60 was approved contingent upon it
including the dewatering plan.
Mr. Fennell stated Mr. Cassel, it
would be a good thing to talk to our fellow city managers and maybe get a hold
of the Mayor. He knows about this. At one time I told him we were going to do
something about interconnections. Let
him know we are doing it and give him a heads up that we are fulfilling our
word so we do not have any sudden surprises.
Mr. Cassel stated okay.
Ms. Early stated we are going to
meet with them as well.
Mr. Fennell stated I want the
engineering aspect, but I think there is another aspect that needs to be done.
EIGHTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Consideration of Surveying Expense for Culvert
Project
Mr. Hanks asked what is going on
with the Paul E. Brewer & Associates, Inc. work authorization? Is this not done?
Mr. Cassel responded technically it
is not completed yet because we had to have the work authorization approved by
FEMA and by the Board in order to process it properly.
Ms. Early stated FEMA has approved
Mr. Brewer’s proposal.
Mr. Fennell stated the money is
actually coming from FEMA and not from the county.
Ms. Early stated it is not the
county.
Mr. Fennell stated but somehow they
were in the approval cycle.
Mr. Cassel stated no. The FEMA grant comes through the state office
for direction. We applied to FEMA for
the grant, but it is administered by the State Emergency Management to make
sure whoever the applicant is complies with all of the parameters and the
processes. It flows from FEMA, to the
state to the contracting entity. We work
through the state to make sure everything is approved by them prior to going
into the work that is going to be specified.
Mr. Hanks asked how do you feel
about this proposal? Do you recommend
it?
Mr. Cassel responded we are good
with it.
On MOTION by Mr. Hanks seconded by Ms.
Zich with all in favor the proposal dated April 6, 2011 from Paul E. Brewer
& Associates, Inc for the route survey for proposed drainage pipe at
NINTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Staff Reports
A. Manager
Mr. Daly stated thank you very much
gentlemen for appearing last month at the luncheon meeting we had here with
regard to data flow systems. We are
actively pursuing at no charge to the District what they may or may not be able
to do for us. Mr. Siegfried will appear
at all of our meetings from now on in the field. He met with
Mr. Cassel stated the backwards
compatibility of their system is what makes it able to do that, which is from
our perspective something we definitely consider an advantage instead of
getting a system that in ten years is obsolete and you have to go back and do
everything in the field.
Mr. Fennell asked do they have that
new Symphony System?
Mr. Siegfried responded no they do
not. I talked to the man from
Mr. Daly stated he invited us to go
visit with Pompano,
Mr. Fennell stated I would like to
see someone using this Symphony System.
That is what sold me. We are
talking about remote control systems for the different lift stations for the
wastewater. Right now each of them come
on and off according to their own little schedule; whatever the water is at
that level. It turns out there is this
new program where you can monitor each one of these and you can have the flow
coordinated to coming back. If all of
the lift stations come on at the same time, they put a lot of backpressure and they are all trying to go
into the same pipe. You can have easier
flow back into the plant.
Mr. Hanks stated imagine trying to
blow up a brand new balloon. That is
just a lift station working against the background pressure. Now imagine trying to blow up a balloon with
somebody sitting on it. That is what
happens when you have multiple lift stations pumping at the same time.
Mr. Cassel stated part of the issue
is as we looked at our wastewater flows, a lot of our pumps were running tons
of hours, burning up tons of electricity, but the effectiveness of the actual
pump, pumping wastewater, was diminished.
We are trying to make sure when the pump kicks on, we make the most
efficiency of that pump as we go down the line.
It may be better to shut off and not have Pump 6 running while Pumps 2,
3 and 5 are going; once Pumps 3 and 5 drop off, you kick Pump 6 back on.
Ms. Zich stated I had no idea that
was a problem.
Mr. Daly stated the electric bill is
over $1,000 every month for the one lift station while the others are
$100. There is something obviously going
on there. Looking at it this way we will
have data coming in minute by minute. We
will put a gage at each of the lift stations which will show the
infiltration. We will be able to analyze
the data to see how to manage our system.
Mr. Cassel stated with the
information we gain from the telemetry and from potentially the Symphony System
we will be able to target those areas
where we get the biggest bang for our buck going after infiltration. We do not want to line pipes where we are
going to get a $50 return. We want the
return where we are going to get a $5,000 return if we are going to spend the
money lining pipes or reworking pipes.
We want to make the maximum efficiency.
With the technology and information we will be receiving we will be able
to target those areas.
Mr. Fennell asked is there any other
competition out there? The concept of
going from random occurring systems to actually being able to control and plan
the system will be a step up.
Ms. Zich asked what does this cost?
Mr. Daly responded we are not at the
level of discussing costs because I told him we did not have any money.
Mr. Fennell stated I think the cost
will be approximately $500,000.
Ms. Zich stated that is what I am
wondering and if it will be worth it.
Mr. Daly stated it will definitely
be worth it.
Mr. Hanks stated you figure that one
lift station, if you drop it from $1,000 to $100; you are looking at over
$300,000 in one year on that one lift station.
Ms. Zich asked is it $1,000 a day?
Mr. Daly responded no, but you have
to remember we process that water with all of the chemicals and electricity
here that comes in through infiltration.
We can spend $250,000 to $300,000 just in engineering costs to find out
where we have a problem. The point is
that when you find out, you then have to fix it.
Mr. Cassel stated you still need to
monitor it to make sure it is after the fact.
Mr. Hanks stated find out if there
is another competing system and then we can consider how much we can be saving.
Mr. Daly stated Mr. Fennell said
$500,000. That is for doing all 41
stations. I think we need to take baby
steps and get our biggest bang for our buck with Symphony before we make this
huge investment.
Mr. Fennell stated the big deal for
me is we can turn things on and off. This
allows you to look at the entire system and be able to plant the drainage. That would mean a lot to us. This would have been a good alternative to
the surge tank.
Mr. Cassel stated you still need a
surge tank in the system. The long term
impact with the technology, the way it comes back in, and the fact you know
exactly when your pumps are running, we know that right now when we go out we
check a pump, we do not know if it has been off for two hours or five hours if
it trips out on a breaker until the next time staff does their rounds, which is
the next day, so with the system in place if the first one trips out, the
second one kicks in. It sends an alarm
that comes back here so we know that pump went out. We can go out and check it. If it is an emergency type situation, we can
get someone out there immediately versus waiting several hours until somebody
calls, if they call, when the light is going off and the wastewater is flowing
over into the streets. It also helps us
manage potential sanitary sewer overflows within the system.
Mr. Fennell stated the other thing I
would like to have us make sure is there is a solar backup to this.
Mr. Cassel stated there is a battery
backup.
Mr. Fennell stated this can also
help us in a power outage situation. We have
all of these generators to operate the lift stations, but we have to know which
one to go to. If you have a solar backup
system, it will tell you what the status of that pump system is. You would not be able to turn anything on,
but you can read if you have to go to station 32 as opposed to 10. The only other thing is our outfall, our
pumps at the canals.
Mr. Daly stated we talked to this
gentleman about that. He can pretty much
monitor anything.
Mr. Fennell stated we can actually
put controls. Right now you have to
physically turn the pumps on.
Mr. Cassel stated you still would
want someone out there to physically turn them on and make sure you come up to
your operating temperatures. You do not
just want pumps to fire up and run. You
want someone to double check them and make sure they are running at their
point. You want to be able to monitor
them after they are up and running.
Mr. Fennell stated I am thinking we
should put monitors out there in those things to.
Mr. Daly stated it is a web based
program.
Mr. Fennell stated in rain
situations you can figure out if canal 25 is getting high and we have to send
someone out to clean out debris.
·
Monthly Water
& Sewer Chart
·
Utility Billing
Work Orders
These items are for informational purposes
only.
B.
Attorney
There being no
report, the next item followed.
C.
Engineer
·
Monthly Aerial
Photographs
·
Project Status
Report
Ms. Zich stated the aerial photographs are
nice, but this is probably the last month we will need them because we are not
going to be able to see anything else inside now.
Mr. Daly stated there is a lot
inside, but there is still some stuff going on outside. In addition there will be the landscaping
that will have to be taken care of. We
can call up and have them do one more month.
Mr. Cassel stated we can do every
other month.
Mr. Daly stated I think it is only
$88, which is not too bad. This way we
have a month by month view.
Ms. Zich stated for $88 keep
going. I did not know it was that
inexpensive.
Mr. Fennell stated the only other
thing that was handed to me was an analysis of water supply potential for area
B; something that was done by CH2M Hill in 1996. It is a whole big buffer area all the way
down the side of the urban area.
Basically it is used as an area to put in wastewater after we clean it
up. They did a complete report of this a
long time ago. I would think the major
problem that was there was they were talking about getting down to maybe 30
parts per billion phosphorus as opposed to the 10 parts per billion required
for the Everglades. It actually is a
very viable way of doing what we should be doing, which from an environmental
standpoint we should be returning our products back to the land. Right now we are trying to find someplace to
ship them off shore and underneath the sea.
It is not a good environmental thing we are doing. We need to be doing more than this.
I did go down to Southeast Dade,
which is in Dade County. They have these
huge processing plants. The one I
visited served a half million people.
They are about ten times larger than we are. They have 19 injection wells. The problem is some of their injection wells
are not doing too well. The monitoring
wells detected something coming up in some other areas so they now have to go
and take the normal treatment that we would have. They now go through this gigantic sand
filter. That is additional processing
they have to do before they can even put down the injection wells. They are desperately trying to figure out
what to do with their wastewater. They
showed us this project where they are talking about somehow putting more water
into Biscayne Bay. They have a project
to clean up water even more. The problem
I saw is they need somewhere between $500 Million and a $1 Billion to actually
build that stuff out. We found out their
prices for water and sewer are very low there.
It is set by the county. They are
losing $15 Million a year at that plant.
In order to make up for that they had to cut costs, which means they had
to cut maintenance and personnel. They
are in no position to spend $1 Billion on additional water clean up. They are probably not sufficiently funding
the plant they have.
Mr. Cassel asked the question I
would have is with a projection of close to $1 Billion to construct, what is
the operational costs over the long haul?
Mr. Fennell responded they still
have to figure out some place to put that water. Another option they were looking at was to
possibly sell it to the nuclear plant for cooling. We still do not have a good solution in South
Florida for what to do with wastewater.
People are scrambling for solutions, but they are amazingly costly. I have not heard anything about SFWMD.
Mr. Hanks stated the Executive
Director resigned.
Mr. Fennell asked are there anymore
questions or comments? Hurricane season is
starting here again. I assume you guys
are going to go down your checklist.
Mr. Daly stated we talked about it
last month. We are updating the manual
right now and we will have a meeting in May.
Mr. Fennell stated I am hoping all
of our new plant construction is going to be completed by then, but you may
need to have some kind of plan given it is not and they have a bunch of stuff
laying around.
Ms. Zich stated at least it is under
roof. That is the big thing.
Mr. Cassel stated that would be part
of the construction requirements and we do have a plan. Ch2M Hill has a plan as part of the bid
project.
Ms. Zich asked are there doors and
windows on the nano plant? Is it totally
contained now?
Mr. Easton responded there are
doors.
The
recorder picked up several conversations going on at the same time.
TENTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Approval of March Financials and Check Registers
There being no questions or comments.
On MOTION by Ms. Zich seconded by Mr.
Hanks with all in favor the March financials and check registers were approved.
ELEVENTH ORDER OF BUSINESS Adjournment
There being no
further business,
On MOTION by Mr. Fennell seconded by Mr.
Hanks the meeting was adjourned.
Glen Hanks Robert
D. Fennell
Secretary
President