1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,880 Okay, it is nine o'clock, and we do have a quorum, so we'll call to order the public 2 00:00:08,880 --> 00:00:14,520 utilities board meeting for the City of Denton for Monday, March 22, 2021. 3 00:00:14,520 --> 00:00:17,640 Do we have anybody who's waiting on the phone to speak? 4 00:00:17,640 --> 00:00:21,040 No, ma'am, we do not, not this morning. 5 00:00:21,040 --> 00:00:22,040 Okay. 6 00:00:22,040 --> 00:00:26,200 And we'll go on to the first item, which is the consent agenda. 7 00:00:26,200 --> 00:00:30,600 Does any board member wish to pull an agenda item? 8 00:00:30,600 --> 00:00:33,320 Okay, I see none. 9 00:00:33,320 --> 00:00:36,480 Do we have a motion to approve the consent agenda? 10 00:00:36,480 --> 00:00:41,320 Okay, Ed has moved, Barbara has seconded. 11 00:00:41,320 --> 00:00:43,280 All in favor say aye. 12 00:00:43,280 --> 00:00:44,280 Aye. 13 00:00:44,280 --> 00:00:45,280 Any nay? 14 00:00:45,280 --> 00:00:46,280 Aye. 15 00:00:46,280 --> 00:00:52,240 Okay, that motion carries, this might be a record today, Tony. 16 00:00:52,240 --> 00:00:58,600 Plans for individual consideration, the approval of the March 8th, 2021 minutes. 17 00:00:58,600 --> 00:01:00,160 Were there any changes? 18 00:01:00,160 --> 00:01:04,640 Okay, I see Ed's been a motion to approve. 19 00:01:04,640 --> 00:01:05,640 Do we have a second? 20 00:01:05,640 --> 00:01:06,640 Second. 21 00:01:06,640 --> 00:01:07,640 Okay. 22 00:01:07,640 --> 00:01:10,600 Okay, Billy's got, Billy got to second this time. 23 00:01:10,600 --> 00:01:12,600 All in favor say aye. 24 00:01:12,600 --> 00:01:13,600 Aye. 25 00:01:13,600 --> 00:01:14,600 Aye. 26 00:01:14,600 --> 00:01:15,600 Any nays? 27 00:01:15,600 --> 00:01:16,600 All right. 28 00:01:16,600 --> 00:01:18,720 Management reports, Tony. 29 00:01:18,720 --> 00:01:27,840 Okay, so the first item that we have for you is the Den Energy Center dashboard ending 30 00:01:27,840 --> 00:01:30,160 December 2020. 31 00:01:30,160 --> 00:01:34,840 We should have folks from finance on the phone if anyone has any questions. 32 00:01:34,840 --> 00:01:41,040 I will just say that these tend to be a little bit late just simply because finance is working 33 00:01:41,040 --> 00:01:45,480 on closing out the previous fiscal year and so things seem to be a little bit delayed 34 00:01:45,480 --> 00:01:51,080 but we have this report to you and then we'll have the January report coming to you here 35 00:01:51,080 --> 00:01:56,320 pretty quick and so, but you know, if anyone has any questions, of course the finance team 36 00:01:56,320 --> 00:02:02,960 is on and they'd be happy to answer any questions you may have or I can. 37 00:02:02,960 --> 00:02:03,960 Questions? 38 00:02:03,960 --> 00:02:07,600 I don't see any, go ahead. 39 00:02:07,600 --> 00:02:12,560 Okay, so the next item is the Public Utilities Board agenda items. 40 00:02:12,560 --> 00:02:19,400 We've added quite a few items on here primarily from finance but I do want to point out that 41 00:02:19,400 --> 00:02:25,840 on the 12th of April we are planning to come back with a end of year summary and just a 42 00:02:25,840 --> 00:02:31,600 general discussion about the budget for 2021 and rate discussion as well, kind of brief 43 00:02:31,600 --> 00:02:37,880 you on those items related to all of the utilities that's electric, water, wastewater and solid 44 00:02:37,880 --> 00:02:38,880 waste. 45 00:02:38,880 --> 00:02:44,000 And then the other item that I wanted to point out really quickly is for April 26, you know, 46 00:02:44,000 --> 00:02:51,040 we did have, we had a short meeting just so that we can let the full PUB know we, city 47 00:02:51,040 --> 00:02:56,480 management met with Susan Parker and Billy Cheek, Chair and Vice Chair, and we had a 48 00:02:56,480 --> 00:03:03,520 very productive discussion about the PUB and its role with the city and certainly as an 49 00:03:03,520 --> 00:03:07,080 advisory role to the council and one of the things that we agreed on is that we would 50 00:03:07,080 --> 00:03:13,800 put a utilities budget priorities discussion on the agenda and so we scheduled that for 51 00:03:13,800 --> 00:03:20,840 April 26 and just want to know from this board what kind of things you'd like to see in the 52 00:03:20,840 --> 00:03:25,280 upcoming budget for 2021-22 and we'll certainly be discussing that, you know, taking that 53 00:03:25,280 --> 00:03:30,160 forward to the council but we'll also share with you some recent priorities that the council 54 00:03:30,160 --> 00:03:34,280 established and there was a couple of items there that we'll highlight for you that pertain 55 00:03:34,280 --> 00:03:40,040 to the utilities and hopefully we can have some synergies there between the board and 56 00:03:40,040 --> 00:03:45,320 also the city council but again that came out of a, what I feel was a very productive 57 00:03:45,320 --> 00:03:48,920 discussion with the Chair and the Vice Chair. 58 00:03:48,920 --> 00:03:54,040 So happy to answer any questions that anyone may have on any of these items. 59 00:03:54,040 --> 00:04:07,720 Good to see we're starting the budget discussion earlier than last year. 60 00:04:07,720 --> 00:04:08,720 Yes sir. 61 00:04:08,720 --> 00:04:09,720 Thank you. 62 00:04:09,720 --> 00:04:10,720 Karen, you had your hand up. 63 00:04:10,720 --> 00:04:15,240 Yeah, I just, I don't know if this is the right place but I just wanted to confirm when 64 00:04:15,240 --> 00:04:18,060 the joint meeting is tomorrow, 1130? 65 00:04:18,060 --> 00:04:19,320 Yes ma'am, 1130. 66 00:04:19,320 --> 00:04:20,920 And that's a non-voting meeting, right? 67 00:04:20,920 --> 00:04:27,200 Well it's just to provide direction, so there'll be items on there, there's going to be items 68 00:04:27,200 --> 00:04:32,000 on there that we're going to ask for some feedback on, certainly on the D&E side specific 69 00:04:32,000 --> 00:04:37,920 to some of the legislative priorities that we've listed out and I'm assuming that everyone's 70 00:04:37,920 --> 00:04:39,560 received that backup. 71 00:04:39,560 --> 00:04:40,560 Yeah. 72 00:04:40,560 --> 00:04:41,560 Okay. 73 00:04:41,560 --> 00:04:42,560 Sorry, thanks. 74 00:04:42,560 --> 00:04:43,560 Okay. 75 00:04:43,560 --> 00:04:49,520 Just so I can clarify, but it's not an actual motion and vote, it's a provide direction. 76 00:04:49,520 --> 00:04:52,640 Correct, correct, just by consensus. 77 00:04:52,640 --> 00:04:53,640 Yes. 78 00:04:53,640 --> 00:04:59,800 So, and just so the PUB knows too, you know, Susan and I spoke a little bit about how those 79 00:04:59,800 --> 00:05:04,440 meetings tend to go and kind of the structure for them but certainly if there's any changes 80 00:05:04,440 --> 00:05:08,040 I'll visit with her but generally speaking, the mayor will open up the meeting, it'll 81 00:05:08,040 --> 00:05:12,560 be a meeting of the council and then Susan will open up the meeting for the PUB, generally 82 00:05:12,560 --> 00:05:18,760 the mayor will kind of take the lead on questions that people may have and he'll pretty much 83 00:05:18,760 --> 00:05:19,760 be the moderator. 84 00:05:19,760 --> 00:05:25,840 But again, he'll work in tandem with Susan on making sure that the meeting flows in good 85 00:05:25,840 --> 00:05:26,840 order. 86 00:05:26,840 --> 00:05:32,920 I thought Mr. Rybeck had his hand up. 87 00:05:32,920 --> 00:05:33,920 Did you, Mr. Rybeck? 88 00:05:33,920 --> 00:05:34,920 Yes ma'am. 89 00:05:34,920 --> 00:05:35,920 I had my hand up. 90 00:05:35,920 --> 00:05:36,920 Thank you. 91 00:05:36,920 --> 00:05:37,920 Two things. 92 00:05:37,920 --> 00:05:47,080 One, Tony, it's so much easier to hear you without a mask on, I really appreciate it. 93 00:05:47,080 --> 00:05:48,320 So much easier to hear. 94 00:05:48,320 --> 00:05:53,680 The second thing is you asked about any priorities we might have or interests in the upcoming 95 00:05:53,680 --> 00:05:55,280 budget discussion. 96 00:05:55,280 --> 00:06:00,080 Having never seen the budget, I would like to know where I can get a copy of the current 97 00:06:00,080 --> 00:06:02,960 budget so I might be able to generate some questions. 98 00:06:02,960 --> 00:06:09,600 Yes sir, we can, I'll send you a link and also send it to Mr. Jumper but it's on the 99 00:06:09,600 --> 00:06:15,000 city's website and there's about five years worth of budgets and also our annual financial 100 00:06:15,000 --> 00:06:18,840 report is on there along with a number of other financial documents but we'll send you 101 00:06:18,840 --> 00:06:20,840 a link so you can get to this. 102 00:06:20,840 --> 00:06:21,840 That would be great. 103 00:06:21,840 --> 00:06:22,840 Thank you very much. 104 00:06:22,840 --> 00:06:23,840 Appreciate it. 105 00:06:23,840 --> 00:06:24,840 Yes sir. 106 00:06:24,840 --> 00:06:29,040 So the other item, Susan, if it's okay for me to jump to the new business. 107 00:06:29,040 --> 00:06:33,760 So under the new business item again, we have a couple of items on here that we continue 108 00:06:33,760 --> 00:06:36,960 to work towards and hope to get that back to you soon. 109 00:06:36,960 --> 00:06:42,160 I did want to just briefly speak to the minutes and we could not get a memo out to you this 110 00:06:42,160 --> 00:06:46,000 time but we'll try to get that to you next meeting but just to give you a little bit 111 00:06:46,000 --> 00:06:51,440 of heads up on that, spoken with the city secretary's office, the minutes are the official 112 00:06:51,440 --> 00:06:59,440 record of your meeting but the minutes are not intended to be verbatim. 113 00:06:59,440 --> 00:07:04,640 They are in keeping with the directives of the city secretary's office. 114 00:07:04,640 --> 00:07:10,040 Obviously, we do have the video archive that then serves to provide additional context 115 00:07:10,040 --> 00:07:16,000 to the minutes but the minutes are the official record and we'll provide some additional detail 116 00:07:16,000 --> 00:07:21,200 on that in a subsequent memo that I'll be working with our legal department to make 117 00:07:21,200 --> 00:07:24,640 sure that I state that correctly. 118 00:07:24,640 --> 00:07:31,800 So I just wanted to follow up on that and then the last item that I'll just speak to 119 00:07:31,800 --> 00:07:37,960 under this new business, for the meeting tomorrow, we obviously have a joint meeting and you 120 00:07:37,960 --> 00:07:39,040 have the agenda for that. 121 00:07:39,040 --> 00:07:45,840 I did want to just briefly just tell the committee that in the council's special called meeting, 122 00:07:45,840 --> 00:07:51,280 you're in the regular meeting, there is a closed session discussion to talk about some 123 00:07:51,280 --> 00:07:56,560 competitive matters related to DME along with some legal matters. 124 00:07:56,560 --> 00:08:02,880 The competitive matters, we did not bring that to the PUB and the PUB at this time will 125 00:08:02,880 --> 00:08:05,220 not be part of that discussion. 126 00:08:05,220 --> 00:08:09,480 We do plan to visit with the council in keeping with some direction that we've gotten from 127 00:08:09,480 --> 00:08:16,000 them before to see how much of the legal information can be provided back to the PUB and then subsequent 128 00:08:16,000 --> 00:08:20,080 to that, based on that direction, we'll come back to the PUB at the next meeting and have 129 00:08:20,080 --> 00:08:26,080 a closed session discussion with you on those items that we are able to visit with you on. 130 00:08:26,080 --> 00:08:30,960 Again, they specifically pertain more to the legal matters, not so much to the competitive 131 00:08:30,960 --> 00:08:35,560 power matters, but because those are tied pretty closely, we just wanted to make sure 132 00:08:35,560 --> 00:08:39,240 that we kind of stayed in keeping with what the general direction from the council was. 133 00:08:39,240 --> 00:08:46,160 I wanted to just let the PUB know that I'd already spoken with Susan and Billy about 134 00:08:46,160 --> 00:08:47,160 that. 135 00:08:47,160 --> 00:08:50,580 I just wanted to be clear and transparent in case anyone saw that on the other agenda 136 00:08:50,580 --> 00:08:53,320 and said, "A, why aren't we part of that discussion?" 137 00:08:53,320 --> 00:08:56,880 So happy to answer any questions that you may have. 138 00:08:56,880 --> 00:08:57,880 Any questions? 139 00:08:57,880 --> 00:09:02,000 Okay, I don't see any this time, Tony. 140 00:09:02,000 --> 00:09:03,000 Okay. 141 00:09:03,000 --> 00:09:04,000 Thank you. 142 00:09:04,000 --> 00:09:05,720 So that brings us to concluding items. 143 00:09:05,720 --> 00:09:13,280 Does any board member wish to have something added to a future agenda item or have something 144 00:09:13,280 --> 00:09:16,680 to say? 145 00:09:16,680 --> 00:09:17,680 Seeing none. 146 00:09:17,680 --> 00:09:18,680 Okay. 147 00:09:18,680 --> 00:09:19,680 No, this is the time where... 148 00:09:19,680 --> 00:09:20,680 Oh, sorry, Billy. 149 00:09:20,680 --> 00:09:21,680 Go ahead. 150 00:09:21,680 --> 00:09:22,680 You were delayed. 151 00:09:22,680 --> 00:09:23,680 I guess so. 152 00:09:23,680 --> 00:09:27,400 So, Tony, how's this going to run, or we're going to go a little bit more into Robert's 153 00:09:27,400 --> 00:09:33,840 rules here with this meeting tomorrow, or is it still going to be just casual? 154 00:09:33,840 --> 00:09:38,400 Well, I think Robert's rules probably always apply. 155 00:09:38,400 --> 00:09:43,240 I think that's certainly going to be up to the chair and the mayor, but certainly the 156 00:09:43,240 --> 00:09:51,640 mayor will take pretty much the lead, and I think he'll recognize folks as they want 157 00:09:51,640 --> 00:09:52,880 to ask questions. 158 00:09:52,880 --> 00:09:57,360 The presentations tomorrow will flow pretty much like the way you've seen them. 159 00:09:57,360 --> 00:10:00,400 The DME presentation is very long. 160 00:10:00,400 --> 00:10:01,920 It's about 40 slides. 161 00:10:01,920 --> 00:10:07,480 We've tried to break that out into two segments to allow for questions in between that are 162 00:10:07,480 --> 00:10:13,880 pertinent to what we believe are areas that there'll be a lot of questions about, specifically 163 00:10:13,880 --> 00:10:20,080 our system operations and dispatch, and obviously then we've broken out the DEC and the energy 164 00:10:20,080 --> 00:10:24,720 management organizations separately to allow for questions, and then we have a separate 165 00:10:24,720 --> 00:10:31,200 discussion on kind of financial matters that the finance team will present. 166 00:10:31,200 --> 00:10:38,000 So, yeah, again, Billy, I would say that Robert's rules of order always apply, but again, the 167 00:10:38,000 --> 00:10:44,000 mayor will kind of see how things flow and work with Susan on making sure that we keep 168 00:10:44,000 --> 00:10:47,680 good decorum and a good process going, good flow going. 169 00:10:47,680 --> 00:10:54,000 Okay, because if I have to raise my hand with this virtual program, I'm not sure how to 170 00:10:54,000 --> 00:10:55,000 do that. 171 00:10:55,000 --> 00:10:56,000 Okay. 172 00:10:56,000 --> 00:10:59,800 Well, we'll see if we can get you some instructions on how to do that. 173 00:10:59,800 --> 00:11:00,800 I can look those up. 174 00:11:00,800 --> 00:11:03,920 I'm just saying maybe a little slow for me. 175 00:11:03,920 --> 00:11:04,920 Okay. 176 00:11:04,920 --> 00:11:05,920 Just whistle. 177 00:11:05,920 --> 00:11:06,920 Whistle. 178 00:11:06,920 --> 00:11:09,920 I can do that. 179 00:11:09,920 --> 00:11:10,920 Okay. 180 00:11:10,920 --> 00:11:14,000 Well, welcome, Ben. 181 00:11:14,000 --> 00:11:18,760 This would be the place where we'd say, "Tell us a little bit about yourself." 182 00:11:18,760 --> 00:11:19,760 Yeah. 183 00:11:19,760 --> 00:11:30,400 Well, my wife and I have three kids currently, and I graduated from UNT back in '07 after 184 00:11:30,400 --> 00:11:31,400 a little tour of Texas. 185 00:11:31,400 --> 00:11:36,400 That was my fourth college here in Texas, but finally made it out. 186 00:11:36,400 --> 00:11:38,320 And I just fell in love with Denton. 187 00:11:38,320 --> 00:11:44,080 So I've moved away and back a couple of times, and hopefully we're here for good now. 188 00:11:44,080 --> 00:11:47,400 Who doesn't fall in love with Denton, huh? 189 00:11:47,400 --> 00:11:48,400 Exactly. 190 00:11:48,400 --> 00:11:52,000 Oh, I would assume you were cheering for UNT then last night. 191 00:11:52,000 --> 00:11:53,000 Absolutely. 192 00:11:53,000 --> 00:11:54,000 Heartbreaking. 193 00:11:54,000 --> 00:11:55,000 All right. 194 00:11:55,000 --> 00:11:59,120 Well, I guess that's the agenda. 195 00:11:59,120 --> 00:12:01,160 Do we have a motion to adjourn? 196 00:12:01,160 --> 00:12:02,160 Billy? 197 00:12:02,160 --> 00:12:03,160 Okay. 198 00:12:03,160 --> 00:12:04,160 And Karen. 199 00:12:04,160 --> 00:12:05,160 Okay. 200 00:12:05,160 --> 00:12:06,160 We are adjourned. 201 00:12:06,160 --> 00:12:07,160 Bye. 202 00:12:07,160 --> 00:12:07,160 Bye.