Mar 13, 2023 Public Utilities Board on 2023-03-13 9:15 AM

- Okay, it is 9.15 and we have a quorum. So call to order the public utilities board meeting for the city of Denton on Monday, March 13th of 2023. Do we have any members from the public that wish to address the public utility board? Seeing none, we'll move on to the consent agenda. Does any board member wish to pull an item from the consent agenda? Do I get A? B? Okay. Do we have a motion then to approve item C, D and E? - So moved. - Second. - All in favor say aye. - Aye. - Aye. - Carries, item A. - Okay, thank you. Actually, I really liked this project going forward. I just had a couple of questions and concerns. The loss of jobs here of the manual meter readers, is that something that we just would gain the benefit of cheaper costs overall or will they be assimilated into the DME somewhere else along the line? - Apologize, Mr. Beck. I've been doing this picture. Stephen Gay, Director of Water Utilities. Could you repeat your question, please? - Yeah, this is a good program. I'm looking forward to this. I just had a couple of concerns. One was the log job loss for manual meter readers. Were they gonna be assimilated into the organization anywhere else? - Currently, that function is provided through contract services. So, and you will see some need for like verification out in the field. - So there will be some manual? - There should be some. - Okay, okay. I was noticing here too, it says the return of investment will be gained within 11 to 13 years compared to 20 years for the lifecycle of the water meters. Now, we're talking about the water meters that are now there now. - Yes, sir, the physical water meters. So the current meters we use today are very mechanical and the ones that we'll be evolving to are more ultrasonic. So there's no moving parts. - Okay. - So it'll last a lot longer. - Okay, and they'll pretty much be put in the same place as where we're seeing our water meters now. Okay, I guess the last thing here I've got a concern about with all things electronic. Is there a concern about these things being hacked? - No, not necessarily. The AMI technology is pretty well established. I think we're a little bit behind the curve on that. I've worked for four utilities and they all have AMI or have had it for several years. So we don't foresee any challenges with the hacking of the data. And it's nothing specific to the customer. It's really just the consumption is that we'll be seeing in the meters. - Okay. Okay, last thing is it's, let me. Okay, it says an improved meter reading accuracy if static meters are selected. So we don't know whether or not. - Right, and that's part of the project is to identify the technology and the actual meters that we'll be deploying in the system. We're looking for the best in breed for the utility. - Okay, we are trying to get those static meters in. - Yes, sir. - Okay, very good. Thank you, sir. - I have a quick question that may be reasonably construed as an odd question, but these meters, if they're ultrasonic, they need power. They're in the ground, so how are they gonna get it? - Batteries, actually, the batteries have a 20 year life on them. - Okay, so these are ultrasonic meters, so they need water in the pipe to read. So if you have any issues where you have water shutdowns, how does that affect them? - We haven't seen any challenges with there not being any water in the pipe. It's just basically for when it breaks those electromagnetic lines of flux for the meter reading. So it's been my experience that with no water in the pipe, with a dry pipe, it doesn't cause any challenges. So it'd be just a zero. It wouldn't register any consumption. - Well, the reason I ask is I've had some experience with some meter hanging for water that if they didn't have enough water in the pipe, they didn't read very well. - Right, and those are more of a positive displacement meter, right? So you actually have mechanical pieces that have to be displaced to register a reading. So if you have a low enough flow, you won't see any reading. So what you're really doing is you have a blank pipe that has an electromagnetic field around it. And as you break that line with the flow, no matter how slight it is, you register a reading. They're extremely accurate. - Okay, thank you. No further questions. - Yes, I have a question that said something about detecting leaks quicker. - Yes, so with an AMI platform, it's basically connected to some type of a service. So when we detect a leak, we can receive notification. We don't have to wait a whole month or a whole billing cycle to determine whether or not there's a leak. - Okay, and if I remember correctly, you don't have to go out to turn the water on anymore. - That depends. And when we go through our analysis and we identify the best in-breed solution, we'll determine whether or not we wanna have what they call a three-position valve installed or integrated into the meters. Well, it will allow us to remotely turn them on, off, or just do a, they call it a life-sustaining flow. But that has yet to be determined. - Okay, the reason I was asking is because you charge extra if you get same-day service. And of course, I understand that if somebody calls at 445, you're not gonna get the water on that day. But if they call at like 10 o'clock in the morning and still have to wait another full day, I know a lot of people moving in and out and that gets to be a real inconvenience for them. - Just kind of wondered why they still charged for it. - Well, we deploy staff, people, I mean, we're rolling equipment, people are going out and they're physically turning those meters on and off. And even if we went to an electronic structure, there's gonna be an additional cost associated with that. Because when we communicate with those meters, depending on the platform that we decide we land on, there may very well be a cost associated with that as well. And so we'll be evaluating that as we roll this new system out. - Okay, thank you. You're very welcome. - I had one. - Oh, go ahead. - So the AMI system, I know there are a lot of challenges with RF and in the soil, like inside of a metal, with a metal plate on top of it and all those sorts of things. But there are solutions, but they often are moving the radio signal out of the 700 or 900 megahertz range into like something that much lower frequency that penetrates the ground better. Does this require all new, a second set of backhaul system, like through the neighborhoods? Like new antennas and. - The focus of this project is to evaluate that. What's gonna be the most appropriate backhaul system? Are we gonna do a standalone radio system? Are we gonna use cellular data? What are we going to utilize to ensure the integrity of that or the strength of those signals? - Historically, with an AMI, what they'll do is on the top of the meter box, they'll drill a hole and they'll put a puck on the top of the hole so you're not penetrating. You don't have to go through the ground or you don't have to go through the lid. So it'll transmit right from the top. - And like a wire down to the meter? - A wire down to the meter, yes sir. - Other questions? All right, do we have a motion to approve? - Move approval. - Second. - Okay, all in favor say aye. - Aye. - Item B, there's someone here. Mr. Rybeck, what was your question? - I wanted to ask just a question or two about this program. This is kind of innovative and interesting. My experience with working around casual labor hasn't been very helpful. So I'm curious, A, what got the city and the Solid Waste Department interested in doing this and if the people do or do not show up, how do you plan to respond? - Good morning, Brian Barner, Solid Waste Director with the City of Denton. And first, we're proud to be a partner in this Ready for Work program. As stated in the AIS, this is a partnership between the city and our Daily Bread to actually identify persons in our homeless community, provide training and supervision and bring them to the landfill to do, as you said, casual labor, things like litter picking, site maintenance, things of that nature. Currently, the City of Denton Solid Waste utilizes a lot of temporary labor, whether it's doing our litter picking, whether it's backfilling vacant field operator positions, riding backs of trucks, helping load bulk during heavy peak periods. And currently, just like everybody else, there are workforce issues. So even though we may request five people to show up the next day, we might get two. Part of the commitment with our Daily Bread is not only do they provide the supervision, but they provide the people. So we'll train the supervisor, outline the program and the jobs that are to be done not only that day, but sort of the universe of things that needs to be done. And then through that supervisor, they will deploy those people on site. So because they are currently being managed through the 288 facility, it's not just whoever shows up that day for work comes in, it's more of a continuous labor force. They'll load up the van, they'll bring them to us. So what we're anticipating is actually a more reliable workforce availability than just your temporary labor call-in type service. - I got you. Well, again, I applaud you all for doing this. I think it's a real interesting approach. My just concern would be if they don't provide the labor, then it's your fallback to go back to your contract labor pool. - Correct. - Okay. - Correct. - So you're not excluding one for the other if they fail to provide enough personnel. - Correct, there are fail safes and fallbacks that are built into the whole process. - Okay, very good. That was my question. - Thank you. - Thank you. - I know I told you I wasn't gonna pull this, but I wanted to go ahead and just make a few comments on, you know, there's three, maybe four shelters in the city of Denton, and this new shelter out on Loop 28, it's Monsignor King also. It's not just our daily bread. So, you know, it's a really good place. We toured it the other day. They have an emergency shelter for the people that initially get there. And then the front one is people that are moving up and getting training, and they're also training them in traffic control. So we're gonna do a job fair out there with them as well. I've got Associated General Contractors that are gonna come in and work and try to steal some of the good people you're trying to steal. (panelists laughing) 'Cause there are some good folks that just, you know, had some bad things happen in their life, and they just need a chance. - Well, and to build on that, I think one of the things that we're hoping to do is, you know, like with everybody else right now, you know, labor is tight, and it's hard to find a person that will show up every day, do a good job, and go home. And, you know, we get somebody out here through this program, you know, for, you know, six months, and it looks like they've got an aptitude for what we need to have done, and expand, and give an opportunity. Then, you know, hire 'em in as a, you know, once we get 'em trained, you know, hire 'em in as a city employee, and then start giving 'em the training they need, possibility to CDL or something else, and actually start driving and working, you know, beneficially within the, as a permanent employee. So, you know, it's not sort of the end of the road, it's really the first step on a long road. - It's a win-win. - It is, it is. - Yeah, I mean, you know, we hire employees all the time, it didn't work out, and they weren't homeless. - Yeah, exactly. (laughing) - All right, thank you very much. - Other questions? I think it's a neat place, neat program. Do we have a motion to approve item B? Mr. Rybeck, move. And Mr. Beck seconds, all in favor, say aye. - Aye. - Thank you. - Thank you. Next item is approval of the February 27th, 2023 minutes. Were there any changes or corrections? Seeing none, do we have a motion to approve? Mr. Chief Barbera, so seconded, yes? - Oh, I just had a comment about-- - Okay, go ahead, go ahead. - Oh, I wanted to thank Mr. Brown for the presentation, which I wasn't here for on the Hickory Creek project, but I did look at the presentation through, and I do appreciate the effort, it was a nice overview. And I hope the other members of the board appreciated the opportunity to get a better long-term view of the project. So, sorry I missed it, but thank you for doing it. - All right, so we have a motion and a second. All in favor, say aye. - Aye. - Aye. That carries. Okay, the next item is PUB23051, budget change. - Good morning, PUB, Daniel Stanford. I'm the budget manager. So this morning I have a presentation on a capital improvement program budget amendment for you. So the proposed budget amendment will increase the expenditure authority for the capital improvement program by $29.2 million, taking the budget from $738.8 million to $768 million. So the increase focuses on DME projects, more specifically the purchase of transformers, LED conversion, Hickory GIS, and text dot relocations. And this slide shows you the overall capital improvement program budget for electric and the differences. So we've reduced some budgets in this category, but have offset those by increasing others, so the net difference is $29.2 million. So with that, I'll take any questions, and we do have electric staff here to answer any operation-related questions. - Can we go back to the other-- - Oh, sure. - First. - For this slide. - That one. Distribution transformers, $19 million budget change. Is it supply chain, or? (laughing) I mean, wow. - Jerry Fielder, Engineering Division Manager, DME. Transformers is the largest one we have. We've got transformers that we've been had on order for over two years, and new contracts are a year and a half. So what we've seen is we've seen 300% or higher increases in the price of transformers, even with the old contract purchases. And I believe you guys have seen several emergency purchases of transformers that have all had an increased price. So yes, over the time frame, all those transformers have increased, and it's about $29 million, or about $20 million for the increase of transformers. - All right. Any other questions? Mr. Rybeck, and then we'll go to you, Barbara. - Okay. Just curious, the technology, software, hardware, that was a big drop. I'm a little surprised at that. - 1.7, 1.8 million decrease. - You're talking about everything going up. All costs of all equipment's going up. Look at that going. That's a heck of a drop on the other side, the flip side. - And I'm gonna give you my understanding. I'm not gonna tell you that it's 100% right. But my understanding is that we've had a lot of software that has actually changed. We've actually been able to get it lower. In other words, it's gonna possibly go out over more years. And there was a lot of initiatives that we had wanted to start that weren't started this year that'll be started in later months or years. - Okay, thank you. - You bet. - So Mr. Rybeck, I'll just mention, you know, so the reason we're amending the budget is really because finance will be bringing forward a notice of intent to issue bonds. And so this is really gonna set that ceiling for us. We're gonna continue to look at this budget before we come back to you and the council to actually issue the bonds. And we'll firm some of these up. So some of these positive negatives may switch around a little bit. But that 102, that'll be the ceiling of the maximum that we think we'll need to issue for the notice of intent. - And then Barbara, you had a question. - Well, as we see things continue to go up, do you see in your crystal ball that this is going to, that we're gonna get caught up and maybe the prices will at least level off? What do you see coming? - We're not seeing any slowdown to development, but we're all, we're still seeing a difficulty, I guess you might say, in getting transformers and equipment like that. So I'm not seeing anything right now that within the next year or so that we can say, hey, look, we're gonna be able to breathe at this point. Right now I have Randy Key, who's here, who's kind of handling the logistics, the material purchases, and his staff is doing great things to trying to acquire all the equipment we have, not only transformers, but some of the other pieces of equipment we have. So in some point in the future, hopefully, yes, but I can't see anything in the near future that we're gonna be settled down. - So it's really the rapid growth we're experiencing plus less in supplies. - Yes, ma'am. - Yeah, Barbara, and I'll also mention that, I mean, you're gonna see that spillover into our five-year CIP as well. You know, we've now looked at, you know, projects that are coming up in the next five years, and we're increasing those based on those inflationary pressures that we're seeing currently, and until we see a change, I think that's gonna be our reality going forward. - Thank you. - You bet. - Any other questions? All right, do we have a motion to approve? Are moved, and Mr. Ebeck, you're seconding? Okay, all in favor say aye. - Aye. - Aye. - Carries, okay, management reports. - So, Madam Chair, members of the POB, we have a couple of items here for you. The first one is really a follow-up to a question that Mr. Rybeck had on the Solid Waste Diversion Program, and so Solid Waste has provided a memo with some information. Certainly, if you have questions regarding that, you know, they'll be happy to, you know, Brian and his staff will be happy to come up here. You know, they do plan to come back to the committee or the board at the next meeting to do a formal work session presentation, but certainly, if you have any questions on the memo, he's here. If you don't have questions today and you wanna send him an email, certainly you could do that between now and the next meeting, so it's whatever your pleasure is. - Any questions for now? No? - Okay, so the next item is future agenda items. You know, this is just trying to list out for you what we have on the schedule, major items we have on the schedule for you. Again, I'm just gonna keep saying it every time. Just know that the budget, you know, we're in the budget process, and so you're gonna have a series of meetings coming up to review all the utility budgets, so just make sure you're cognizant of those dates, and certainly, if you're gonna be out, just let us know so that we're aware. And then finally, on the new business action items, you know, we have, you know, the Hickory Creek project was completed. We got that information to you, as Mr. Ryback referenced earlier, and then we have the diversion ordinance presentation scheduled for the 27th. Certainly, if there's any other items that you have that you'd like to see, please let us know. That concludes my item. - All right, that brings us to concluding items. Does any board member wish to say anything to the public or put something on a future agenda? Okay. Seeing none, it is 936. Billy. - Motion to adjourn. - We're adjourned.