Sep 11, 2023 Public Utilities Board on 2023-09-11 9:00 AM

- Okay, it's 9.09 and now we do have a quorum. So I'll call to order the public utilities board meeting for the city of Denton on Monday, September 11th, 2023. The first item is presentations from the public and no one has registered to comment. So we'll move past that. The next item is consent agenda. Does any board member wish to pull on item A through E? - I'll save you guys. I'd like to drill some stuff, but I'm not going to. (laughing) - So you're not gonna pull on it? - No, I'm not gonna pull on it. - All right, so do we have a motion to approve the consent agenda items A through E? - So moved. - Mr. A, okay, and Barbara second. All in favor say aye. - Aye. - Aye. - All right, next item is approval of the August 28th, 2023 minutes. Were there any changes or corrections? - See you guys. - See you guys. - You owe me one, okay? (laughing) - Seeing none, do we have a motion to approve the minutes? - So moved. - And a second? - Second. - All in favor say aye. - Aye. - Aye. - Management reports. - Madam Chair, members of PB, we have three memos that we've provided to the board follow-ups to questions that we had. One was related to the Gibbons Creek power station. The other one was information on solar for commercial. And then the last one was some telecom issues that we've tried to address. So if anyone has any questions on any of those three, happy to try to respond. Mr. Ryback. - I had a question on the large rooftop PPA memo. - Yes, sir. - It's more of a question of how the system operates and how DME interacts with it. I thought you guys brought up a really good point about what happens when this building is, you know, abandoned or sold or the stops being occupied for some period of time. The solar is still there, it's still working, it's still feeding into the system. Is there any way that DME has to control that flow of power or regulate it or does the system have to be decommissioned for that to stop happening? How does that work? - Yeah, so generally speaking, if the business goes out of business and it shuts down, all the utilities are cut off and we remove the meter. So that disables the system. Again, just like with residential, it is a net metering process. So we don't have two separate meters. So the system doesn't maintain. I think what Bill really intended was if there's a holiday or there's some type of shutdown in the business, the business is not out of business, they've just shut down for a few hours, the system continues to produce electricity. And in that situation, we could end up with a net positive, right? So we could end up with more power coming into our distribution system versus it being used up by the business. I think that's what he intended to mean. Not that the system remains after the business is closed. - Okay, but even under those circumstances, whether it closed or shut down, the solar is active, right? It's still producing DC power. So what happens to that? - Yeah, I would imagine that the system is disabled at that point if the building is completely vacated and there's no tenant there. But again, the fact that we removed the meter, there won't be anything flowing back to us. - Okay, so it's no longer a risk for DME. - That's correct. - 'Cause that thought occurred to me reading your report and I was like, well, what happens to that power because the DC doesn't turn itself off. - Yeah, I would imagine that the business, whoever vacated that property should have disconnected the system as well, disabled the system so that it's not producing any more power. - Okay, thank you. - Yes, sir. - So back up, the Gibbons Creek item, did anybody have any questions about that at all? I'm sorry. - The question that came from Ms. Russell and she just wanted an update on where things were. We tried to put in some pictures to kind of show the story of where things are. I think generally speaking, and Billy, you can certainly say more if you need to, but things are progressing well. Everything's been demolished. There's just some minor cleanup here and there. There's a lot of monitoring that needs to happen from here on out for probably the next 20 or 30 years. All that rests on G-Serg who purchased the property. - Most of the property, there's still property out there for sale. I don't know if we can discuss that in open session or not. Is that right? - Well, the property that you're talking about is related to the mine. And the question here was specific to the generation only. - Okay. - Yeah. - And that's why I said in the memo, I did state that that any mine property or transmission assets were not part of the memo. We just concentrated just on the generation component. - Okay, I just wanna make sure that everybody knew that there was an issue out there. - About 10,000 acres. - 730? - Yeah. - 730. - Is that right? - Yeah, a majority of the mine property has also been sold already. - Yeah, but it's just, it's the ugly property. It's not the pretty property. Pretty property sold really quick. (laughing) - I was just wondering, there's still, if I understood the memo correctly, there's still a bond which the DME still has participation in. So how does that work? And once the bond is depleted and used, is there any further obligation from the utility? - So the bond isn't for DME, it's for TMPA, which DME is a member, 21%. - So just our portion therefore. - So as they do the remediation work, based on where they are, there is a release of that bond. And so it's a recognition that the risk that was protected on the bond has now been relieved. And so there's a sign-off to reduce that. At some point, all of it will be gone, but that's likely gonna take some time. - But there's no continuing liability for the utility in the city after the bond is depleted. - Our portion of it, yes. - Yeah, so there is, and that's what I'm saying. So it won't all be released. There's a 20 or 30 year worth of monitoring that has to happen that obviously GSERG is required to do that, but TMPA will continue to monitor to protect our best interest. - Okay, thank you. - It's, we've got a good, we have a good staff over there. We've got a good legal representation. We got Tony, who is on top of things, and he and his cohorts with the other cities. They're on it, they're doing well, Lee. So I feel very comfortable. And I want to hand over my presidency this week to Tom Jeffries out of Garland. And Tom is very capable and been around for 30 years and he's good dude. When I say good dude, usually that's my description of a person of any type, woman or man. - So those were the three memos that we had for you. And now going on to the new business action matrix, the items that we had outstanding. I think we've all, we have answered all of those already. Yes ma'am. - Could we go back to, I wanted to ask about the three telecom use of right of way. - Yes ma'am. - How do you know, how do you know if wires are wrapped around a branch that's fallen and you call the city and they say, it's not us. How do you know who to call? - So generally we get notified at DME more often than not. And so we roll a truck out and so our staff go out there and there's identification information on the cables themselves that we're able to identify who the owner of that cable is. And then our staff notify the company that there's an issue for them to come out. If it's a simple issue that our staff can handle safely, we generally will do that purely because at the end of the day, they're attached to our cable. There are customers, it's our community. And so we do a lot of that work. Unfortunately, that's created some bad behavior with some companies out there and that they expect that, right? And so that's something that we're working towards is this enforcement that Jerry kind of mentioned and also looking at some of our ordinances so that when we expend those resources on behalf of someone else, that we can turn around and bill them for that as well, if they're not gonna do it themselves. And so while they should be self policing, we know that that's not happening. And so we're having to do that on their behalf. - So as a, I mean, this summer we've had so many live branches just fall unusual. And if we call and the city will take care of that, we don't have to hunt down the utility. - No, ma'am. If they contact our dispatch center at 940-349-7000, we generally will take care of all that. - Okay, all right. Thank you very much. - Yes, ma'am. The final item is just a feature agenda matrix. The one item that's down here, obviously there'll still be other items, but is the wastewater master plan that will be coming to you on October 9th. I don't believe that that's shifted out. I know that there was some movement on the council agenda, but I'll verify that, Kim, just to make sure. But it looks like October 9th is when they will be coming back to you with the wastewater master plan. So with that, that concludes my item, but happy to answer any questions that you may have. - Why is Brian still here? - Brian Borner. - Sitting in your company listening to this. (all laughing) - Good answer. - I kept looking for solid waste. (all laughing) Did he get a promotion and he's over everything now or something? He'd be good at it for sure. - All right, then that leads to concluding items. Does any board member wish to have something put on the agenda or have anything to say to the public? - I'd like to move from, we shut this thing down. - Okay, 920. - Where'd you turn? - Pretty good.