Okay, it is nine o'clock and we have a quorum, so a call to order the Public Utilities Board
for the City of Denton on Monday, January 22nd, 2024.
Kim, did anybody register to speak?
Nope.
All right.
Then we'll go right into the consent agenda.
Does any board member wish to pull an agenda item?
Yes, ma'am.
I would like to pull items A, B, and G.
Okay.
Any others?
All right, so do we have a motion to approve items C, D, and E?
An F.
Okay, Mr. Devin moves and Billy seconds.
All in favor?
Aye.
Carries.
Okay, item A.
Here he comes.
Hi, good morning, members of the board.
My name is Taylor Holt.
I am a project manager for the Capital Projects Department.
This is for the amendment number five to the Elm and Locust Phase Two project.
So the proposed amendment request number five is due to the scope change.
We redefined the scope to include full-depth street reconstruction for the project, including
alternative culvert layouts and additional utility work surrounding the square.
So the scope of the project is going from Elm and Locust from University to Oak, so
north of the square.
So here you show the amendment number five summary.
So we have currently $72,000 remaining on the current contract due to additional services,
and then the total additional work for this scope redefined is $962,000, bringing the
total amendment just over $890,000.
So with this, staff recommends an approval of an amendment to the contract between the
City of Denton and half-associates, and then not to exceed the amount of just over $890,000.
How about that?
I'll have any questions.
Yes, I'm the questioner.
It's my fault you had to do this.
I'm sorry.
No, no.
On a short notice.
The project has been going on since 2018.
So is it like moving slowly from section to section over time, and is this bond money
that was approved before 2018, it all happened before I was on the board.
So I'd like to get some background on this.
Yeah.
So as you mentioned, the project initiation was in 2018.
So the different amendments here are for the additional work that was added to the scope.
So amendment number one was for utility work added for Austin Street.
The amendment number two was for a reduction in billing due to COVID-19.
Amendment number three was for additional design services.
And then amendment number four was for Oakland Street, a drainage study for that.
And so Trevor can speak to a little bit more of the history.
Thank you.
Sure.
Trevor Crane, Director of Capital Projects.
So this is an older project.
I actually started this R. This was one of my projects when I was a project manager when
I got hired on to the City of Denton five years ago.
So this project has evolved a lot since 2018 to where it is now.
We're currently going through the Elm and Locust turn back with Textodd.
So Elm and Locust are both Textodd owned streets currently.
Originally this project was just going to replace the water and wastewater utilities
through Elm and Locust.
So as we've worked through the process of taking those streets back over, we've continually
added scope so that we could do the complete streets that we're doing now.
So you've added sidewalk improvements, drainage, street improvements in addition to the public
utility portion of the water and wastewater.
So we've worked with Textodd to go through the turn back so that we will actually own
the streets after this project's done.
We've added drainage to it as well.
And we've worked with the county in order to be able to include this project as a part
of their county bond in 2022 that got passed, which allowed us to add money to do the full
street reconstruction.
So this is a city project, but it's also using county bond improvement money.
Correct.
Does the street cross across the state or city and county border or lines or does it
connect to county streets or roads or how does that work?
Sure.
So as a part of the county bond election, we were allowed to submit projects that would
be included in that bond.
So this was one of the ones we submitted, Bonnie Bray 4B, Bonnie Bray 5, I believe Westgate
and Ryan Road were also projects that we submitted that were approved in that bond as well.
So you'll see some of those projects coming forward either to PV or council as we move
forward with those projects.
Okay.
So there was a lot more here than met the eye, so I'm really glad I asked you fellas
to come in and talk about it.
This is a project that's long time coming.
So we're excited to be able to get it out there and start construction on it.
Okay.
Well, that's all I have for questions.
Anybody else feel free?
Yes.
Go ahead, Billy.
Okay.
So what I was going to pull this item as well, what I've noticed is you've got over a million
dollars worth of changes, less the existing fee remaining on contract, but of that $952,000
or $62,000, you've got over half, $541,000 in planning, which I'm assuming means engineering
and drawings and investigation and all that.
That's the first part of my question.
So when you mean planning, do you mean?
When you say construction plans, $541,000 some odd dollars.
Yeah.
So that's for the actual design of the water, wastewater improvements, changes, everything
like that, street reconstruction, changing the profiles, everything that goes along.
So over half is engineering, whereas the actual work that's being performed is less than the
engineering that needs to be performed.
I mean, that's kind of, unless you've written something down wrong, that's what it says.
Okay.
So this is just the design amendment.
The actual construction project is going to be, we're estimating around $21 million for
the actual construction of the water, wastewater, drainage, and street reconstruction from 380
to Oak.
Okay.
So you'll see that come back.
That is just the engineering.
This is just the design.
Yes, sir.
So this will not be included in the construction of a little over 2 million is what you said?
21.
21 million.
Right.
Sorry.
This is the entire project, not just the portion around the square.
Correct.
This is the design of the entire project from 380 to Oak.
Okay.
That's where I got confused.
All right.
That's all I got.
Anyone else?
All right.
Do we have a motion to approve item A?
So moved.
Mr. Radwick moves.
Second?
Good job.
Second.
Mr. Taylor, all in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries.
Good morning, David Brown, Water Utilities Project Manager.
Today I bring to you the construction manager at risk design phase contract for our expansion
out of the concrete water reclamation plant.
So let's talk just to refresh what's going on out there.
The plant's over 60 years old, and of course there's a 75/90 rule that we have over at
TCEQ through TCEQ that at 75 percent we need to be in design for the plant expansion, and
at 90 we need to be in construction.
Right now it's close to the 75, so our design has started.
It's about at 30 percent.
So what we're going to touch, we're going to go to a different technology for, is membrane
bioreactor filtration, and also we'll do some improvements with our headworks.
Prior to that, we had a headworks project that we approved for design, and then we went
to expansion.
We felt that it's best to combine these in construction, combine those at the same time
the plant will be going, this portion of the expansion will be going at the same time.
So with that, TCEQ did approve a permit up to 30 MGD, so that's approved.
And also we're going to replace the headworks and an existing 24 inch plant interceptor
over there.
Could I just ask what headworks means?
Headworks is where everything from the city comes in, influent-wise.
So there's actually a lift station there, but it's headworks, and everything from the
city comes there through all the interceptors, and then it pumps out into the plant.
Thank you.
So with that, we wanted to use a construction management risk.
This will be the first one for our department.
The advantage of that is being able to start some construction early on, and also have
the CMAR look at design and help the design to cut out some things and get a better product
in a way so we can move quicker.
We're finding a lot of things have lead times as far as electrical, so we can jump on that
as well.
And we'll bring several different phases of the construction, and that'll be a recommendation
of the CMAR, how we bring that phase approach.
So we had two proposals came in.
We evaluated it with an evaluation committee.
Sunk construction was chosen, and here's their cost.
It's $2,452,441.
So with that, cost modeling, constructability review, and this is just in the design phase.
So they'll help us go through and recommend for our phases when we start, and we'll bring
other phases to you.
So here's the project schedule, CMAR design.
Like I said, Kim Lee Horne is our designer on both projects.
Sunt will join and get involved with it between the city and Kim Lee Horne in order to help
us out.
Phase approval is today for the CMAR, and then the design approval.
We're looking for the first phase around the quarter four of 2024.
We'll start construction '25 and complete construction around 2027.
So that staff recommendation is that we adopt a contract with Sunt Construction.
Be glad to answer any questions.
I know Devin had a question earlier.
Really quickly, if you could go back to the map slide.
Let me see if I go back.
Which one would you like?
Yeah, I think this one.
So what is red and what is blue?
The red would be, blue is the initial, what we're looking at initially.
This is not set in stone how we're going to go, but this is kind of how we're looking.
We're going to put, and I'll show you, we're going to put the headworks over here.
Right now that's where the headworks would be in conjunction with where the primary,
I mean the MBR facility is.
Okay, so like this is like a phase one, phase two expansion.
Yes sir.
So with CMAR you're able to, it's kind of a module effect where you can add modules for
your CMAR, I'm sorry not CMAR, MBR, you can add modules for your MBR to gain more capacity.
We're going to build the headworks at 75 MGD, so we're already ready for the future.
The first initial phase, we're looking at a 5 MGD MBR, so that'll get us up to 26, maybe
up to 30 in some instances, but that's the initial.
But what it does is sets us up for success so we can go ahead and be ready just to a
quicker upgrade in capacity by doing that modular approach.
Thank you.
Yes sir.
Questions?
Mr. Ryback.
Yes.
So I was wondering, since you've, since the recommendation is to retain Sunt as the construction
manager at risk, so they're hired for the project, not just for the design phase.
They're hired for the project and they will bring, once they go through the design phase,
they will bring, basically they'll bring three bids, they'll recommend the packages, and
they'll bring three bids with one of them being Sunt construction.
Okay so Sunt would also potentially act as general contractor in addition to the CM at
risk.
Yes sir.
Okay.
I was curious about that.
So they'll actually go out and they have their evaluation, they'll go out and actually evaluate
the bids and actually say hey, we think this is good for us to do it or another company
to do it, but they'll be, yeah, yes sir.
Well I noticed in the evaluation there were only two companies who actually fully responded
to the request for a proposal and being as they are both companies that do a lot of this
kind of work, I suppose it's possible that Sunt could end up hiring Archer Western to
do some portion of the work.
It's a possibility.
Yeah those are the, those are kind of the big players in our area, Archer Western and
Sunt.
Okay.
Other questions?
Yes.
I think I got this one right.
On the scoring criteria, qualification and experience of the firm.
You found that Archer Western was not qualified, not as qualified or experienced.
One thing is is that Sunt had a little bit more experience in the CMAR with the group
that Archer Western sent was a little less experience on CMAR.
So this being our first CMAR, we have, want to be able to, what they brought to us was
a more experience in that realm.
Okay.
A little, and then there's a little bit down on pre-construction services and that probably
was presentation I would imagine.
Quality assurance and quality control, does that have more to do with item number one?
As far as just the proposals or?
Yeah, yeah, of course.
That's what you graded.
You graded the proposals, correct?
They brought us, they brought a, one of the things that was impressive is being able to
evaluate when we need to purchase things or when we didn't as far as just the way the
market is.
They're going to bring that to us, you know, do we want to purchase electrical stuff right
now?
Because now do we want to, they can evaluate the price range and give, hey, this is a good
chance to buy it.
That's what they brought to the table.
Okay.
So $800,000 difference in cost?
Yeah.
Gotcha.
All right.
Well.
Kyle was on the evaluation committee, you got something to add?
Yeah, real quick.
I'm Kyle Pedigo, so I'm the planning and engineering division manager for water utilities.
Regarding the experience, both are extremely experienced in wastewater treatment processes.
With Sunt, like David said, they have much more experience delivering these projects
through the CMR approach.
So when we looked at them, Archer Western seemed like a contractor that can do CMR,
and Sunt seemed like a CMR contractor that could deliver the package smoothly.
So that was a big contributing factor in the analysis.
And you said this is the first one, CRM, that you're doing, so you wanted it done.
Through water utilities.
So the city has done CMR.
Yeah.
But for you.
Yeah.
But for our group, this is the first one.
And with that, they seemed to be the better fit for our group.
Okay.
What do you estimate the value of this project eventually costing?
Yeah, right now we're looking, our initial EAC is right at $185 million.
$185 million.
So this is just the beginning of the engineering.
Yeah.
So this will bring us up to the construction.
Yeah.
So whoever gets in here has got their foot in the door for the CMR, obviously.
Well, they have to bid out packages, so each work package has to be open bid.
So once we get up to that point, they'll deliver their guaranteed maximum price that we sign
them up for.
Gotcha.
And then the work package will be bid out individually.
So the group that you sent over, or the group that they sent over, you thought that SUNT
sold themselves the best?
It was, yeah, the committee was universal after both presentations that SUNT presented
the better product.
Okay.
All right.
Well, that's all the questions I have.
I know which way I'm going about it.
I would like to comment on your question, and I understand and appreciate it because
I too looked at that and looked at the difference, but I've actually had some experience with
both companies and construction projects over the last couple of decades, and I support
your decision.
I think SUNT has done a better job at the manager at risk portion of the work.
I work with Archer Western primarily on design bid projects and that seemed to be more their
lane was working on stuff that other people put together.
So it seemed like I had the same concern that Billy did about the difference in price, but
thinking back on it, it seemed like SUNT had done more of that work and they had more pre-construction
personnel, that they have people that do just that sort of thing and are committed to it.
So I agree, it's a little bit of a bump in price, but I think you picked the right horse.
Thank you.
Appreciate you sharing that.
Any other questions?
Do we have a motion to approve item B?
So moved.
Mr. Rybick moved.
Do we have a second?
Second.
Mr. Pluck seconds.
All in favor say aye.
Aye.
All right.
Nay.
Oh, and a nay.
We have a nay.
Sorry.
I would like this type of contracting anyway, I think I'll make that clear.
Okay.
Oh, you're not on.
I voted.
Nay.
Thank you.
All right, item G. And I know both Billy and Lee have questions on this one.
Excuse me for one moment please.
Sure.
Good morning.
My name is Capitolia Brown.
I'm a Senior Real Estate Specialist, and I'm here today with Cole Tankersley, who is the
project manager, and Stephen Gay, the Director of Water Utilities.
And we're here to talk to you briefly about the I-35 utility relocate project that we
have going on.
The project overview for this is water utility relocate supporting the I-35 widening.
This is a textile reimbursable program of 100 percent.
And this will go from Meadow Street to Fort Worth Drive, it's on the access road.
They have a project schedule, and the project schedule is to be completed.
The engineering part was completed November 23, public utilities board for January was
for today, and then tomorrow we're looking to take this to council for January the 23rd
for a notice to proceed for second quarter of 2024.
And we have the construction completion, the third and fourth quarter, and the third quarter
doing a 90-day calendar, with the fourth quarter 120-day calendar.
Three details, it's currently owned by 5-Sac Self-Storaging and 18-Sac Storage, and that's
U-Haul.
And the acres that we're looking to acquire will be 2.1 acres, with an appraised value
of $23,249, and the square foot value on that is $4.37.
From their other piece of the profiting, we're doing the 0.78 acres, just a little under
one acre, that's valued at $14,017, and the appraised value is $4.37.
And this is just to expand and improve the northbound right-of-way on I-35.
Our recommendation, we're here today, we're going to take, wanting to take this to council
for tomorrow to establish authority to negotiate the acquisition of the easements using the
eminent domain, if necessary.
Any questions?
- I have a question.
I noticed that on this project, we were retaining health and associates, and we're also retaining
them as a surveyor on another project.
I was just a little confused about the property acquisition, and the survey company, and...
- Right, for the property acquisition, we have at least 12 companies, and we sent this
out for a bid, and they came back as the better choice for the bid, and that's how we chose
half associates for the real acquisition property.
- So have we used them before in this service, or is this something new that they're doing?
- Half associates is an engineering firm, but they have multiple branches, or departments,
I guess I should say.
So they have an acquisitions department, a relocations department, or division, and survey
and engineering.
- Okay, so they're more than a surveying firm.
- Yes.
- But I was just surprised to see them in two relatively different categories in the
same consent agenda, and I was like, "I wanted to at least ask about that relationship and
capacity or capability."
- And really, the action you're asking from us is to give you the authority to negotiate
and use eminent domain, or make the recommendation to the council.
- Yes.
- Okay.
- That is correct.
- Okay.
- Go ahead.
- Could you bring up the picture of the take?
- Let me see if there are other, yeah, that's the best one, I think.
So there are going to be easements along the U-Haul side, and I'm sorry, I don't see a
better picture.
- A better picture.
- Yeah, that's why...
- But it's right along here.
- Okay.
- So how many feet into the property is it?
20?
- 20 feet?
- Yes, sir.
- And it's a subsurface easement.
- Good morning, Council, I'm Cole Tangersley, I'll be the project manager for the construction
portion of this.
Let me see here, what's the next page?
- So the easement's only going to be a 20-foot easement, and it's going to basically go to
about right where this line is right here, just past the concrete.
The only reason we're getting this easement is because initially, and then the rest of
the project, we're going to be operating inside of TXOT's driveway with a permit.
But because they're going to be rebuilding this bridge that goes over the train tracks
here, the riprap's going to go too far over, and we can't get our lines under it.
So we ended up having to just move out another 20 feet.
So it's just a strip right along, just past the right here, so then it goes down all the
way.
And we're just going to be moving this waterline back.
- So you're just moving the waterline back, and really the take is going to be on that
north side of the parking lot, so they end up losing some parking spots, is that what?
- They won't lose any parking spots, these are 50% easements, usually subsurface.
So as long as they don't put anything, it'll look the same for them.
- They don't put a structure up there.
- No structure, that's right.
So the parking lot won't change, and that's why you see the appraisals, the amounts usually
like a lower amount.
- Do you have that agreement, I mean obviously you haven't pulled the trigger on the deal,
you're trying to work it out so you don't have to go to condemnation, but do you have
an agreement with the property owner about, do you have an agreement with the property
owner about allowing them to put the parking lots, parking spaces back in there?
- The easement, the city's standard easement document allows for flat work.
It allows for paving, so they would continue to be able to use it as parking.
- Will TextDot's work go into that new easement as well?
- This will be outside of the new TextDot right of way.
That's why the easement is needed, it's being moved outside of the right of way.
- But they're not acquiring anymore as far as you know?
- They've already acquired, that's why the city is needing to relocate its utilities.
- So they're not acquiring anymore as far as you know?
- As far as I know, that's correct.
- Okay.
- Just related question, is this the only location we expect to have additional easement
procured outside of the TextDot right of way?
- That's correct.
- The other side, we have plenty of room.
This side here, if they didn't, if they weren't building the road up, we would have had room
as well, but when we started doing engineering, it just doesn't work.
We'll be under that, it just doesn't work.
So we have, unfortunately we had to squeeze out a little bit.
- Specifically for this creek with the changes to the bridge, so the rest of I-35E all the
way down through South Denton, is that finalized yet?
- This is a very small project.
It's only this side of the road here, most of those other projects you're discussing
sir are already in construction.
The only project is gonna start from this water line right here, we'll move back inside
of TextDot's easement and then just this water line right here are the only two pieces that
are affected.
So it's, and project's concerns is relatively small.
- Okay, and I understand this one is just a small area.
I guess I was trying to understand if we're going to see more of these in the coming year
or two.
- Staff has already taken the other items to council authorizing the acquisition.
So this is another one of those projects that's been in the works for a few years now.
So we've already started the acquisition relocation of utilities and as Cole mentioned, they've
already been in construction, many of them, most of them so.
- Thank you.
Okay, I'm good.
- You're good, okay.
No other questions?
All right, do we have a motion to approve item G?
- So moved.
- Billy moves, do we have a second?
Lee seconds.
- All in favor say aye.
- Aye.
- Opposed?
Okay.
Items for individual consideration.
Consider approval of the January 8th, 2024 minutes.
Were there any changes or corrections?
I hope not, I signed them.
Do we have a motion to approve?
Thomas moved, Lee second, all in favor say aye.
- Aye.
- Do we have approval of the revised public utilities board meeting schedule of 2024?
Do we have a motion to approve the new calendar?
- So moved.
- Billy moves, Lee seconds, how's that?
All in favor say aye.
- Aye.
- Okay, management reports.
- Madam Chair, members of the PAB, just really quick on the calendars, I wanna make sure
that you noted that November 18th was a date that changed.
I tried to coax Kim into doing a presentation, she refused, so thank you for that.
We caught that after the fact and so nobody wanted to meet on veteran's day, so we wouldn't
be here.
So on new business action items, the only item that we have left here is related to
the EV vehicles, we'll be bringing back, we asked for a year for that, we'll be working
with Fleet to get that information to you.
And then future agenda items, we only have the one item on here, which we already did,
we are waiting for the budget department to complete their calendar and then we'll populate
that here, but again, as you know, that will be heavy into the budget here before too long,
so we'll get those dates to you, that way you can mark your personal calendars as well.
With that, that completes the management update, unless you have any questions for me.
I have one, have we had any concerns with supply for our power grid during the recent
cold snap or are we doing good?
Well, lots of concerns, that's for sure.
I think that RCOT has been able to keep the supply, you know, mean the demand, we did
have a few closed days there a couple of weeks ago, but I think generally speaking, I think
we've fared pretty well.
It hasn't been as cold as other years, and so we're hoping that that will continue, but
certainly a concern that we deal with every single day in 15-minute increments, just so
you're aware of, so, yeah.
Any other questions?
Okay, on concluding items, does any board member wish to have something put on a future
agenda or say something to the public?
I see none.
Let's go into the work session.
Receive a report, hold a discussion, and give staff direction -- oh, and it cut it off.
Oh, on the dead-end criteria's manual, thank you.
Good morning, everybody.
My name is Brett Bourgeois, I am the deputy city engineer here at Denton, and I am here
to present the proposed updates to our criteria manuals for this year.
So a little bit overview of our agenda, we're going to have a -- kind of discuss what our
public outreach plan has been for this year, go through a little bit of background on what
the criteria manuals are, talk about the high-level changes that we're proposing, and some next
steps for the process going forward here.
I have in attendance multiple technical experts in different departments across the city that
are able to answer any specific questions you may have that I can't answer.
So our public utility or our public outreach plan this year has been started in September.
We all developed our town hall, brought all developers into the Development Services Center,
presented a lot of the high-level overview or high-level changes that we're proposing,
discussed the process that we're going through, and opened them up for feedback from the community.
We published the criteria manuals online in November once we had a draft that had been
reviewed internally enough that we felt was confident to be published online to receive
outside comments.
We then presented to the Texas Society of Professional Engineers that represents the
Denton district, Denton area, so we got all the engineering firms in, presented the changes
to them as well.
We went to plan the zoning commission a few weeks ago on the 10th, and we're here today.
We plan to go to the city council on February 20th for a work session and then a public
hearing with an effective date on March 1st.
So a little bit of background on the criteria manuals.
This was a pretty extensive update that we did this year.
Previously we've had about four different criteria manuals.
We added a fifth one this year with our street lights, so we had separate documents.
We decided to roll those all into one document with different sections to cover different
areas of the criteria manual, and that mirrors the DDC.
It's one document that we have to update, one document to bring forward instead of five
different documents we bring forward.
What we've done in the past for our criteria manual updates is that we had the representatives
of all city departments get together, we walked through every document, made sure that everybody
was on board with it.
That process worked pretty well, but it was very inefficient in terms of time of staff.
And so this year we did a little bit different process.
We identified key staff members, technical leads in every department, let them make their
proposed changes, their proposed updates, kind of tackled what we knew we needed to
change.
And then once we had a document already into like a preliminary draft, then we brought
all the city departments together, showed them what we'd done and say, "Hey, now provide
us comments."
We made it more efficient to have people comment on something instead of asking them to create
something.
So that was a little bit different process, and it seemed to work better because it was
just quicker in terms of the time.
And then once we had all those changes made in September, we sent it out for internal
review from September and October and made further internal adjustments before we went
out to post it online for public comment.
We've done it online, we've posted the public hearing notice on the Denton Record Chronicle,
and now we're presenting all the different boards and commissions and city council.
So a little bit of history of the different documents the city has.
We have the Denton Development Code, which sets the policies and the procedures of how
land uses and how to develop within the city of Denton.
The next level down, we have the criteria manuals, which provide the technical information
and the design requirements to design, and the technical direction for projects in the
city of Denton.
And then we have the standard specifications and the standard details, which explain, "Okay,
now that you have it designed, this is the materials you have to use.
This is how you have to, you know, place the backfill.
This is how you have to compact the roadway surface."
And then the drawings show what the connections and how all those different templates are
supposed to look like.
And this is another kind of a show in the hierarchy of the different documents within
the city.
Development Code and everything references down to the lowest level during construction.
So a little bit high level of some of the changes.
For solid waste this year, we received -- they had a pretty extensive rewrite of their criteria
manual a couple years ago.
They received some comments on one of the tables was a little bit difficult to read
and difficult to follow in terms of the enclosure requirements.
So they received that feedback, made those changes, improved the table going forward.
We've also provided some information on the routing of solid waste vehicles.
The truck routing was discussed in the transportation criteria.
It was not discussed in the solid waste criteria, so a lot of times it was missed.
Require a 30-foot turn radius for the new trucks.
Need a 50-foot clear space in front of the containers to allow the trucks to back in.
You get the equipment and pull out.
We also put in some requirements saying that you cannot park cars or place things in the
swing gates.
So yes, they had a clear space, but you can't open the gates because you had vehicles parked
directly against the container.
So we had to explicitly say you can't park here now.
For the stormwater one, this is the one that we're kind of anticipating a little bit more
of pushback from the development community is this first bullet point here, is that we
are recommending this year.
It's not a requirement and this puts us more in alignment with the current regulations
within ice swim for the Metroplex.
We're recommending that all stormwater runoff is treated to an 80 percent, 80 percent of
the total suspended solids are captured and treated out of the stormwater runoff.
We've been using that in the detention pond requirement, but it doesn't function that
way.
So we've been actually over-designing, over-sizing our detention ponds within the city.
And this is a better way of actually enforcing the requirements of water quality.
We've discussed it internally.
We decided to do kind of a soft rollout, make it a recommendation this year, kind of get
people used to this idea, then make it a requirement going forward.
This is a two-part process or two-fold reasons for that because ice swim already discusses
this and that we need to be doing, we should be doing this.
They provide 28 different pre-designed mitigation solutions to actually treat this as the total
suspended solids, and EPA is going to do an update where they're going to make this requirement
going forward also.
So in order for us to be in compliance with the EPA and our MS4 permit, we're going to
be needing to treat water quality.
Yes.
I have a question that may be outside your scope, but what kind of processes are they
or are you looking towards to treat stormwater runoff?
So like I said, ice swim has about 28 different options, bioswales, filtration systems, you
know, cartridge filter systems, something like that that will treat not just the volume
of water, but actually take a lot of that sediment out of the water before it goes into
the stormwater system.
So like if you have like a grass area or like a drainage swale that allows the water to
infiltrate into it, that material collects the solids or the silt or the clay and gets
cleaner water out into the system.
So who owns the stormwater facilities?
Doesn't the city own them?
That goes into our next bullet point.
So currently a lot of the stormwater facilities, we have some public and we have some private.
We don't have a good inventory of who owns what, and so we were actually putting in here
a stormwater maintenance agreement where when a private development or private facility
comes online, they sign an agreement with the city saying we own it, it's a type of
this property, here's how we operate and maintain it, and it's a requirement for them to operate
and maintain it where we can request records of it.
If they're not operating and maintaining it appropriately, the city can come in and operate
and maintain it, and then we're working on a mechanism to charge back to the property
owners that we've had to maintain this for them.
So this is being done in Fort Worth and other cities within the Metroplex.
We use Fort Worth as a go-by, as in a good example, so we built it off of that, but that's
coming forward.
So what would be an example of a development here in Denton that they'd have their own
private stormwater maintenance facilities?
So a lot of detention ponds in the city of Denton are owned by HOAs, and HOAs don't know
they own them, and so they're not properly maintaining them, so they have a lot of vegetation
growth, they're getting infiltrated with sediment, they have debris in them, so when storm events
happen, those detention ponds don't function and flood, create habitat for mosquitoes,
things like that where they need to be maintaining those, and there's no mechanism for us to
make them maintain them.
We don't have right of entry a lot of times to access them ourselves, we have to do record
research and what happens is that when a flood event happens, we get calls of city manager's
office saying, "We're flooding, go fix it," but we don't know it's not the city's, but
we go out and we fix it anyways, because that's what our obligation is.
So we need to figure out, we need to create a process where we can say, "Hey, we came
and fixed this for you guys in an event, we need you guys to help reverse the cost of
the city that we've had to expend to maintain these structures for you."
How are you going to monitor the stormwater runoff solids?
It's done through the design process.
So when they do the design calculations, it shows that what the percentage of the areas
that are straining, as long as you put these mitigation measures in, you can calculate
the runoff is, and then as long as we make sure that they're in construction that we
need to do, we're going to be able to monitor that.
I actually have an expert here from our watershed group.
Christy Upton will be able to answer some of those questions.
Christy Upton, Environmental Services.
I'm the Environmental Compliance Coordinator and monitoring for stormwater runoff.
So as Brett alluded to, the design process is the modeling or the idea of what this structure,
how it will function and how much pollutant will be removed.
The design is for sediment removal with the understanding, as the ice swim manual also
discusses, along with sediment removal.
Many of those pollutants of concern are also captured.
So those designs are meant to capture other pollutants in addition to the sediment.
So you're not really monitoring, you're doing that in the design phase.
You're theoretically stopping the sediment runoff through the design phase.
Pre-construction, yes.
Post-construction, there's two monitoring tools.
The first is to monitor for the function of the structure, which is why the maintenance
agreements are necessary to put the onus on the property owners to monitor for the maintenance
of those structures.
But secondly, our stormwater team, the watershed protection group, they do have a monthly stormwater
monitoring program, so there's monitoring sites across the city of Denton and they collect
samples, they've been collecting samples for over 20 years.
So we have trend data, we have knowledge about the quality of the stormwater coming off of
our land and we continue to monitor for concerns.
Is most of this complaint driven?
No, we have specific sites across the city that we have been collecting for over 20 years.
So we know those trends.
But are those including the HOA run or the citizen-owned drainage systems as well?
Correct.
So these monitoring sites were chosen for access, for points of collection, so you'll
have multiple streams coming together.
So while it's a great tool for us to know the quality of what's coming off of our land,
it's not a direct measurement of a specific facility and how well that specific facility
is doing.
But if they see something that's way off, it also can trigger for --
And then you start looking upstream at that point, yeah.
Correct.
All right.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
Before you go, I have a question, it may not be in your bailiwick, but so we're collecting
and stopping all this sediment from getting into the runoff, where does the sludge go?
Good question.
There's disposal rules on that.
Most of it can go into your general landfill unless there was a reason for concern.
But I think, for the most part, it's landfill.
Thank you.
All right.
And one of the other big changes that we're looking at this year is that when a project
develops a site, the site already naturally grades to different outfall points within
the property.
And so when a developer comes in and wants to come in and regrade the site, if they're
going to divert water, say, from outfalling from the west side of the site to the east
side of the site, require some additional diversion information and calculations to
make sure that we're not over flooding the flood control structures or the storm drain
system on that east side of the property.
We want to make sure that -- because it's already designed to account for the way the
flows go, so for changing it, we need to make sure that we're not causing any adverse impacts
in that direction.
And also, we actually added discussion as to what is considered an adverse impact or a
downstream impact.
And so it was never clearly defined.
It says you can't cause adverse impacts downstream or adverse impacts on neighboring properties.
It wasn't defined.
That's a, you know, subjective term is what is adverse impacts.
We actually had to define you cannot raise the flood level on a neighboring property.
For the transportation criteria manual this year, we were shorthanded on staff for a transportation
engineer.
We actually did hire one.
We have a new transportation services group, so they are going to be making more technical
updates this year.
The big change that we did is that we kept a lot of the technical the same, but we restructured
the entire document.
So before this document, I referred to it as kind of a Frankenstein document where everything
was just added to the bottom if we needed something, was added to the bottom.
And so this year, we reorganized it to make it flow coherently.
When someone's designing or looking at it, it all makes sense in the order that you read
it and you apply the criteria.
Given the technical changes that we did make, we were actually made aware by a developer,
a consultant engineer, that our profile grades did not make sense.
So our roads are crowned, and then you transition up to the driveway up to the pad.
Well, that transition from the crowned roadway to the driveway approach was not mathematically
possible to meet and have a sidewalk, et cetera, on it.
So we had to go back and reevaluate that and adjust that transition and fit in our technical
documents.
We've also added a Q&A analysis for gate entrances and drive-throughs to make sure that we're
not stacking vehicles back into traffic or into travel lanes.
We added, for the turn lane warrants, some factors to consider with its vehicles versus
trucks versus the crash history versus the history of the intersection, how it's functioning.
We had to outline all that because we were getting some pushback from the development
community as to is the need for a turn lane warranted or not.
And then we also added guidance on how to measure the distance from driveways to intersections.
That was one that's engineering convention is different on this one.
You measure from the center intersection to the driveway, from the back of the curb to
the driveway, from the right-of-way line to the driveway.
And so we discussed internally, and the best solution we came up with was from the back
of the curb.
Because if you're measuring from the center of the intersection, 50 feet to the driveway,
what if you have an intersection that's got four lanes and a turn lane on it?
Well, that 50 feet all of a sudden is now five feet at the back of the curb.
If you measure from the right-of-way line, when you go out to the field, you don't know
where the right-of-way line is.
You might have an easement, you might have utilities.
So back of the curb is an actual physical device or barrier that you can measure from
to the nearest driveway.
So that's what the direction we decided to go with.
For the water/wastewater updates, we prohibit the use of installing manholes, grates, et
cetera, in sidewalks, ramps, and driveways.
The reason that is that they're not ADA-approved devices or surfaces, and if you have to service
those manholes, you have to open them up.
Now you're blocking the sidewalk, you're blocking the driveway, you're taking the curb ramp
out of service.
So we need to have those off of those facilities so we can access them and not obstruct the
flow of people or of traffic or people.
We provided some additional guidance on the sizing of water meters.
Our water department had some confusion or concern with developers not knowing what size
meters to order, so we clarified that table and adjusted to make sure it's more clear.
We wanted a five-foot minimum separation from our sewer manholes and any other utility line,
so that way if we ever need to service the manhole, we can.
We don't have to relocate the utility that's adjacent to it to access the manhole and serve
us that manhole if we need to tap into it or repair it for any reason.
And then we also asked our lift stations to be designed to 100-year flood protection instead
of a 25-year flood protection.
Lift stations are considered critical infrastructure.
If they go down during the flood event, we have a serious issue.
Part of our FEMA community rating system is that we recommended that all critical infrastructures
be protected against 100-year flood, so this is putting us in compliance with the recommendations
from FEMA saying that we want to protect our city and prevent the flood risk.
So for the street light design criteria, this was actually adopted in, I want to say, late
October.
It was a new criteria manual.
We didn't make any changes.
We made, I think, very slight changes, just some wording changes to it, but the big thing
is that we just added it to this document, so that way it's all cohesive into one document.
One of the highlights of it is that we require lighting studies done on all streets except
for local residential roadways with a 30-mile-per-hour or less speed limit.
We require lighting to be spaced every 30 feet or over 250 feet for those residential
roads, and that we also put lighting requirements for intersections, cul-de-sacs, railroad crossings,
et cetera.
And the manual also outlines what are approved lumineers, hardware, poles, provides a list
of those.
That's what staff keeps on hand.
That's what staff knows how to operate and maintain, so we have all that listed out within
the criteria manual.
So for the -- the last thing that we added was an official design deviation section to
the criteria manual.
There's always been a variance procedure or a deviation procedure from the criteria manual.
It's been informal, it's been kind of administrative.
This outlines the steps, the requirements to -- if a designer or developer is unable
to meet the criteria within the document, a process to change the design or do different
criteria, provide a document in there, a form for them to fill out, and justification for
it.
It needs to be demonstrated on the hardship of the site, physical characteristics, something
that they -- that they don't have a control over cannot be a deviation because something
is expensive or hard, it's -- this is what the city needs to protect its infrastructure
and for the residents.
It cannot be a life safety issue that we want to get around, so we have a criteria for that.
And then those deviations go to the technical experts in the different fields to review,
evaluate, and make a recommendation if they need to be -- if they approve it or they disagree
with that deviation.
And then if they do disagree with it, it gives some language saying, okay, well, you can
resubmit additional information, you can have a meeting to kind of explain the case and
kind of go through the process of evaluating that further.
So next steps, after today, we plan to go to city council for a work session at a public
hearing and a proposed adoption on February 20th and with an effective date on March 1st.
And again, kind of the overall public outreach plan that we've gone through.
And if you have any questions, myself and all of our technical experts are here to answer
them.
>> Okay.
Questions?
>> I have --
>> Let's do a ride back.
I'm just so --
>> Sorry.
[laughter]
>> My first question is, you had a meeting with area engineering firms, personnel.
Did you receive significant feedback from the engineering community during the public
review comments?
>> We actually posted a form online, a comment response form so we can receive comments.
We have received a few, I don't remember exactly how many, a lot of -- excuse me, a lot of
the comments that we received is actually from internal staff from what they've seen.
It's a combination of what do we see in terms of the design variances or deviations that
we need to address receiving frequency of these ones or the comments that the staff
receives from developers that they're saying, "Oh, we're having a hard time meeting this.
This is a challenge.
This is not what the industry standard is."
So a lot of the comments come internally.
We have received a few from external, and we do our best to address those.
>> Well, I'm disappointed in my engineering brethren in that case, because it seems to
me that although all this standardization and confirmation, you know, conforming with other
upcoming standards is probably prudent, it seems to me we're adding a lot of cost to
development and those costs are going to affect the private sector, but they're also going
to affect future city projects.
Has there been any kind of cost trade-off risk assessment of these changes?
>> There has been some of the feedback we've received is that we've done a lot of updates
real frequently, and so our goal is to get this document to a point where we're comfortable
with it and not touch it for about five years, because we've gotten a lot of feedback that
they don't know -- the criteria is constantly changing.
We don't know what criteria may know the full -- to follow.
We can't estimate the cost.
We can't figure out how to apply these, because we're changing them yearly.
Well, when I got here two years ago, it was the first time they were updated since 2008,
so there are a long time in between updates, and now we're trying to get ourselves up to
current standards in a reasonable time, and it's just between staff demands and timing,
it's hard for us to get these updates done in one go.
So we're doing this kind of incremental approach, and then once we get it out to a certain point,
we want to leave it alone, let the industry kind of get used to this as the standard for
them.
>> Absorb it, so to speak.
>> Yeah.
>> Well, I serve on a standards committee, so I am familiar with this problem.
>> Yes.
>> I was wondering, is there some way we can get some kind of cost trade-off analysis on
some of these changes?
>> We can look into it.
We can ask the developers.
The changes that we're seeing on the design side are not super impactful from capital project
side or internal engineering design, because it's --
>> Well, let's see, Mike, for instance, the lighting, you made, I think, some pretty good
changes to the lighting requirements for street lighting, but there's going to be cost impact
to that, and they'll primarily be felt by the city.
>> It's going to be felt by the city, either through the contracts with the developments
coming in or felt by the city to actually have to install them themselves, because we're
having to go back and retrofit the lighting in a lot of locations and change the lighting
or add lighting ourselves for internal city costs.
So the cost is getting applied to the city one way or the other, unfortunately.
>> Okay.
Well, I understand that.
I'm just saying it looks to me like you're creating some cost issues.
I don't see any consideration of the cost risk tradeoff.
Is there some way that we can get some feedback on that?
>> I can definitely speak with staff and see if we can get some feedback on that, yes.
>> Thank you.
>> So I think --
>> Go ahead.
>> I'm just -- I'm trying to understand with the cost evaluation.
So the criteria manual implements code and policies set by city council.
So the cost of city council not having elected to have, you know, features in the neighborhoods
required by policy or code.
Is that --
>> Are you asking me or him?
>> Well, I'm just trying to understand.
I want to make a cost benefit analysis of not requiring street lights or not requiring
storm water detention.
>> We're increasing the number of street lights in the requirement or increasing the frequency,
additional locations that we have in our current design requirements.
That's kind of what I was thinking.
So if we're asking for more and we're asking for better, more and better costs more money.
So that's going to cost the city more money because primarily the city is responsible
for the street lighting.
>> Just a quick question just for clarification, Ali.
Is this just specific to street lighting or just kind of a general across all the criteria
manuals?
>> Since there's a sweeping review and standardization and modernization, the whole design criteria
manual.
>> Okay.
Yeah, we can certainly put together a cost impact analysis for the changes on the street
lights.
I mean, if it's going to take 10 more street lights, we know what the cost is of that based
on the criteria manual.
So we can certainly do that.
I just want to clarify that this was across the board for all the changes.
>> I just picked on the lighting because I thought it was the simplest and most straightforward.
>> Correct.
Okay.
>> So if you go ahead and you went years ago in the 2008 version, we changed our drainage
plans completely.
I mean, we went from 100-year floodplain to a 500-year floodplain design, I believe is
how it went.
And I called up King Arthur and he didn't remember exactly what the floods were that
year.
So Camelot, you know, is the reference.
>> That was a joke.
>> Anyway, yeah.
So it's all theoretical anyway.
But yeah, I remember that was a huge change in cost to developers.
Not that it wasn't necessary, but it was an issue in the middle of designs and the criteria
change.
And so they came in and asked for -- to use the existing when they filed.
But anyway, I think that's more what I would think was going to cost a heck of a lot more.
>> Yeah, the development.
And you've met with the development community and you have their feedback.
>> Correct.
>> Okay.
>> Yeah, and the big change I think last year we saw was that we were -- all the designs
seem to be a 100-year flood event for storm drain design.
But we've received comments and feedback from the community that -- and we know internally
that that's a big lift for projects to do, especially in-field projects that are redeveloping
in downtown or areas where they're now tying into an existing storm drain system.
And to have them to design to 100-year, okay, great, they can put 100-year in, but they
have to chase that storm drain system down to where it no longer has an impact, which
might be down to Lake Louisville, and that's not realistic.
So we provided provisions last year to allow -- to design to a smaller storm event knowing
that incremental improvement is better than no improvement and trying to balance the cost
of the incremental improvement versus -- no improvement versus the improvement that we
want.
So we've already kind of built that in last year's updates.
Other questions?
Just -- you kind of answered it just a bit about the development community, but did -- you
did have -- did you have any input out there that just came in and y'all had aha moments
-- oh, we didn't catch that or we didn't think of -- I mean, that -- it's got to happen,
right?
The one that had that was the driveway -- the transition from the roadway to the driveway.
So we actually had a development come in.
It was a green field development, and they were asking for a variance or deviation to
the transition, and we're like, it's a flat lot.
You don't need a variance for this.
Just design it appropriately.
So we kind of went back and forth with them, and they're like, no, you don't understand.
We can't design it, and we're like, explain it to us.
We actually got into a meeting with them and drew it up and ran the math, ran a traverse
of the site around in a circle and said, we mathematically -- you mathematically cannot
meet these grades that you're asking for in your criteria manual.
I was like, holy smokes, how long have we had this?
And he basically outlined and said, every development that's come in since you've had
this has not met your standard.
You either have to ask for a deviation or they've built it incorrectly and not told
you about it.
And so --
>> Or not got caught.
Exactly.
So we kind of had to go back and go, when do we make this change?
Why do we make this change?
And then what are other agencies or what is the recommendation we should go going forward?
So we addressed that this year and corrected that.
>> I know that I've been involved with developments where, you know, the goal is to follow the
existing grade, whatever possible, right, and then design the rods around them.
And so in doing that, you end up having slopes like this and slopes like that all over the
place, which are not good design, obviously, for a home.
We're not responsible for everybody's home, don't get me wrong, but just comment on that.
I know drainage is a huge issue, and I'm glad to hear that somebody actually came up with
some good ideas from the outside, because that's important.
>> So the next step is public hearing.
>> Next step is that we're going to present this presentation or a very similar version
of it to City Council on the 20th, February 20th, and then that night, open up the public
hearing and propose these documents for adoption or this new document for adoption.
>> Do you have what you need from us?
>> Yes.
Thank you very much.
>> Thank you.
All right.
It is 10.03.
Do we have a motion to adjourn?
>> Absolutely.