WEBVTT

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 - Good morning, I'd like to call the Public Utility Board meeting of Monday, October 28th,

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 2024 to order. We'll start out recognizing any public comments. Are there any public comments,

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 comments from the public? There's none. We'll move on to the regular meeting. That is part of the

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 regular meeting, excuse me. Two, there are no items on the consent agenda, so we'll go straight

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 into the items for individual consideration. Item A is the consider approval of the October 14th,

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 2024 minutes. Are there any changes or discussion? If not, we'll entertain them. Go ahead, I'm sorry.

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 - So I do have to say, I like the new format of the minutes. I think there's a lot more detail in

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 there. It talks about the discussion a little bit more, and with that, I'd move approval of the

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 minutes. - We have a motion for Mr. Taylor. I entertain a second. - Second. - We have a

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 second for Mr. Rayner. All those in favor, please say aye. - Aye. - It passes unanimously. Item B,

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 PUB 24-193, this is consider recommending an adoption of an ordinance to the City of

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 Denton to Texas Home Rule Corporation, authorizing the manager to execute a contract with HM and MFLTD.

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 Doing business is muckaroo in fouls. - Good morning. Gio Pignato, project manager,

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 Capital Projects. I'm here to present again the Denton Solid Weight Fleet Shop. I want to go to

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 the project overview. This is our new, yes, sir? - I'd like you to get a little more alignment with

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 the microphone. I'm having a little trouble hearing you. - What about now? - Say again. - Yes,

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 what about now? - Better. Thank you. - Okay. The project overview, this is a new facility

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 that will help alleviate the main fleet shop at 804 Texas Street, and it will reduce the travel

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 time between the solid waste and the landfill, which is about 10 miles round trip.

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 The project schedule will stay the same. It's one year during construction, the construction phase.

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 - Giovanni, excuse me, can you make that full screen if you're able to? - Let me see how I do that.

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 Can we clear it in the bigger? The project schedule, it will stay the same. It's one year

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 during construction phase. The recommendation, the staff recommend the contract with muckaroo in fouls.

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 And we took your question last time, and we went to operation, and

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 some stakeholders, and they are here if you have more questions.

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 - Okay. Would anybody like to start out with any questions? - Yes. I'm looking at the pricing

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 evaluation sheet, and it would appear that the selected contractor is not the lowest by a pretty

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 good margin. I see on your point scale that they did rate slightly higher. I'm curious how much of

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 a weighting factor the points are over the overall cost of the project from the bid standpoint.

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 - I will have my supervisor for that question. - Okay.

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 Billy, I was just trying to beat you to the punch on this. - I'm going to let you guys go first.

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 - Good morning board members. Seth Garcia, deputy director of capital projects. So for this one,

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 price is 40%. Qualifications are 60%. - Well, I did notice a reasonably substantial

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 spread in the pricing from low to high of a million dollars on a less than 10 million dollar

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 project. - Yes, sir. - So it just left me wondering if there is a little more to it than just the

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 scoring process. - Yeah. Again, I think some of its familiarity with this kind of building,

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 again, the two lowest bids did not show significant experience with any kind of fleet shop,

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 which led to a deduct in points on their proposal side. And then again, anytime you don't have the

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 experience, we worry about the cost factors and making sure they have all items of the scope

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 included in their bid. Again, that's where the top two, we were a little more comfortable with

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 where those numbers came in at. Still overall, compared to our engineer's estimate, we were about

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 a million dollars underneath what our engineer thought the OPCC was going to be. - So within the

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 initial budget estimate, we were still well within. - Correct. Yeah, I think we're in between one and

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 1.2 million in savings right now. - Okay. Well, I have no further questions. - All right. - Thank you.

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 - Mr. Rayner, Mr. Taylor, any questions? - And I will say, we do have Tom Grammer here with Fleet

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 to address some of those questions that you guys had earlier about contract savings or the offsetting

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 of 804. We want him to come up and speak to that just a little bit, if that would help. - Would that be, yes, I like that. - Yeah.

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 - Good morning, everybody. Tom Grammer, Director of Facilities and Fleet. So this fleet shop here is going to

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 help alleviate not only the work at 804 Texas Street, find efficiencies in travel, but give our staff

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 members the applicable working conditions that they do not have currently. Right now, we have five

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 technicians servicing the solid waste fleet and we only have two bays. A lot of the technicians are

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 working in the parking lot and in the weather, whether it be hot, cold, raining, and indifferent.

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 So what this shop does is it provides the necessary grounds to do the work, which through our fleet

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 study says if you can have the proper facilities and tools, you will be more efficient as an

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 operation. So by building this facility and giving the technicians the appropriate space to work in,

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 we should be able to turn around a better uptime for solid waste and overall create a better and

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 more efficient fleet for them to operate with. - So how many bays will this building have then?

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 - Six, sir. - Six. - Yep. - Currently, how much work are the technicians having to do remote

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 outside the building and parking lot? - Well, we only have two bays and there's five technicians, so

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 I think the math on that would be... - 60%? - 60%. - How much of that outside work do they

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 have to actually travel to a vehicle that is broken down or in need of service outside the

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 facility? - Right. So for the most part, any vehicle that breaks down is towed to us. There's

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 a parking lot outside of the facility where the vehicles are stored waiting for repairs or being

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 repaired right outside of the doors. - Thank you. - Of course. - Do you know how much money we're

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 going to save by building our own facility? - It's hard to say. I know that our operational

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 efficiency will increase and therefore turn into a dollar saved by downtime. We spend hundreds of

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 thousands of dollars on these vehicles and every minute that they're sitting in the parking lot

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 broken and unable to be repaired, there's money lost through depreciation and then the availability

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 to pick up trash. So by creating the space and bringing these vehicles in and increasing our

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 uptime, we will see a savings on the backside of that. It's hard to say the dollar amount currently.

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 - So you did an analysis of the way that it's being done now outside repairs and such versus

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 having it inside and what were your numbers then? - Yeah, so we had an operational study conducted

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 in fleet, I think it was 2020, and they noted that when you do not have the appropriate equipment or

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 the space, you lose operational efficiency as technicians, which then turns into more downtime

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 because we can't get the vehicles inside. So by giving a technician each technician their own bay,

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 bringing them in from the elements, having all the appropriate space will increase our technician

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 efficiency. Could be 20, 30, 60 percent, right? If we have five technicians and three of them

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 are working outside, just bringing them inside to have those bays and tools available will increase

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 the capacity of our shop out there. - And will we be needing to hire any more technicians

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 since we have six bays now? - Not with the current facility, but as the city grows and expands into

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 the future, we will need additional technicians. More trucks you add to the fleet, the more work

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 will be needed, but this facility is not requiring any additional FTEs. - And do you have it designed

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 where it can be expanded? - Yes. - Okay, thank you. - Of course.

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 - Well, since you bring that up, I'm looking at the artists or the architects rendition of the building

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 and I see three bays. I'm assuming they're opposed since you have six. - Yes, sir. - So how can the

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 building be expanded? I'm just looking at the drawing. I'm just asking to expand it out. - So

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 when we were looking at the floor plan here and the site layout, we orientated the building a lot

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 where if there's ever a need to expand the facility, we're able to add on to the end of the building.

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 One side has the administrative spaces, which will always be fixed. The other end is just the

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 end of the bay doors, right, under the bay wall. So you can continue to build out on that if necessary.

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 - All right, so the bays can be expanded outward parallel to the existing bays. - Correct. Yeah, so

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 we would continue moving on towards this direction. - Okay, just looking at the building,

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 it was very symmetrical, so it can be expanded. Thank you. - Of course. - What is...

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 Jumped out and ran across over here just a second. Oh, the repair ratio, in other words,

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 what is an average month as to truck repairs that would be needed for that facility? - I can grab

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 that information for you, sir. - I'm just thinking, and I know you keep the garbage trucks in good

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 shape and such, but I'm just wondering, you know, are we looking at an average of let's say three or

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 four because of the amount of stress you put on those vehicles and such that you normally go in

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 there a month or what? - Well, every vehicle has a preventative maintenance schedule, and we see them

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 three to four times a year guaranteed just for oil changes, brake chops, things of that nature.

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 Then all of the other repairs that are unforeseen, if there's a, if the operators run into a curb and

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 break something, or if a hydraulic line snaps and we have to replace it outside the normal PM

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 schedule, we often see trucks in more than their PM schedule for repairs in that nature. - Yeah,

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 I would think so, yeah. - Okay, Mr. Rabak. - So in general terms, just in a broad brush of things,

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 how much do we spend on vehicle maintenance a year? - For solid waste? - For solid waste for this

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 fleet that you manage? - I don't know the number right now. Brian may have the number? No? Okay,

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 so we can get that number to you. I have the overall fleet numbers. - If it's not vitally important,

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 I think you need the building. I'll look for it. I'm just curious. So for instance, you're spending

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 a million dollars or two million dollars a year. If you're 10% more efficient, then that's a savings

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 of a hundred or $200,000. I was just trying to think of some beneficial way to frame this,

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 but that's fine. Thank you very much. You don't need to get back to us with that. I was just

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 curiosity. Thank you. - So just to follow up, you said you have the overall fleet number of kind of

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 annual fleet maintenance cost? - Yeah. So the fleet operation runs $17 million annually,

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 and that's to service all vehicles throughout the city, general fund, and utilities.

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 - And so it looks like solid waste, I'm reading the other report that you put together for this

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 meeting, is 114 vehicles, and that's about almost 20%, 18% of the total fleet? - Yes. - And they're

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 probably very high mile vehicles? - Not high mileage, but definitely they're heavy duty

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 application. They get used. - Maybe high hours. They're driven eight hours a day or something like

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 that. Thank you. - Of course. - Okay. So I mean, I think the point of the conversation was, I mean,

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 I used to buy a lot of things and propose a lot of capital expenditures, and I had to prove why they

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 were going to be valuable to the company that I worked for, and I didn't get to build them if I

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 couldn't prove there was a use, and I mean, you were spending, you know, nine, nine and a half

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 million dollars here, a million dollars more than the lower bidder, so I mean, there's obviously a

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 million dollars there that is really unaccounted for. I mean, you've put it in here, you want to

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 use these guys because they've experienced building this kind of building, which sounds like a pretty

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 simple, what is it, tilt wall? - It is tilt wall construction. - Yeah, tilt wall construction is pretty

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 vanilla, so I bet you do, but you know, it would have been nice. We asked all these questions.

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 I mean, they were out there, and I don't think anybody doesn't support you in this

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 venture, but sure would be nice to know why and to be able to explain to people, hey, we're building

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 this because here's what it's going to save us in the long run, and we don't really have that

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 information. I mean, do we? I mean, am I missing it? - We have the information, sir. I can go collect

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 that and provide it to the board. What we're really gaining here is the capacity to service the vehicles,

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 which that will keep them on the road longer, and then the end user experience will be better. We

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 won't miss trash collections. We won't miss pickups. That's really what it comes down to. Now,

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 the dollar amount of what we're saving, I can go generate that number for you, but we ask what the

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 value is. The value is being able to service the citizens in a stronger capacity. - I think, yeah,

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 I think we get that. I don't think that's an issue at all. I really don't. Yes, Mr. Ryback,

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 you want to follow up with that? - I do want to follow up with that. I think the point he's trying

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 to make is be very helpful if you have this information before you go to council. - Of course.

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 Or maybe not, but anyway. Okay, any further discussion? If not, I'll entertain a motion.

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 - Moves. So moved to approve. - Mr. Ryback has made a motion to approve. Is there a second?

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 - Second. - Mr. Taylor has made the second. All those in favor, please say aye.

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 - Aye. Any opposed, sign the same. All right, passes unanimously. Thank you, sir. - Thank you.

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 - All right, we've got individual item C, PUB 24-224, consider recommending adoption

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 of an ordinance of the city of Gittin, establishing the schedule of rates for electric service.

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 Are we staying here for this? Okay. - Yes, this is all open attention. - Gotcha.

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 - Good morning, PUB and members of the board, Vispopentavong, ADF Finance,

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 and here to present the ECA adjustment and transmission cost recovery factor.

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 Looking at this chart, basically, it provides two scenarios, right? The first scenario is really

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 maintaining the ECA at its current rate. And basically, the second scenario to the right is

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 reducing the ECA down from the current rate. So if you look at the current rate, if we leave it as is,

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 in March of 2025, our over and under would be around $7.2 million. If we adjust it downwards,

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 the rate would be, I mean, that actual balance would be around $4 million. So, and our original

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 forecast back in July for the year end for September, we were thinking would it be under

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 recovering by $2.8 million, but actually, we actually over recovered by $2.5 million on the ECA.

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 So now this slide, we discussed the TCRF. The TCRF is the transmission cost recovery factor.

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 So on the left side is really maintaining the rates as is. So by September 2025,

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 we would actually be under collecting or under recovering by close to $5.8 million.

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 If we adjust our rate to the new rate, which will be on the next slide,

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 we would be around $50,000 over collecting or right on getting close to zero. And

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 with this methodology, we're hoping to get as close as possible to zero.

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 So this slide just shows again what our current rate is for the ECA, which 0.0515,

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 and our proposed rate is 0.0416. And on the TCRF, this is for all the different

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 customer class within the TCRF rate. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Are you proposing to lower

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 rates? Yes. Can you put an advertisement out there on a billboard? Because that's the only

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 advertisement we're going to get. Okay. That's fine.

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 And let me just interrupt. So just to be clear, right, so the proposal that this is talking about

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 is to lower the ECA, but we're increasing the TCRF. The net impact of that will be a reduction. I just

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 want to be clear with the board. And just remember the TCRF, we reinstated that in April, right? And

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 so we've not made any adjustments to TCRF until now. And the plan, the hope is that we would do

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 that on an annual basis, not necessarily quarterly basis, but I just want to give you that additional

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 context. Yep. No worries. Sorry. Oh, no. And back to the TCRF. So the residential and the GS small

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 would go from 0.0135 to 0.0176. The GS medium would go from $3.85 to $5.02, and the GS large

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 would go from $5.34 to $6.95. So here is kind of the picture of the monthly bill. So overall,

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 as you can see for the four different classes of rate payers and the ECA and the TCRF combined,

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 it's a reduction of 1% for the overall bill. Just a question for myself. The GS small versus

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 medium large, is that how much power is being demanded, or are we talking about the size of

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 the footprint? I'm just curious. It would be the demand, because that's hard. So give me, if I may,

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 an average, let's say, I would think the large would be like universities, things like that. I

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 mean, this would be large, Peterbilt and all. Medium, would that be like a 50,000 square foot

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 strip center? Yeah, Walmart. I'm just trying so I can picture that. And then small would be like

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 your 10,000 square foot strip center. Convenience store. Yes, things along that line. Mom and pop

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 shops, too. Okay. Thank you very much. Questions? I have a few questions. So could we return to the

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 slide on the ECA, the chart slide? So in the TCRF, you have that calculated out through the end of

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 fiscal year, through summer of next year, through Q3 of next year. And in the past, we've experienced

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 the highest energy prices, the most outlay by DME, the highest load, all that stuff, is Q3 calendar.

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 This forecast ends in March. Is the thinking that we're going to have kind of a seasonal

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 rate we'll set like in the fall, we'll set like a winter rate, and then we'll look at the forecast

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 for summer energy, and we'll set kind of a summer rate? So do we expect to have an up-down movement?

00:20:53.520 --> 00:20:59.840
 Or do we need to extend this forecast out to the end of the fiscal year? So when we look at this

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 internally, we certainly look at it for a ninth month period at a time, right? And so one of the

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 things that we had communicated to the board and also to the council is that now that we've kind of

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 almost gone a year of really kind of looking at this calculation, the goal is to try to keep things

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 pretty even, right? So even at the proposed 462, if I look at where do we think, based on the current

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 forecast, where we're going to be, we'll be slightly above that policy limitation. We'll be,

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 I think the number I have is about 5.5 million. So while we could potentially make an additional

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 reduction here, the fact of the matter is, the closer we get to that projection, the more we'll

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 know. So next quarter, if we come back, and if the projections are still true, we may very well look

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 at another reduction, right? But I think the ultimate goal is to try to have the ECA stay

00:21:52.160 --> 00:21:56.080
 pretty stable throughout the year so that we're not having these peaks and valleys, and it gives a lot

00:21:56.080 --> 00:22:04.240
 more certainty to our customers. Okay, and I also noticed, so is this a fund balance of about 4

00:22:04.240 --> 00:22:11.360
 million, or is this a fund overage of about 4 million? It's a fund overage, so it's a separate

00:22:11.360 --> 00:22:18.880
 account that we're keeping, and that balance in that account cannot go less than 5 million dollars,

00:22:18.880 --> 00:22:24.800
 it cannot go above 5 million, and that's the test that we look at when we're looking at

00:22:24.800 --> 00:22:31.360
 at this quarterly review. So less than negative 5 million? Yeah, it can go down as much as

00:22:31.360 --> 00:22:37.040
 negative 5 million. And so the target is zero? Yeah, the problem is if you make this go all the

00:22:37.040 --> 00:22:42.320
 way down to negative 5 million, then next quarter we'll come back, we're gonna have to bump it up

00:22:42.320 --> 00:22:46.640
 again, and one of the things that we keep hearing from customers is we understand you gotta raise

00:22:46.640 --> 00:22:52.080
 rates, but when you do a 20% rate increase all at once, that's what we're trying to avoid here.

00:22:52.080 --> 00:22:57.280
 When we listen to our customers and try to make sure that we cut as much of that variance as

00:22:57.280 --> 00:23:01.840
 possible. Yeah, and that's my concern with not showing summer. We expect summer prices to be

00:23:01.840 --> 00:23:06.960
 on average about twice as high for energy as the rest of the year, so, and, you know, we had

00:23:06.960 --> 00:23:14.320
 25, 20, it's almost 30 million dollar kind of price shock in the last year and a half, so I want to

00:23:14.320 --> 00:23:21.760
 make sure we're, the board understands that, you know, we've got that high risk period kind of in

00:23:21.760 --> 00:23:27.040
 the summer, and that we can see it, you know, just even knowing where we're going to enter

00:23:27.040 --> 00:23:32.240
 summer at, you know, and maybe 4 million's enough. I just worry if we had another, you know, I can't

00:23:32.240 --> 00:23:40.000
 remember the exact number, but 20 or 25 million dollar unexpected energy cost. That's, and Mr.

00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:43.920
 Taylor, I mean, we certainly looked at that scenario. The scenario that we looked at was,

00:23:43.920 --> 00:23:50.400
 what if we kept the ECA the way it's at, at that rate, but I think based on our current forecast,

00:23:50.400 --> 00:23:56.320
 we're going to show a huge, potentially a huge increase if our power forecast is accurate, right,

00:23:56.320 --> 00:24:00.720
 and so, so then you're going to have to come back and make an even a bigger reduction, right, and so,

00:24:00.720 --> 00:24:05.440
 so we thought kind of stair stepping this might be kind of hedging our bets a little bit to make

00:24:05.440 --> 00:24:10.560
 sure that we cut, cut those huge swings and how they impact our customers. Yeah, definitely, I

00:24:10.560 --> 00:24:14.560
 definitely agree with that kind of rate stability. I just want to make sure that we're looking far

00:24:14.560 --> 00:24:23.440
 enough out to keep the rate stable through, through next summer. I also, I wish we had a little more

00:24:23.440 --> 00:24:27.440
 information. I know some of this is competitive, but I wish we had a little more information on

00:24:27.440 --> 00:24:34.000
 kind of the source of the change in the forecast. There's an old joke about economists, like an

00:24:34.000 --> 00:24:37.840
 economist will give you their predictions for what's going to happen next year, and you have

00:24:37.840 --> 00:24:41.360
 them back next year, and they'll give you all the reasons why what they said would happen didn't

00:24:41.360 --> 00:24:48.000
 happen. You know, a little bit of that where, you know, like is this, we're, we did a little better

00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:56.720
 than perhaps expected because maybe loads were lower or maybe our PPA's output was higher or,

00:24:56.720 --> 00:25:02.160
 you know, hedge price, you know, long-term hedge prices were lower than forecast or the deck did

00:25:02.160 --> 00:25:08.720
 well. Just kind of very simple, like we were looking at this and it, and we had kind of wins

00:25:08.720 --> 00:25:15.040
 here and losses here, and the net was, you know, to our benefit or to our, you know, deck tournament.

00:25:15.040 --> 00:25:20.320
 Yeah, and we could certainly do that if the board would like that. If you remember, you know,

00:25:20.320 --> 00:25:25.760
 the council didn't fully delegate to the board's decision, but certainly you're looking at this

00:25:25.760 --> 00:25:31.760
 on an individual consideration basis, the council will look at this on a consent agenda basis,

00:25:31.760 --> 00:25:35.280
 right? So if there's additional information, whether if it's, you know, certainly if it's

00:25:35.280 --> 00:25:39.520
 competitive, we can always propose a closed session and go through those numbers. I can tell you,

00:25:39.520 --> 00:25:44.800
 we went through all of those different scenarios internally to get to where we are, and so it would

00:25:44.800 --> 00:25:49.360
 not be a big lift for us to do the same thing here with the board. It'll just take a little

00:25:49.360 --> 00:25:54.880
 bit more time, but we can certainly do that if that's your desire. Yeah, so I think if next

00:25:54.880 --> 00:26:01.840
 quarter, just one slide on kind of the general trends of maybe the four biggest factors that are

00:26:01.840 --> 00:26:09.840
 affecting ECA, RECA. Now on the TCRF, I did have a question, I think it's two slides, like one more

00:26:09.840 --> 00:26:16.400
 slide. On this one, are those demand charges on the medium and large, are they for CP or are they

00:26:16.400 --> 00:26:28.720
 like an NCP demand? Do you all know what the... Yeah, so the basis is what their usage was the prior

00:26:28.720 --> 00:26:34.880
 year. I'm just wondering if that's that summer coincident peak or if it's just a general...

00:26:34.880 --> 00:26:41.040
 Just a general, yeah, just general. Did you say historical? Well, demand always looks back,

00:26:41.040 --> 00:26:52.000
 but that's 12 months. Yeah, so I was just trying to... I believe our transmission cost of service

00:26:52.000 --> 00:26:58.960
 charges are based on our four CP contribution, right? That's correct, that's correct. So our

00:26:58.960 --> 00:27:05.600
 contribution is based on that four CP is calculated every year. Now the way that we've... So the total

00:27:05.600 --> 00:27:10.320
 estimated cost that we're trying to recover that we're going to be paying out is about $30 million.

00:27:10.320 --> 00:27:19.440
 We get the annual matrix, I think it's in March, and so normally there's a little bit of a delay,

00:27:19.440 --> 00:27:25.280
 and then there's adjustments throughout the year that change that a little bit. So in our estimation,

00:27:25.280 --> 00:27:32.320
 we've included kind of a historical look at how much has come in after the matrix has been released,

00:27:32.320 --> 00:27:36.720
 and that's how we get to the $30 million, and of course then we're just backing into for each

00:27:36.720 --> 00:27:41.600
 customer what that would be. Right, and I guess one last question. Our largest customer

00:27:41.600 --> 00:27:49.680
 have specific contracts on... Do those demand charges change with these changes or are those

00:27:49.680 --> 00:27:56.080
 fixed by that contract? So in that contract, we've stipulated that they are fully responsible for any

00:27:56.080 --> 00:28:03.120
 incremental increase to our transmission costs as a result of their usage. And so they're not

00:28:03.120 --> 00:28:08.400
 necessarily paying this KVA charge, they're just paying a calculation of exactly their contribution.

00:28:08.400 --> 00:28:15.760
 Correct. All right, yeah, I think in general this is good news that rates are going down,

00:28:15.760 --> 00:28:21.600
 you know, energy rates going down almost 10% here, and the transmission cost recovery is

00:28:21.600 --> 00:28:31.040
 by a percentage rate is going up like 30%, but that's only like 0.4 cents, so not terrible. I

00:28:31.040 --> 00:28:37.440
 think the, you know, we have to cover our transmission cost of service, so it's something

00:28:37.440 --> 00:28:47.200
 we just, we can't avoid. Those are all my comments. Okay, yeah. I like the idea of us getting a kind

00:28:47.200 --> 00:28:54.160
 of reassessment in another quarter or so, not to hold up your process and moving forward with that,

00:28:54.160 --> 00:29:01.040
 but I'm comfortable that you still have a pretty good cushion calculating all this out so that if

00:29:01.040 --> 00:29:06.560
 there are some unforeseen activities that you'll still be in pretty good shape. So, but I like the

00:29:06.560 --> 00:29:11.920
 idea of getting just kind of a quick review and update at the end of the quarter. Thank you.

00:29:11.920 --> 00:29:18.240
 Thanks, guys. Yeah, good idea. Okay.

00:29:18.240 --> 00:29:27.440
 Was there any more on that? Got another one, David? I'm ready to move approval on the second.

00:29:27.440 --> 00:29:31.760
 Okay, we have a motion from Mr. Taylor and a second from Mr. Rybak.

00:29:31.760 --> 00:29:36.320
 She has asked me to announce these things, so that's why I'm being a little more diligent today.

00:29:37.040 --> 00:29:44.560
 All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. All right.

00:29:44.560 --> 00:29:54.480
 We have a work session. Oh, I'm sorry, skipped page. Management reports, Tony.

00:29:54.480 --> 00:30:01.200
 So, Mr. Chair, members of the board, so we have a few items here for you. We had a follow-up memo

00:30:01.200 --> 00:30:08.000
 to you on electric vehicle information. I think, Mr. Taylor, you had requested that about a year

00:30:08.000 --> 00:30:14.400
 ago, and Tom's here if you have any additional questions on that. And then we also have a follow-up

00:30:14.400 --> 00:30:20.320
 from finance on the utility system revenue bonds that were issued for the water department. So,

00:30:20.320 --> 00:30:25.520
 if you have any questions for Tom or Jessica, they are both here and happy to walk you through

00:30:25.520 --> 00:30:35.040
 any questions you have on those two memos. We have one question on the electric vehicle comparison.

00:30:35.040 --> 00:30:48.080
 Good morning. So, I see you have a good bullet point list of kind of benefits and experiences.

00:30:49.040 --> 00:30:57.440
 I was hoping for kind of like, I think I'm a solid waste question, like maybe number of work

00:30:57.440 --> 00:31:04.960
 orders or hours of work order maintenance, preventative maintenance and unexpected or

00:31:04.960 --> 00:31:12.080
 whatever the non-preventative maintenance is called. Yeah. Are you seeing higher or lower

00:31:12.080 --> 00:31:17.440
 maintenance effort on the light vehicles? Yeah, absolutely. So, when it comes to electric

00:31:17.440 --> 00:31:22.960
 vehicle light duty applications, we see initial purchase prices that are higher than internal

00:31:22.960 --> 00:31:28.800
 combustion engines. However, over the period of life cycle, we do see up to 30 percent of reduced

00:31:28.800 --> 00:31:32.800
 preventative maintenance and repair needs of that vehicle, which generate the cost value. So,

00:31:32.800 --> 00:31:39.040
 initial purchase price, you know, but you get some efficiency by not seeing it in the shop as

00:31:39.040 --> 00:31:43.120
 frequent. Of course, they don't need oil changes. They have less mechanical moving parts. So,

00:31:43.120 --> 00:31:48.720
 we do see a reduction in maintenance costs through the life cycle of the vehicles. Thank you. Of

00:31:48.720 --> 00:31:52.320
 course. Yeah, that would have been, you put that on here. That's a lot easier for us to remember.

00:31:52.320 --> 00:31:59.520
 So, what about the replacement of battery packs? So far, none of our vehicles that we have in the

00:31:59.520 --> 00:32:04.160
 fleet require that. So, we don't have any experience on the replacement of battery packs. Ideally,

00:32:04.160 --> 00:32:07.760
 with our turnover time of vehicles, when we see them at the end of their life cycle, we would be

00:32:07.760 --> 00:32:12.080
 auctioning them off before we have any of those catastrophic repairs. So, the city's plan is not

00:32:12.080 --> 00:32:16.960
 to replace the battery packs, but to replace the vehicle. Well, through our fleet model currently,

00:32:16.960 --> 00:32:21.760
 we obviously do not want to keep vehicles 10, 15 years, right? That provides higher maintenance

00:32:21.760 --> 00:32:27.040
 costs the longer we own the vehicle. These battery packs seem to be lasting 10 years before we see

00:32:27.040 --> 00:32:30.720
 any issues with them in the marketplace, not fleet specifically. So, ideally, through our current

00:32:30.720 --> 00:32:34.400
 model that we have where we're attempting to turn over vehicles at a faster rate to reduce long-term

00:32:34.400 --> 00:32:40.240
 maintenance costs, we shouldn't see any of those unless it's a warranty repair or an anomaly. So,

00:32:40.240 --> 00:32:46.240
 your daily mileage is low enough that you don't reach the threshold of the battery cycles then?

00:32:46.240 --> 00:32:51.680
 It all depends on the use. Some departments may, some not. Right now, we don't see that as being a

00:32:51.680 --> 00:32:56.480
 problem. The light duty electric applications are used locally and in town, so we don't see a heavy

00:32:56.480 --> 00:33:00.320
 duty cycle in the batteries. The reason I ask the question is I have a couple friends who bought

00:33:00.320 --> 00:33:06.560
 hybrids or electric vehicles, and they drive them regularly to and from work and so on and so forth,

00:33:06.560 --> 00:33:12.240
 and they run about four and a half to five years and poof, battery. Yes, I believe one of our oldest

00:33:12.240 --> 00:33:19.120
 vehicles is a 2017 or 19 in that fleet, and we haven't had any concerns with that vehicle as of

00:33:19.120 --> 00:33:22.800
 now. Okay, well as long as we're not replacing the battery packs, I guess we don't have the cost to

00:33:22.800 --> 00:33:29.760
 worry about. Thank you. Correct, yes sir. So, I was wondering if this dovetails into the electric

00:33:29.760 --> 00:33:38.000
 stations. Six I think we were looking at at one time. Once those are fully in operation, I'm assuming

00:33:38.000 --> 00:33:43.280
 well we've got two now or how many do we, do you know? I think we have six or seven. I believe

00:33:43.280 --> 00:33:47.920
 it's in the, it should be in the memo. I missed it, that's why I'm asking. But anyway, with that

00:33:47.920 --> 00:33:55.680
 being the case, that will help you with some of the information that we've been talking about,

00:33:55.680 --> 00:34:00.880
 would it not? It would. Okay, but the six, I didn't realize that the six, I missed it, but the

00:34:00.880 --> 00:34:06.400
 six locations have already been identified. Yes, we have through our fleet purchasing process as an

00:34:06.400 --> 00:34:10.160
 electric vehicle is brought into the fleet, the question is asked to the user, do you have adequate

00:34:10.160 --> 00:34:13.840
 charging at the facility that you're going to be parking this unit? Most of the time, it's just a

00:34:13.840 --> 00:34:18.720
 level one that's required. We don't see the demand need for a level two charger for the capacity of

00:34:18.720 --> 00:34:22.720
 the batteries, so we're able to put an external plug on the facility so that we can use a level

00:34:22.720 --> 00:34:27.360
 one charger. Only a few locations require a level two. It's those high use areas. I believe Solid

00:34:27.360 --> 00:34:32.560
 Waste has a couple of them. DME may have one. Fleet has one, obviously, so we can charge faster

00:34:32.560 --> 00:34:36.880
 so we can get that vehicle back out on the road. But for the most part, we see the level ones as

00:34:36.880 --> 00:34:42.880
 the true need and we can provide that at the time of vehicle purchase. Thank you. Of course.

00:34:42.880 --> 00:34:51.600
 So you, I think last year when we approved one level three charger, like a fast charger,

00:34:51.600 --> 00:34:56.960
 has that one been constructed yet? Was that for the fire department? It was just, it was a single

00:34:56.960 --> 00:35:02.000
 blanket item that was one level three charger, several level two chargers. It was the six million

00:35:02.000 --> 00:35:07.280
 dollar. Yeah, multi-year contract. Yeah. I don't know, so I don't know if the fast charger's been

00:35:07.280 --> 00:35:14.720
 built yet. I was just curious. I'm unaware of that. Steve Austin, Bionic Man. Yeah, we'll have to go

00:35:14.720 --> 00:35:20.720
 back and take a look at that, Mr. Taylor, but I know we had, the city had submitted an application

00:35:20.720 --> 00:35:27.200
 for a DC charger and level two chargers and we did not obtain that. And so then we ended up installing,

00:35:27.200 --> 00:35:34.000
 I think, two level two chargers at Development Services. So that I'm aware of, I don't know if

00:35:34.000 --> 00:35:38.000
 we have a DC charger, but let's go back and take a look at that and we'll get back with you.

00:35:42.160 --> 00:35:52.080
 Okay, everybody's good. All right. Thank you. So Mr. Chair, no other updates on the future agenda

00:35:52.080 --> 00:35:56.240
 or new business. So if there's certainly something that you'd like to see, please let us know.

00:35:56.240 --> 00:36:01.680
 We will try to schedule and start, you know, having a little more formality for when we'll

00:36:01.680 --> 00:36:06.320
 come back to you on a quarterly basis with the ECA and we'll start putting that on the calendar

00:36:06.320 --> 00:36:15.120
 that way you know when that's going to happen. Mr. Ryback. I did have a quick question on the

00:36:15.120 --> 00:36:32.720
 revenue bonds. Good morning, maybe. Jessica Williams, Chief Financial Officer. Yes, thank you.

00:36:33.280 --> 00:36:39.840
 Just a quick question. I noticed in the comments that the beneficial rate we're receiving for the

00:36:39.840 --> 00:36:47.280
 bonds on that saved us about a million dollars. So what are we currently paying for revenue bonds

00:36:47.280 --> 00:36:52.480
 as far as interest in the general market? So when we were last in the market, we were looking at

00:36:52.480 --> 00:37:00.320
 about a 4.8% with the Texas Water Development Board. We were able to secure 3.43 over 30 years,

00:37:00.320 --> 00:37:05.760
 which is a fantastic rate right now. It also includes a 14% subsidy that the Texas Water

00:37:05.760 --> 00:37:11.280
 Development Board gives to cities who are doing these projects that are on the state water plan.

00:37:11.280 --> 00:37:17.440
 I'm sorry, I missed something about the 14%, I'm sorry. The 14% is a subsidy that Texas Water

00:37:17.440 --> 00:37:22.560
 Development Board assigns to the projects that are on the state water development plan. Oh, I got you.

00:37:22.560 --> 00:37:27.920
 So if we're doing the project, but the greater plan is that our project benefits everyone else,

00:37:27.920 --> 00:37:32.560
 then there is some subsidy there. Well, that was my question. I was just curious. So a million

00:37:32.560 --> 00:37:37.600
 dollars. Okay. So what's the interest rates close to five? So that makes perfectly good sense. Thank

00:37:37.600 --> 00:37:45.040
 you. Yes. Thank you for having that answer quickly. All right. I have something I would like to add to

00:37:45.040 --> 00:37:52.800
 the new business action items. We had the issue come up with the water treatment plants with the

00:37:52.800 --> 00:37:58.800
 filters, one failing and then another one, and they got a new maintenance plan and change to a

00:37:58.800 --> 00:38:04.960
 different media from the sand of the activated granular charcoal. And I would like to get some

00:38:04.960 --> 00:38:09.200
 feedback on that and what the plan is and when it will be implemented and how it will be carried out

00:38:09.200 --> 00:38:16.400
 since obviously the water restrictions affected us all. Yes, sir. We'll communicate that to the

00:38:16.400 --> 00:38:26.960
 water department. Thanks. Mr. Anybody else got any more? Okay. Looks like we are going to move

00:38:26.960 --> 00:38:35.280
 on to concluding items, which is our work session. Item A, PUB 24-223, receive a report,

00:38:35.280 --> 00:38:41.360
 hold a discussion of the city of Denton's cart tagging program and its results, which has reduced

00:38:41.360 --> 00:38:51.520
 contamination and curbside recycling over the past four years. All right. We ready? Yeah. All

00:38:51.520 --> 00:38:55.840
 right. Well, good morning. My name is Brandy Neal. I'm the administration manager for solid waste and

00:38:55.840 --> 00:39:02.160
 recycling. I'm here to provide an update and overview and results for our cart tagging program.

00:39:02.160 --> 00:39:08.720
 So a little bit of the backstory or the problem in this case, residential curbside recycling

00:39:08.720 --> 00:39:16.720
 contamination reached a high of 68% in fiscal year 2021. With those high contamination rates

00:39:16.720 --> 00:39:23.040
 comes low quality of materials that are being sent to our MRF or your material recovery facility,

00:39:23.040 --> 00:39:27.280
 which is going to affect the value of the commodity being sold. So in turn, we're going

00:39:27.280 --> 00:39:32.480
 to get less revenue in the solid waste enterprise. And a portion of that goes straight back into the

00:39:32.480 --> 00:39:38.720
 residential recycling education and outreach program. We also are at a potential violation of

00:39:38.720 --> 00:39:44.320
 a contract with our MRF. So not only do we outline in the contract what items can and

00:39:44.320 --> 00:39:50.080
 cannot be recycled. We also outline a certain percentage of contamination that should be

00:39:50.080 --> 00:39:57.680
 delivered, which is 15%. So one five. So looking at the contamination rates for the entire year,

00:39:57.680 --> 00:40:03.520
 kind of where we started, you can see in October of 2020, we're at 64%. You can see that it started

00:40:03.520 --> 00:40:12.160
 to rise 64, 67. And we did reach that peak of 68% in January of 2021. You can see from there that

00:40:12.160 --> 00:40:16.320
 there's a little bit of a downfall. So there was a couple of things that we put into place to help

00:40:16.320 --> 00:40:22.720
 fight that contamination and cart tagging being one of those. So what is contamination? This is

00:40:22.720 --> 00:40:27.840
 a great question. A lot of people just assume it's trash, and that is not always the case. Sometimes

00:40:27.840 --> 00:40:32.960
 it is just general trash. But a lot of times it's a lot of different things. So non-program

00:40:32.960 --> 00:40:38.480
 materials being one of those. So you can see here bulleted, we have metal, plastic film, flexible

00:40:38.480 --> 00:40:44.080
 plastic, and styrofoam. So all of these things are recyclable at their recycling facility,

00:40:44.080 --> 00:40:50.560
 not necessarily in the blue bin at your curb. So just thinking about metal, sometimes people

00:40:50.560 --> 00:40:55.840
 will put, we've seen trampolines make it into the blue bin because it is metal, and it can be

00:40:55.840 --> 00:41:00.560
 recycled, but it needs to go to a metal recycler. Same thing with plastic film. You've seen the

00:41:00.560 --> 00:41:05.280
 grocery bags. They all have the chasing arrows on there. It tells you to recycle them. They'll end

00:41:05.280 --> 00:41:09.760
 up in the blue bang. And again, those need to go back to the grocery store or to someone else that's

00:41:09.760 --> 00:41:14.320
 going to take those plastic films. So that's contamination. That is contamination. It's

00:41:14.320 --> 00:41:20.720
 considered contamination, along with flexible plastic. Flexible plastic is anything really. So

00:41:20.720 --> 00:41:26.400
 your bread packaging, your chip packaging, the air bubbles that come in your package are in your

00:41:26.400 --> 00:41:32.640
 boxes that are being delivered, your Amazon packaging. Go ahead. What if you pop them all?

00:41:32.640 --> 00:41:39.360
 If you pop them, there's still contamination. So also those blue and white Amazon packages that

00:41:39.360 --> 00:41:45.360
 you see, those are all considered contamination. Then we have also soiled recyclables, which could

00:41:45.360 --> 00:41:50.240
 be, most people think of pizza boxes, which pizza boxes are a little bit of a concern. Not necessarily

00:41:50.240 --> 00:41:55.520
 the grease, but people are leaving pizza in there and there are cups of marinara or ranch, those kind

00:41:55.520 --> 00:42:01.280
 of things. So that's the soiled recyclables that we're talking about. Bagged recyclables is a huge

00:42:01.280 --> 00:42:06.480
 challenge for us, which we'll talk about in a little bit. But if that goes to the MRF and it

00:42:06.480 --> 00:42:11.120
 is in a black bag, they're not able to see what is in that black bag. And for safety concerns,

00:42:11.120 --> 00:42:15.840
 they will not open it. So they don't know if there's needles in there, diapers, food waste,

00:42:15.840 --> 00:42:20.720
 or it's clean recyclables. Even if it's an opaque white bag, if they're not able to see through it,

00:42:20.720 --> 00:42:25.840
 unfortunately, that is considered contamination. Yes, sir. So when these materials are separated

00:42:25.840 --> 00:42:33.360
 out from the recycle stream, I assume they go to the landfill. Correct. So how many cubic yards or

00:42:33.360 --> 00:42:38.800
 tons of material is that typically in a year? I do not know that answer, but I can get it for you.

00:42:38.800 --> 00:42:47.280
 68% of them. Well, 60 at this time. Two years ago, 68% of the tons were considered trash.

00:42:47.280 --> 00:42:53.440
 I understand the percentage I'm asking about. For actuals. Yeah. Cubic yards of material or tons of

00:42:53.440 --> 00:42:56.640
 weight. We do tonnage, so I can get you some tonnage information. I presume you have it

00:42:56.640 --> 00:43:03.040
 somewhere. Yeah, we do. And then the last thing is donation items, which was what we would call

00:43:03.040 --> 00:43:07.680
 wish cycling. So this is the resident that has wonderful intentions. They may have an item that,

00:43:07.680 --> 00:43:11.840
 you know, isn't at the end of life and they want someone else to take it. However, they're under

00:43:11.840 --> 00:43:16.240
 the impression that maybe it's being sorted out when it's delivered to the MRF, which is not the

00:43:16.240 --> 00:43:22.720
 case. Unfortunately, it does end up at the back and goes to the landfill. So looking at a visual

00:43:22.720 --> 00:43:27.840
 representation of our contamination rates. So this is for residential. As a reminder, this is what it

00:43:27.840 --> 00:43:34.320
 looked like in January 2021. So this is all over Denton. So a lot of people say, not my neighborhood.

00:43:34.320 --> 00:43:39.520
 You know, we're excellent recyclers and you may be, but your neighbors may not be. But you can see

00:43:39.520 --> 00:43:45.120
 in this map here that if you zoom in really, really close, but everybody is red. So every single one

00:43:45.120 --> 00:43:53.760
 of the residential routes is over 50% or higher in contamination. Again, this is in January of 2021.

00:43:53.760 --> 00:44:04.080
 Yes, sir. Not to be paranoid, but how do you get that information? That's a great question. So Pratt

00:44:04.080 --> 00:44:09.040
 or MRF, when we deliver our material to them, they automatically call a contamination rate

00:44:09.040 --> 00:44:14.800
 and it's printed on a ticket. Each month they will send us that data. But how do you know it's

00:44:14.800 --> 00:44:21.840
 my neighborhood versus theirs? When they deliver it, they deliver it by route number. So these are

00:44:21.840 --> 00:44:27.760
 route specific. So you can see they're kind of in a cluster. And so every route is in that cluster,

00:44:27.760 --> 00:44:35.360
 but it doesn't pin down to a street or a house. Yeah, it's just a route and the routes consist of

00:44:35.360 --> 00:44:43.600
 1200 stops. So it's a pretty big route and there's about 10 recycling routes probably.

00:44:43.600 --> 00:44:48.800
 Yeah, about 10 recycling routes throughout the entire week. It's hard to see that. Is the darker

00:44:48.800 --> 00:44:54.880
 the spot, the more contamination? That's correct, yeah. The yellow is the 50% and then everything

00:44:54.880 --> 00:45:00.160
 greater than that yellow. So that kind of mauve pink and that bright red is just going higher and

00:45:00.160 --> 00:45:08.240
 higher. Is that the square area that's really yellow right there? Downtown, yes. So the businesses

00:45:08.240 --> 00:45:13.280
 around there are doing a good job of recycling. This is for residential and the businesses would

00:45:13.280 --> 00:45:21.760
 be considered commercial. But commercial valet does wonderful downtown. So talking about the

00:45:21.760 --> 00:45:26.960
 solution a little bit. So in June or July, I apologize, in 2021 a cart tagging program was

00:45:26.960 --> 00:45:31.680
 going to be implemented. So the goal was to educate the residents on what is accepted in the City of

00:45:31.680 --> 00:45:36.240
 Denton's program. So get out there, be on the street, have conversations with them directly,

00:45:36.240 --> 00:45:40.960
 clean their carts out with them if we needed to. It's going to reduce the contamination overall in

00:45:40.960 --> 00:45:46.000
 the blue bin and we're going to be able to identify the most contaminated items and then our audit

00:45:46.000 --> 00:45:52.480
 results are going to help drive our outreach program. So prior to the cart tagging program,

00:45:52.480 --> 00:45:57.600
 we had some residential education in place. So we worked very closely with environmental services.

00:45:57.600 --> 00:46:02.800
 They have a couple of engagement coordinators that help do our social media post. We also have a

00:46:02.800 --> 00:46:07.440
 monthly newsletter letter that was going out and the utility bills. There's always a recycling

00:46:07.440 --> 00:46:12.240
 message or some other services that we offer, whether it's yard waste or home chemical collections.

00:46:12.240 --> 00:46:17.360
 Then also meeting with the HOAs and going out to the residents and meeting them where they are

00:46:17.360 --> 00:46:22.640
 and having those conversations with them about what can go in their bin. Also at the curb,

00:46:22.640 --> 00:46:28.720
 our operators have been using a non-collection tag that's pictured here, this orange tag,

00:46:28.720 --> 00:46:34.400
 since the beginning of about 2019. Now this tag has everything on it. You can see it says your

00:46:34.400 --> 00:46:39.600
 cart is blocked by a vehicle, maybe your cart is less than four feet away from the object,

00:46:39.600 --> 00:46:44.480
 but you can see number four says that your cart is contaminated with trash. So it doesn't

00:46:44.480 --> 00:46:49.440
 necessarily tell them what the problem is, it just tells them that their cart is contaminated

00:46:49.440 --> 00:46:55.040
 and it does give them a brief description of what can go in the cart. Now this does present

00:46:55.040 --> 00:47:01.440
 a challenge with the operators. We are, I can't think of the word, I just lost my word, automated,

00:47:01.440 --> 00:47:06.240
 I apologize. And so the drivers are just driving from cart to cart, the arm's grabbing them,

00:47:06.240 --> 00:47:11.040
 so they're not necessarily lifting the lid and looking inside. So unless the contamination is

00:47:11.040 --> 00:47:17.920
 just sticking out, they're not going to see that. So our cart tagging program did begin in July.

00:47:17.920 --> 00:47:23.360
 We did get approval to hire some interns. So luckily we have two great colleges, three great

00:47:23.360 --> 00:47:28.160
 colleges here and lots of intern opportunity. So we brought some interns on. We were going to use

00:47:28.160 --> 00:47:33.040
 the PRAT data that is delivered to us monthly and we're going to really focus on our what we're

00:47:33.040 --> 00:47:37.120
 going to call worst first route. So we had to start somewhere and we were going to start with

00:47:37.120 --> 00:47:41.600
 the highest contaminated routes. We're going to use the existing infrastructure that we had,

00:47:41.600 --> 00:47:45.920
 so we already had some small fleet that we could use and we were going to be able to track our

00:47:45.920 --> 00:47:51.040
 progress. We had just recently implemented Rubicon, our smart routing system, so this is going to

00:47:51.040 --> 00:47:55.520
 give us an opportunity to talk directly to our drivers and so they would know which carts were

00:47:55.520 --> 00:48:00.560
 contaminated and which ones not to collect. And then we needed to go out and start lifting lids.

00:48:00.560 --> 00:48:06.880
 So just a quick overview. So again, we're going to target those highest contaminated routes first.

00:48:06.880 --> 00:48:11.840
 We're, as soon as we approach a container, we're actually going to examine the outside of the

00:48:11.840 --> 00:48:16.960
 container as well. So a lot of residents aren't aware, but if the container has a crack in the

00:48:16.960 --> 00:48:22.080
 side or some of them are missing lids completely, that's going to introduce water into our recycling

00:48:22.080 --> 00:48:26.960
 stream, which is a contaminant as well. But they can have those things replaced at no additional

00:48:26.960 --> 00:48:31.440
 charge. So we're going to put in a complimentary work order for them if we notice those things,

00:48:31.440 --> 00:48:35.680
 especially the lids that are missing or the bodies that are cracked. We're also going to

00:48:35.680 --> 00:48:40.400
 replace the educational sticker that's on top of the blue bin. So depending on the neighborhood,

00:48:40.400 --> 00:48:45.040
 you know, when their cart was delivered, that cart stays with the home, even as the residents

00:48:45.040 --> 00:48:50.320
 turn over. And so it fades when it's sitting outside. And so we do want to replace that

00:48:50.320 --> 00:48:53.760
 because the resident doesn't have an idea of what goes in the bin if they can't read that

00:48:53.760 --> 00:48:56.880
 educational sticker. So we go out and do that. Do you have a question?

00:48:56.880 --> 00:49:05.120
 Thank you. I'm intrigued on, so this blue bin is going to be their identification number that

00:49:05.120 --> 00:49:09.120
 I see there. That's going to be, that's going to be connected to a residence.

00:49:09.120 --> 00:49:09.760
 Correct.

00:49:09.760 --> 00:49:16.640
 Irregardless, let's say it's rental property and we have people coming in and out. So that

00:49:16.640 --> 00:49:24.960
 cart is going to stay there. Correct. Till it gets older, whatever. Exactly. And so if the,

00:49:24.960 --> 00:49:32.720
 let's say rental property, have a house that's been vacant for two, three months, is the owner

00:49:32.720 --> 00:49:38.320
 of that property then going to be paying a monthly fee for that blue container? As long as the

00:49:38.320 --> 00:49:45.280
 utilities are still on, then they will pay. So only, so the utilities, that is the triggering

00:49:45.280 --> 00:49:51.840
 mechanism. So if it's turned off, then it just, as you said, stays dormant until someone comes in.

00:49:51.840 --> 00:49:52.960
 Correct. Thank you.

00:49:52.960 --> 00:49:59.120
 Yeah. It's all utilities together. Okay. So we're going to replace the educational sticker to make

00:49:59.120 --> 00:50:03.280
 sure the resident knows exactly what goes in that bin. And then we're actually going to start to

00:50:03.280 --> 00:50:09.680
 open the lid and inspect the contents inside. So what does the process look like? So we open it,

00:50:09.680 --> 00:50:14.400
 we're going to take a quick glance. We're going to look inside. Our threshold is 15%. So as a

00:50:14.400 --> 00:50:20.160
 reminder, that is the target for us with Pratt as well. So that is our goal. If the contamination is

00:50:20.160 --> 00:50:26.000
 less than 15%, then we city staff are going to clean out the container for the resident. Now,

00:50:26.000 --> 00:50:31.120
 we only clean it out if the trash has not been collected, because we take that material and we

00:50:31.120 --> 00:50:35.760
 put it into their green bin. If it has been collected, unfortunately, we do have to leave

00:50:35.760 --> 00:50:41.840
 it behind and it will end up at the MRF, but 15% is their goal as well. So it's not going to,

00:50:41.840 --> 00:50:47.520
 you know, change our numbers too much. If it's above that threshold, and it's 15% or greater,

00:50:47.520 --> 00:50:52.560
 or depending on what the contaminant is, maybe it's something heavy that we can't lift out,

00:50:52.560 --> 00:50:56.720
 maybe it's a television, something that just massive and it takes up the entire cart,

00:50:56.720 --> 00:51:01.040
 or maybe it's food waste and it's all over everything and we can't clean it, then we will

00:51:01.040 --> 00:51:06.400
 have to give them a tag. So they are provided this yellow tag here just says recycling contamination

00:51:06.400 --> 00:51:12.400
 notice. Your blue cart is contaminated and it will not be collected. It does ask the resident

00:51:12.400 --> 00:51:18.080
 to clean the cart out and then it will be collected next week. You can see here also that it will tell

00:51:18.080 --> 00:51:24.560
 you exactly which items belong. Again, just cardboard, cartons, paper, bottles, tubs, and jugs,

00:51:24.560 --> 00:51:28.720
 those kind of things, but it doesn't necessarily describe what their problem is. Again, it's just

00:51:28.720 --> 00:51:36.800
 only telling them what goes in the cart. So that kind of got us thinking like we have a lot of work

00:51:36.800 --> 00:51:42.160
 to do here, right? So we need to do some program improvements. So we introduced three more tags into

00:51:42.160 --> 00:51:47.280
 the mix. So one of them being a notice tag, so that's the first one. So this is the tag that we

00:51:47.280 --> 00:51:52.160
 provide the resident when we clean the cart, because if they aren't there and they don't see

00:51:52.160 --> 00:51:56.720
 us doing it, they probably didn't even know we came by and removed any contaminants from their cart.

00:51:56.720 --> 00:52:02.080
 So the notice tag says your cart will still be collected, but we notice these items in your cart.

00:52:02.080 --> 00:52:06.400
 So the pictures that are on here are just items that when we're out doing the audits we've noticed

00:52:06.400 --> 00:52:11.200
 these were the biggest things. So you're seeing plastic bags, soil food containers, styrofoam,

00:52:11.200 --> 00:52:16.080
 things like that, and then there is an other section that we can really write on there exactly

00:52:16.080 --> 00:52:21.200
 what the concern is. And then also we are going to give them an oops tag. So this is going to go

00:52:21.200 --> 00:52:26.000
 with the yellow tag that you've seen in the prior screen. This is what tells them exactly what they

00:52:26.000 --> 00:52:30.960
 have done wrong. So not only just highlighting what goes in the cart, but now they know exactly

00:52:30.960 --> 00:52:36.720
 what doesn't go in the cart. So same images that you're seeing. The only thing new here is textiles,

00:52:36.720 --> 00:52:42.480
 so we will see some textiles show up in there, and some yard waste from time to time. And then we also

00:52:42.480 --> 00:52:47.440
 have the other box as well. And then one of the things that we noticed when we went out and we

00:52:47.440 --> 00:52:53.520
 started doing these audits is that we have a lot of residents who are doing an amazing job, and they

00:52:53.520 --> 00:52:57.840
 are cleaning out their yogurt and they're cleaning out their cat jar or cat food and dog food.

00:52:57.840 --> 00:53:02.720
 Everything is just pristine. And those are the residents that we want to highlight and give them

00:53:02.720 --> 00:53:07.200
 you are a recycling star. So we've been able to personally hand these out to people in their

00:53:07.200 --> 00:53:11.760
 garages as they notice what we're doing and ask us. And they're super pumped about it and put them

00:53:11.760 --> 00:53:18.960
 on the refrigerators. So some of our top contaminated items that we found when we went out and we started

00:53:18.960 --> 00:53:24.560
 looking in these bins was plastic bags. Whether it was grocery bags that flexible plastic or bagged

00:53:24.560 --> 00:53:30.000
 recyclable. So we spent the past two years really our social media campaign is focused on bagged

00:53:30.000 --> 00:53:36.240
 recyclable. So we used to say keep things empty, clean, loose, and dry. Now we move to unbagged.

00:53:36.240 --> 00:53:40.400
 You can see this picture here. This is at your local mall. So if you're out there walking,

00:53:40.400 --> 00:53:46.080
 you'll see this image. Also we have had a couple of billboards that have been posted over the past

00:53:46.080 --> 00:53:52.080
 couple of years. We've been able to wrap some of our trucks in our fleet. I think we have three to

00:53:52.080 --> 00:53:56.320
 four vehicles that are wrapped now that all have a message about keeping your recyclables out of a

00:53:56.320 --> 00:54:04.720
 bag. Recently we have sponsored the player of the game or the touchdowns for some of the high school

00:54:04.720 --> 00:54:10.320
 games. And then most recently that's not on here which is super exciting. We have an ad out on

00:54:10.320 --> 00:54:18.880
 Spanish radio talking about grocery bags and bagged recyclables. So this is some of our car tagging

00:54:18.880 --> 00:54:26.560
 metrics. So this is the entire program from start to finish. So it's a it's a pretty long data range

00:54:26.560 --> 00:54:31.280
 there. But the important thing to see is that we've touched every single route. So now we have gone

00:54:31.280 --> 00:54:35.520
 and we've touched every single route. As a reminder, I don't think I told you this, but our auditors

00:54:35.520 --> 00:54:42.160
 are on foot. So they do drive out to the streets or to their routes and then they get out and they

00:54:42.160 --> 00:54:48.480
 walk from stop to stop. So it does take a long time to to get across the entire city as a whole.

00:54:48.480 --> 00:54:54.560
 So we have been able to audit 35,000 homes and that's not our complete residence that we service.

00:54:54.560 --> 00:54:58.720
 But we have touched every single route but not all residents put their card out every single week so

00:54:58.720 --> 00:55:05.200
 we won't be able to touch them all. Overall we're seeing about a 33 percent contamination rate that

00:55:05.200 --> 00:55:11.440
 does include both oops and notice tags. Included in that number in the beginning we were seeing

00:55:11.440 --> 00:55:15.680
 higher numbers more like 50 percent but now we're seeing a lot lower numbers.

00:55:15.680 --> 00:55:22.400
 And then spoiler alert, this is our results for this past fiscal year that we just completed.

00:55:22.400 --> 00:55:30.080
 And in September we've seen a three-year low in contamination of 28 percent contaminated. So

00:55:30.080 --> 00:55:35.520
 cart tagging program isn't the main thing here. We have a lot of other things but it really has driven

00:55:35.520 --> 00:55:41.280
 our social media and our post about how we want to make sure that people are keeping bags out

00:55:41.280 --> 00:55:47.680
 and then any other contaminants that we find along the way. And then this again is just a visual

00:55:47.680 --> 00:55:53.680
 representation of the same thing you seen earlier. So as a reminder in January of 2021 we were at 68

00:55:53.680 --> 00:56:00.640
 percent. You see all the bright red and if you look over to August of 2024 we're at 28 percent

00:56:00.640 --> 00:56:07.040
 and now you see the introduced yellow and blues. So green is exactly where we want to be so we're

00:56:07.040 --> 00:56:13.520
 not there yet. We still have a ways to go but we have come really far. And any questions?

00:56:17.040 --> 00:56:24.400
 Mr. Rybak. Yes I have a couple questions. One thing you notice this if you'd go back to the

00:56:24.400 --> 00:56:31.200
 slide with the program improvements and the various notice tags. Yes. Okay our neighborhood

00:56:31.200 --> 00:56:38.400
 got tagged recently. I was very surprised and the number one thing that they were complaining about

00:56:38.400 --> 00:56:43.840
 in the tags I just happened to get home when they were still walking our particular street

00:56:43.840 --> 00:56:50.400
 was a single use paper. But we didn't get a notice or an oops we got the yellow tag. So our can was

00:56:50.400 --> 00:56:55.200
 not picked up and there were numerous yellow tags on our street and I asked the fellows who were

00:56:55.200 --> 00:57:00.400
 lifting the lids and doing the examinations. They said well you guys had way too much single

00:57:00.400 --> 00:57:05.600
 use paper in here. I'm like well but it's all clean single use paper. I said well that doesn't

00:57:05.600 --> 00:57:13.440
 matter. I was like well that's interesting because on my calendar that I download each year about the

00:57:13.440 --> 00:57:21.920
 dates and so forth single use paper is not listed. And on the most recent flyer I got from utilities

00:57:21.920 --> 00:57:27.120
 also does not mention single use paper. Clean or dirty immaterial you don't want it that's fine.

00:57:27.120 --> 00:57:32.080
 But we didn't get a notice and I don't believe our neighborhood had ever been audited before we

00:57:32.080 --> 00:57:39.520
 just got a no pickup. Boom yellow tag you're out clean it up it won't be picked up. Yeah so anyway

00:57:39.520 --> 00:57:43.440
 I didn't like that very well. I'm kind of responsible for you being here today to give this

00:57:43.440 --> 00:57:49.440
 presentation. So I'm just wondering about the efficacy of your program. Obviously it's very

00:57:49.440 --> 00:57:53.920
 effective. I can see that it's been going on for a long time. I was completely unaware of it. We

00:57:53.920 --> 00:57:59.360
 didn't receive any prior notice. Boom they showed up. Boom they yellow tagged us. Boom they drove by

00:57:59.360 --> 00:58:04.720
 our can. So it was kind of disheartening to be notified in that way about something that even

00:58:04.720 --> 00:58:10.400
 though I'm trying to pay attention I knew nothing about. Yeah I'm gonna let Brian take this. Okay.

00:58:10.400 --> 00:58:14.880
 Lucky you. Well two things. First of all Brian Burner Solid Waste Director I appreciate you

00:58:14.880 --> 00:58:20.480
 bringing this up. And you know you can see that you know our cart tagging program is responsible

00:58:20.480 --> 00:58:25.200
 for really driving down the contamination and in turn increasing the quality of the recyclables

00:58:25.200 --> 00:58:30.480
 that we're doing. This audit is also like a pop test. You can all remember back when we were in

00:58:30.480 --> 00:58:34.480
 grade school we always feared the pop test. One because we didn't know what was happening so we

00:58:34.480 --> 00:58:39.280
 had to make sure that we knew it was going on. So point taken. You didn't know. We'll take that in.

00:58:39.280 --> 00:58:46.000
 We'll include that in our program. But secondarily the pop test doesn't only test the student. It

00:58:46.000 --> 00:58:53.120
 also affects the teacher to determine is our program teaching in an appropriate way. So again

00:58:53.120 --> 00:58:57.760
 thank you for bringing that up. But again you know it's a two-way sword here is we you know if

00:58:57.760 --> 00:59:01.760
 we told everybody when we were coming then you know like cramming for the test you know you cram

00:59:01.760 --> 00:59:06.400
 for the day and then you go back. So really what we're trying to do is create that muscle memory

00:59:06.400 --> 00:59:11.040
 to ensure that our our our recycling is the quality that we want.

00:59:11.040 --> 00:59:16.720
 Bill I appreciate that. Again if we had gotten a first notice tag saying oh by the way all

00:59:16.720 --> 00:59:21.440
 single-use paper is not desired then that would have been an easy change to make. Right. And I

00:59:21.440 --> 00:59:25.360
 assure you we have made it. Good. You saved me a lot of trouble because I don't have to separate it.

00:59:25.360 --> 00:59:31.520
 Good. Very good. Following up on a previous question for this fiscal year we have

00:59:31.520 --> 00:59:39.200
 actually taken in gross tonnage from our recycling program 11,456 tons which is an increase over last

00:59:39.200 --> 00:59:49.760
 year of 326 net tons being 7,606 which is a increase of 702 which means that you know we're

00:59:49.760 --> 00:59:56.000
 cleaning not only are we we have growth in the system but we're also collecting cleaner materials

00:59:56.000 --> 01:00:02.480
 going into so really coming out the back end and going to that the landfill is 3,850 tons a year

01:00:02.480 --> 01:00:08.640
 and again we want to try to drive that down. Okay so when you can be that figure of the number of

01:00:08.640 --> 01:00:13.840
 tons going to landfill that's what's being separated out from recycling. Correct that is

01:00:13.840 --> 01:00:18.640
 that is what is going and when you say separated out that's really a misnomer it's not going through

01:00:18.640 --> 01:00:23.920
 the system and then at the very end after we've picked everything out a lot of this is pulled out

01:00:23.920 --> 01:00:28.240
 on the front end if they see contamination they're they're pulling out large swaths of it

01:00:28.240 --> 01:00:34.480
 so because again you've got physical people online that are pulling things out and if it's plastic

01:00:34.480 --> 01:00:38.480
 bags they're not going to break them open the plastic gets into the gears and the bearings

01:00:38.480 --> 01:00:43.120
 pushes the bearings out shuts down the machine so a lot of that is you know based on employee

01:00:43.120 --> 01:00:48.720
 safety as well as ensuring the viability of the mechanics on the front end of the system. So if

01:00:48.720 --> 01:00:54.640
 your tonnage if you've identified the tonnage you're removing I'm wondering do we also know

01:00:54.640 --> 01:00:59.680
 how much more tonnage we're putting into the landfill as a result of this shift? Actually

01:00:59.680 --> 01:01:07.120
 it's how much less again you know this year today we've put in 3,850 I could go back to next last

01:01:07.120 --> 01:01:12.560
 year's number and even though we were collecting smaller tonnage we would smaller gross tonnage we

01:01:12.560 --> 01:01:19.440
 would have greater material a greater quality of material going to the land removed inside separate

01:01:19.440 --> 01:01:24.960
 it out so again this this this 3850 that we're seeing is actually a reduction over what we would

01:01:24.960 --> 01:01:30.720
 have seen last year at this time. I guess that's good it is very good and it was nice to see the

01:01:30.720 --> 01:01:36.560
 long-term impact of the program again we didn't get a notice we just got tagged and they drove

01:01:36.560 --> 01:01:42.720
 by us and that was that. And I get it and I appreciate it and we'll do a better job of including

01:01:42.720 --> 01:01:48.000
 ensuring that that those products are included but again you know to the end and the example

01:01:48.000 --> 01:01:51.360
 the pop test we're not going to tell neighborhoods you know when we're going to be in your neighborhood

01:01:51.360 --> 01:01:57.920
 we still go with worst first so whatever the top two contaminated neighborhoods were from the last

01:01:57.920 --> 01:02:02.080
 month those are the two we're going to focus on for the next month. Well again single-use paper thing

01:02:02.080 --> 01:02:06.240
 but yes there's a line item somewhere on the website about it but the materials I've

01:02:06.240 --> 01:02:10.800
 received in the mail and that I download annually don't mention that so I thought

01:02:10.800 --> 01:02:16.720
 we were doing the right thing but we were not. Yes sir. Now that we've had confessional

01:02:16.720 --> 01:02:27.280
 I saw the aluminum and steel cans. Yes. But then metal is not allowed.

01:02:27.280 --> 01:02:34.400
 We see a lot of car parts coming into our our facility and again the way the Murph is set up

01:02:34.400 --> 01:02:41.120
 it's not set up to process car parts so again you know any kind of really the Murph is is more

01:02:41.120 --> 01:02:46.080
 container driven if it's a steel container an aluminum container a plastic container that is

01:02:46.080 --> 01:02:53.520
 what we can take but if it's if it's other metal type material car parts you know shelving you can

01:02:53.520 --> 01:02:58.960
 either take it to a metal recycler or bring it to us at the landfill either we've got recycling

01:02:58.960 --> 01:03:03.600
 bins free of charge you can throw it in there we have a place for you to get rid of it. Then

01:03:03.600 --> 01:03:07.920
 you'll address that. Correct. A couple other questions I have it was interesting what you

01:03:07.920 --> 01:03:15.200
 brought up so we're talking about recycling so there there is that animal and by reducing

01:03:15.200 --> 01:03:24.080
 the undesired elements they're going to the landfill. Correct. So my question is has there

01:03:24.080 --> 01:03:30.160
 been a study as to it what kind of increase then because I'm assuming if we were sending it off to

01:03:30.160 --> 01:03:35.920
 Murph and that's not going to work and we're talking about 11 million what'd you say we have

01:03:35.920 --> 01:03:44.240
 we have collected 11,456 tons curbside okay into going into the land into the Murph and then they

01:03:44.240 --> 01:03:52.080
 have processed and actually been able to sell on the open market 7,606 tons. That's wonderful but

01:03:52.080 --> 01:03:58.880
 so it stands to reason that there's going to be a higher percentage now going into the landfill

01:03:58.880 --> 01:04:04.000
 that was accidentally putting in through the Murph is that correct or are you taking that out

01:04:04.000 --> 01:04:09.040
 and still throwing it in the landfill? If I understand your correct your question correctly

01:04:09.040 --> 01:04:16.880
 anything that is not sold on the third party market as a as a commodity paper plastic to some

01:04:16.880 --> 01:04:22.480
 end user that material goes out the back door to the landfill. Which landfill? City of Denton

01:04:22.480 --> 01:04:29.520
 landfill. So Pratt Pratt's taking it out there and at the facility at our landfill right okay.

01:04:29.520 --> 01:04:36.400
 Correct so I look at that as a as a double customer entity in other words we got the

01:04:36.400 --> 01:04:40.560
 green dumpsters are all going to landfill we know what's coming in we have pretty much that

01:04:40.560 --> 01:04:48.560
 down. It sounds like to me now we have a new number coming in that's rejects of the recycling

01:04:48.560 --> 01:04:56.880
 I'll call it. What percentage have you all looked at what kind of increase in the landfill that

01:04:56.880 --> 01:05:05.280
 that is creating? We have not answered that question specifically because we've done waste

01:05:05.280 --> 01:05:10.240
 characterization studies and we know what the components are what the potential that we can

01:05:10.240 --> 01:05:15.920
 recycle but we also know that you know every two things first of all every year we've got new stuff

01:05:15.920 --> 01:05:22.640
 being introduced in the market. Tammy brought up excuse me Brandy brought up like the Amazon

01:05:22.640 --> 01:05:28.160
 packages that you know are bubble wrap and then may have the the paper on the outside you know

01:05:28.160 --> 01:05:36.240
 it's a melded welded product that's trash because we can't separate that plastic from that so as new

01:05:36.240 --> 01:05:40.640
 products you know those are going to have to go to the landfill but as we get a whole lot smarter

01:05:40.640 --> 01:05:45.600
 about you know the packaging in fact three weeks ago I was at a conference where we were talking

01:05:45.600 --> 01:05:51.200
 about packaging and new you know ways that things are being put together so that they can be pushed

01:05:51.200 --> 01:05:56.640
 into the recycle market. We will always have a sector that will will end up going to the landfill

01:05:56.640 --> 01:06:01.280
 but year over year over year even though the population is growing and our tonnage is increasing

01:06:01.280 --> 01:06:07.200
 we are seeing less coming out the back of Pratt to go to the landfill and more commodities being

01:06:07.200 --> 01:06:17.440
 sent to the open market. And I then my discussion I think I should have with regular the regular

01:06:17.440 --> 01:06:25.120
 trash solid waste versus your recycling because I and I'd like to then see something along the

01:06:25.120 --> 01:06:30.640
 lines of has there been a study with this increase and I hope we do it forget about Pratt going out

01:06:30.640 --> 01:06:36.880
 the back door now I'm doing my own Pratt as it were and so my green dumpster is going to be

01:06:37.200 --> 01:06:42.960
 filling up a little bit more and it's going to go to the landfill so I'm curious as to what is

01:06:42.960 --> 01:06:51.280
 does that affect the life expectancy of that landfill to a to a beyond the comfort levels?

01:06:51.280 --> 01:06:58.400
 No because from our standpoint everything sitting on the curb of a customer here in the city of

01:06:58.400 --> 01:07:03.760
 Denton is waste you put it in a green bin or you put it in a blue bin end of the day trash is going

01:07:03.760 --> 01:07:09.840
 to the landfill recycling is going to merge from being sold so whether that that incremental piece

01:07:09.840 --> 01:07:14.560
 ends up in the blue bin and then has to be sent to the landfill or it's put into the the green

01:07:14.560 --> 01:07:19.520
 bin and goes directly to the landfill what we're talking about is operational efficiency every

01:07:19.520 --> 01:07:24.480
 time we touch a piece of garbage more than once it costs us money it costs you money so if we can

01:07:24.480 --> 01:07:30.960
 get it put in the right dumpster at the right time and handle it once it helps us maintain our low

01:07:30.960 --> 01:07:35.760
 cost of service to our residents and I agree with that my point is I'm looking at a physical

01:07:35.760 --> 01:07:43.440
 mountain correct so much land that we've got yeah forget about the money cost we're now

01:07:43.440 --> 01:07:50.400
 is there there's going to be an increase in that landfill right I'm just curious as to has there

01:07:50.400 --> 01:07:54.080
 been a study as to what kind of percentage not that we can do anything about it other than I

01:07:54.080 --> 01:08:00.080
 think we need to be aware of that so that it might adjust our 30-year plan and I may be facetious

01:08:00.080 --> 01:08:05.200
 on that but you know that number is built into our long-term plan and we are you know we do

01:08:05.200 --> 01:08:11.120
 know what our growth rate is inclusive of that attorney do you have a yeah my comment was just

01:08:11.120 --> 01:08:16.880
 brian aren't you in the middle of doing a closure post closure study or haven't you done one recently

01:08:16.880 --> 01:08:22.960
 that that would show kind of life expectancy of of the the landfill house changed over time

01:08:22.960 --> 01:08:29.200
 yeah we so we have our comprehensive solid waste management strategy that laid out a

01:08:30.640 --> 01:08:35.840
 what our waste characterization is so we're working on our programmatic recycling here and

01:08:35.840 --> 01:08:41.200
 as you can see that our contamination levels have decreased which has increased the amount

01:08:41.200 --> 01:08:47.200
 of programmatic recycling that's being pulled out the other one that we're working on is 30 percent

01:08:47.200 --> 01:08:52.480
 of the makeup of our trash is organics so we recently did our organics pilot and valet so we

01:08:52.480 --> 01:08:57.520
 have a six phase program to pull that organic waste out of the landfill and then the other one which

01:08:57.520 --> 01:09:03.120
 we haven't started but we're trying to formulate is cnd construction and demolition is another

01:09:03.120 --> 01:09:07.440
 30 or 40 percent of the makeup of waste so that's another strategy that we're going to be using

01:09:07.440 --> 01:09:15.040
 to reduce that landfill space capacity concern so working on programmatic recycling and if you look

01:09:15.040 --> 01:09:21.760
 at the current trash makeup it's 50 50 of all your trashes could be recycled today in that blue bin

01:09:22.560 --> 01:09:28.640
 so when we're talking about pratt and the trash that's going to the landfill i would make a safe

01:09:28.640 --> 01:09:33.200
 assumption that probably 50 of that is also programmatic material but it was stuck in a bag

01:09:33.200 --> 01:09:38.000
 that we couldn't open because of safety concerns so being able to continue this outreach and

01:09:38.000 --> 01:09:44.560
 education on what is in our program is important to continuing to decrease the amount that's coming

01:09:44.560 --> 01:09:49.440
 out of pratt and going back to the landfill i think that's wonderful and so kudos to that

01:09:51.120 --> 01:09:58.400
 let's take that out and put it over here for a minute i want to know with that added

01:09:58.400 --> 01:10:05.680
 increase of trash not recyclable not murph not pratt this is what i'm doing

01:10:05.680 --> 01:10:11.680
 is that going to be affecting the landfill because more trash is going to be going in there

01:10:16.960 --> 01:10:22.000
 and then to the murph and then to the landfill or it's going into the green can and into the

01:10:22.000 --> 01:10:29.520
 landfill so the same amount of trash is coming from your house into the landfill it's just if

01:10:29.520 --> 01:10:34.400
 you put it in the blue bin as contamination it has to like yeah and i don't want that but that's

01:10:34.400 --> 01:10:41.520
 let me say something on what you just said this is theoretically there is now less going into the

01:10:41.520 --> 01:10:47.680
 landfill because you're educated and you're not putting things in your recycle bin so the in the

01:10:47.680 --> 01:10:54.720
 past they would just dump your entire recycle bin including the good stuff with the landfill stuff

01:10:54.720 --> 01:11:01.040
 because it was contaminated or the whole and actually the whole truck would be dumped yes so

01:11:01.040 --> 01:11:06.800
 most people produce five missing out on the recyclable five and a half pounds of waste per

01:11:06.800 --> 01:11:11.680
 day and it's the makeup that we're talking about yeah i think i think the key here is so we have

01:11:11.680 --> 01:11:16.400
 this metric of contamination and that's that's how much entered the murph that shouldn't have

01:11:16.400 --> 01:11:23.360
 basically then there's a second metric of diversion you know what percent of stuff

01:11:23.360 --> 01:11:29.840
 of waste got diverted and didn't make it to the landfill either you know we have yard waste

01:11:29.840 --> 01:11:35.760
 diversion recycling murph is diversion they have other diversion programs the landfill so i think

01:11:35.760 --> 01:11:41.440
 there's a there's two metrics and this one is just really focusing on contamination residential

01:11:41.440 --> 01:11:46.320
 residential bin contamination so i think and it would be good to see both those numbers and

01:11:46.320 --> 01:11:53.760
 you know 11 000 tons diverted or 11 000 tons initially routed to the murph 7 600 whatever

01:11:53.760 --> 01:12:02.800
 diverted um out of 200 000 tons to 100 000 tons i don't know what the what the total tonnage is

01:12:02.800 --> 01:12:10.240
 right that you can get a diversion right that way and so um sorry no no i appreciate i mean that's

01:12:10.240 --> 01:12:17.440
 what he said yes okay thank you i just have a quick question and you did not introduce yourself

01:12:17.440 --> 01:12:22.080
 oh i'm so sorry i read that memo too tammy clausie and a deputy director thank you

01:12:22.080 --> 01:12:27.520
 i have one other thing i would like to mention we talked a lot about the work

01:12:27.520 --> 01:12:36.640
 absolutely let me follow up on on tony's uh response uh annually as part of our tceq permit

01:12:36.640 --> 01:12:42.320
 to operate our facility we're required to do what's called a post a closure post closure analysis

01:12:42.320 --> 01:12:49.040
 purpose of that is to ensure that we have adequate funds set aside so that when we do fill it up in

01:12:49.040 --> 01:12:56.320
 in almost 45 years from now that money is available we don't have to to spend an extra tax for our

01:12:56.320 --> 01:13:02.720
 citizens to close it in post and part of that is ensuring that looking at last year's volume that

01:13:02.720 --> 01:13:07.840
 came in and making sure that that were our percentages are correct or sending the right

01:13:07.840 --> 01:13:13.680
 amount of money into this fund you know currently we are on track we still maintain that 45 years of

01:13:13.680 --> 01:13:21.920
 capacity that we're looking at our our engineering estimates to begin with are remaining stable

01:13:21.920 --> 01:13:28.080
 and as tammy was saying and as we're looking at this actually we're increasing our time to

01:13:28.080 --> 01:13:32.800
 closure because again the diversion that we're doing so we'll bring additional information back

01:13:32.800 --> 01:13:38.560
 to you but it is uh that you know we are actively looking at all these different variables uh you

01:13:38.560 --> 01:13:42.880
 know we're we're we're statistics nerds for lack of a better term it's not just you know throwing

01:13:42.880 --> 01:13:49.040
 garbage in a hole it's about you know the the the the numbers that drive this and and you know last

01:13:49.040 --> 01:13:55.120
 week i was at wastecon so we had 13 000 folks like us talking numbers and safety and and trash so

01:13:55.120 --> 01:14:01.440
 it's you know it's not just us it's part of the the standard that we operate so one other uh you

01:14:01.440 --> 01:14:07.760
 know of course mr ryback would take care of his right away but uh there may be some that uh are

01:14:07.760 --> 01:14:13.920
 just going to do what they're going to do correct and so at some point the sheriff has to come and

01:14:13.920 --> 01:14:19.760
 knock on the door i mean facetious but what what are the provisions for that currently our ordinance

01:14:19.760 --> 01:14:26.960
 does allow for us to to institute a a cart seizure program so if at some point in time we have a

01:14:26.960 --> 01:14:31.280
 person that is operating so nefariously that they and they have told us they cannot and they will

01:14:31.280 --> 01:14:36.800
 not then you know we'll we can seize the cart again you know that we don't want to get there

01:14:36.800 --> 01:14:42.160
 we want to be kinder and gentler our folks out in the field are talking with every with folks every

01:14:42.160 --> 01:14:46.480
 day we're actually working with the university of north texas right now in their anthropology

01:14:46.480 --> 01:14:52.480
 department and we're looking you know at at not only what's being recycled but but why and and

01:14:52.480 --> 01:14:57.360
 household makeup and and how that potentially affects what's going into so we're getting to

01:14:57.360 --> 01:15:02.320
 some pretty heady stuff as we're looking at the way that garbage and recycling is managed you know

01:15:02.320 --> 01:15:08.640
 one of the things that i it's it's what's called the nag slide or i call it the nag slide you know

01:15:10.640 --> 01:15:13.760
 does the wife tell the husband to recycle does the husband tell the wife

01:15:13.760 --> 01:15:18.320
 does the you know how do those family data and we're trying to work at that not only

01:15:18.320 --> 01:15:24.080
 not only who who recycles but the socioeconomic the demographic piece of it so that again as we're

01:15:24.080 --> 01:15:30.640
 divide you know devising these these notices cart you know our stickers our programs that

01:15:30.640 --> 01:15:35.920
 were being as effective as we possibly can in the community thank you mr ibeck

01:15:39.600 --> 01:15:45.840
 that was a long way around the horn but i'm glad that you covered that that was excellent um

01:15:45.840 --> 01:15:53.280
 the um one thing i wanted to mention is just a personal peeve you refer to this as contamination

01:15:53.280 --> 01:16:01.840
 now my line of work contamination is chemical biological or nuclear correct i consider this

01:16:01.840 --> 01:16:07.280
 maybe spoilage or non-responsive product or something along those lines obviously you're

01:16:07.280 --> 01:16:12.080
 committed to the term contamination it's probably in use industry-wide but long and i saw that tag

01:16:12.080 --> 01:16:17.840
 and it said contamination i was like wow you know where's the where's the hazmat suits

01:16:17.840 --> 01:16:26.400
 no i get it i spent a bulk of my career in in that industry and affecting those pieces and

01:16:26.400 --> 01:16:30.480
 and again it's a contractual term and it is an industry you know bmp best management practice

01:16:30.480 --> 01:16:36.240
 term uh but again my contamination is different than an uh environmental contaminate which is

01:16:36.240 --> 01:16:41.520
 different than a food contamination uh but again it's a it's a similar term okay but it was just

01:16:41.520 --> 01:16:47.200
 that was all part of the thing i was like how do you call this contamination it's it's just waste

01:16:47.200 --> 01:16:56.480
 material anyway thank you for that thank you personal item so i uh i do want to say i like

01:16:56.480 --> 01:17:01.520
 the i mean you know that the the the leading statistic right your headline here it's going

01:17:01.520 --> 01:17:09.840
 from 68 contamination down to 30 28 28 28 is you know that's that's a great statistic to see

01:17:09.840 --> 01:17:16.400
 you know it's a lot of hard work there uh i i was it looked like there were about 35 000

01:17:16.400 --> 01:17:23.200
 bin checks over three years or 37 months i think was the way that slide worked so that's about

01:17:23.200 --> 01:17:30.080
 eight or nine hundred a month getting checked uh and how many total uh residential customers are

01:17:30.080 --> 01:17:38.240
 there it's about 38 000 close to between 38 39 right now just growing okay and then uh and this

01:17:38.240 --> 01:17:42.800
 is you have like two interns that are doing this we actually don't so we we have a couple interns

01:17:42.800 --> 01:17:46.880
 um and we do employ them over the summer we've actually hired a full-time auditor so we have one

01:17:46.880 --> 01:17:52.240
 full-time auditor doing all the job um and then during the summer this past summer we hired four

01:17:52.240 --> 01:17:57.120
 interns um so it's usually just the one full-time auditor and then the summer months we have a couple

01:17:57.120 --> 01:18:02.160
 extra okay and i think there is the other side of this equation which is diversion rates so

01:18:02.160 --> 01:18:08.000
 contamination is don't put it in the blue bin if it doesn't belong but maybe people are just not

01:18:08.000 --> 01:18:11.520
 putting anything in the blue bin give zero contamination because there's nothing in the

01:18:11.520 --> 01:18:17.520
 blue bin uh so i think we also need to seek a you know what is our diversion rate and how are we

01:18:17.520 --> 01:18:24.800
 performing and um i know there in the last decade or so there've been you know major changes in the

01:18:24.800 --> 01:18:33.120
 solid waste department and it in like 2016-17 the diversion rates were above 30 residential

01:18:33.120 --> 01:18:41.120
 and contamination rates were around 20 and at the time there was an education program it used that

01:18:41.120 --> 01:18:49.040
 that family dynamic was i believe the term was uh intergenerational learning so to educate children

01:18:49.040 --> 01:18:55.200
 and the children would then teach their parents and and instead of doing you know or 800 contacts

01:18:55.200 --> 01:19:01.920
 a month maybe a similar number um but instead of perhaps that punitive approach of like i feel like

01:19:01.920 --> 01:19:09.680
 i'm in trouble or you know like you know got a citation uh it would the the perhaps the the

01:19:09.680 --> 01:19:14.720
 goal would be the kids come home from school or a program that they attended like a little one-hour

01:19:14.720 --> 01:19:19.440
 thing on excited to recycle and telling their parents oh you can't recycle that but we can

01:19:19.440 --> 01:19:25.040
 recycle this that kind of thing so they would aim to increase contaminant or decrease contamination

01:19:25.040 --> 01:19:30.320
 and improve diversion and i just wonder about the cost effectiveness of i don't know if it would be

01:19:30.320 --> 01:19:41.920
 possible to compare 2015 recycling education and numbers versus 2024 recycling audit numbers in in

01:19:41.920 --> 01:19:48.480
 cost well let's not forget that in between those dates we had the 2021 when you had your peak was

01:19:48.480 --> 01:19:54.400
 also the covid period the lockdowns the shutdowns everybody was stuck at home nothing was open i

01:19:54.400 --> 01:19:59.360
 mean there were some serious extenuating circumstances and i don't believe any of the

01:19:59.360 --> 01:20:04.080
 program i think at that time there was kind of a gap between programs too so i mean if you wanted

01:20:04.080 --> 01:20:10.000
 to look at a zero program year you might bring in 2020 or something like that but i'm just again for

01:20:10.000 --> 01:20:15.040
 cost effectiveness and like i said half of the equation is contamination but the other half of

01:20:15.040 --> 01:20:22.160
 the equation is diversion and c and d and other diversion programs are great but we also can keep

01:20:22.160 --> 01:20:27.520
 improving our residential recycling diversion as well 100 to follow up on that too just from the

01:20:27.520 --> 01:20:32.960
 graph um you know cart tagging is a small piece of the pie there's a lot of other things that

01:20:32.960 --> 01:20:37.440
 are happening and so didn't sustainable schools like we were just talking about there was a gap

01:20:37.440 --> 01:20:41.200
 during that time where we weren't in schools we actually seen our contamination at the

01:20:41.200 --> 01:20:48.880
 dent isd become 90 contaminated and so we do have an active person in that role currently and they

01:20:48.880 --> 01:20:54.400
 are back out at the schools we've seen that number drop tremendously but there was a big gap and we

01:20:54.400 --> 01:20:58.720
 had to get a handle on it and so we are back in the schools and the diversion commercial diversion

01:20:58.720 --> 01:21:04.720
 article that was recently passed we've been working very diligently to get all of the customers on

01:21:04.720 --> 01:21:10.160
 board we're at about 50 percent trying to help them educate them on what other items they can

01:21:10.160 --> 01:21:14.560
 divert outside of just programmatic material so that's c and d that we're talking about

01:21:14.560 --> 01:21:21.120
 or metal those big metals dumpsters that they can get from you know metal recyclers in town too so

01:21:21.120 --> 01:21:32.240
 absolutely also uh you know we're over the past four or five years we've aligned our metrics with

01:21:32.240 --> 01:21:37.760
 national best practices with regard to how they are done so you know one of the big

01:21:37.760 --> 01:21:43.280
 complaints i guess from a solid waste standpoint is the way i manage my diversion recycling may

01:21:43.280 --> 01:21:47.280
 be different than this city than this city so again you know there's a lot of work going in

01:21:47.280 --> 01:21:53.040
 to align what those are second half part of that is you know with enough money you can probably

01:21:53.040 --> 01:21:59.520
 do anything and you may remember that five years ago we we lowered our cost to the resident 27

01:21:59.520 --> 01:22:04.720
 percent you know a lot of not to say a lot of that money was spent you know in recycling education

01:22:04.720 --> 01:22:11.200
 but there was a lot of of money being spent for a very little return our you know our current

01:22:11.200 --> 01:22:21.840
 diversion rate is right at about what 28 i believe it is our goal is 30 by 2030 40 by 2040 75 by 2075

01:22:21.840 --> 01:22:27.440
 and we're well on our ways to reaching those ends so again doing it cost-effectively first

01:22:27.440 --> 01:22:32.800
 and foremost but secondly being you know uh meeting those industry standards and and being best in

01:22:32.800 --> 01:22:44.720
 class unless there's further discussion thank you very much thank you that i'm glad we get to use

01:22:44.720 --> 01:22:50.560
 all that information you compiled it'd be a shame if we didn't ask questions i hope red dixie cups

01:22:51.360 --> 01:22:58.240
 still are going into the blue right you're talking the solo cup yes no right red solo cups

01:22:58.240 --> 01:23:04.000
 yes can they go in the blue they're plastic yes okay because i got a lot of college guys i gotta

01:23:04.000 --> 01:23:09.760
 gotta get them to start moving their stuff around clean okay thank you that was the but not coat

01:23:09.760 --> 01:23:17.520
 hangers not no coat hangers those are tanglers they tangle and i told her and she said but it's

01:23:17.520 --> 01:23:24.240
 recyclable i said you take it to the dry cleaner they love it i am all right mr chair before before

01:23:24.240 --> 01:23:30.880
 you move um um just for clarification it sounds like uh mr reiner was looking for some additional

01:23:30.880 --> 01:23:37.760
 feedback i think i'm fine with the conversation that i've had although we did want the diversion

01:23:37.760 --> 01:23:42.880
 if we could okay i'll go ahead and submit that uh the solid waste and we'll get it get a schedule

01:23:42.880 --> 01:23:49.680
 back to you i appreciate that anything else lee okay you've already got slapped on the hand and

01:23:49.680 --> 01:23:56.720
 godly everybody else got slapped it's okay it's a life lesson i bet hoa bumped him it's a life

01:23:56.720 --> 01:24:05.120
 lesson all right now there's nothing further except for the sidebars we stand adjourned yay