Wastewater Treatment Board

CITY OF CORTLAND WASTEWATER TREATMENT FACILITY Meeting Minutes Members: Da te : 6/ 26 /17 Ti me : 5 :30 p m Chairman John Troy – Present C on fe r en ce R o om , C or t la nd Wa st e wa t e r Vice Chair William Starr – Absent Commissioner Todd Morris – Present Commissioner Diann Potter – Present Commissioner Gary Thomas- Present Village of McGraw Mayor Allan Stauber – Present Bruce Adams, Supt. of Wastewater – Present Edward Poole, Chief Operator - Present Meeting called to order at 5:26 p.m. Minutes from May 22, 2017, meeting for approval. Motion to approve the minutes from May 22, 2017, meeting by Diann Potter. Seconded by Todd Morris. UNANIMOUS Superintendent's Report: Superintendent's Report for June 26, 2017 (as written by Supt. Adams) Administration– The site visit from EFC went very smoothly. They were pleased with what they saw and had no complaints regarding Cortland’s participation in the requirements for utilizing EFC funding. On 6/20 the Common Council approved moving ahead on completing the new anaerobic digester and committed unallocated reserve funds for doing so. On 6/20 the Council also approved declaring two old submersible pumps as surplus and transferring them to the County landfill operation. The landfill hopes to use them as leachate transfer pumps. The gas-powered non-submersible pumps they’ve been using have been short-lived and unreliable. The PWOA has requested a change to the weekend schedule wherein instead of one operator working 8 hours on Saturday and another one 8 hours on Sunday, each operator would work 4 hours each day. This schedule allows for two hours of overlap each weekend day, which should allow for better attention to tasks that benefit from such, for example pressing sludge. Ed and I have agreed to implement the schedule change on a trial basis. Ed, Phil and I attended a workshop in Hemlock, NY on 6/20 focused on a data management product from Hach. Most of the data management this department does is done in tools that I have developed in MS Access, MS Excel and Visual Basic. I would like to move the department to a third-party tool well prior to my retirement and the Hach product has features that could be advantageous to our operation. Last week we dug an exploratory hole to locate the 48” secondary effluent pipeline. As feared, it runs too close to the existing digesters to place the new digester where initially planned. We are now looking at placing the new digester farther to the East, displacing the driveway to the rear of the facility. A new drive would be laid to the West of the existing digesters to enable access to the rear of the facility. Bruce Adams Superintendent of Wastewater Motion to approve the Superintendent's Report by Todd Morris. Seconded by Diann Potter. UNANIMOUS WWAB Minutes 26 June 2017 Page 2 of 4 Plant Manager’s Report: Plant Managers Report for June 26, 2017 (as written by Edward Poole, Chief Operator) Operations- The process is running well. Because of tank cleaning and maintenance, removal rates are lower than last month but still 90 percent or better. There were no violations for the month of May. The digesters are doing well despite having an issue with the heating on the North digester, which killed much of our methane formers and in turn soured the digester. We treated with a ton and a half of lime and after three weeks, it is finally getting back to normal. I continue to send a monthly update to May El Prince, our DEC inspector via email. Because of higher than normal rainfall, we were forced to move SBR startup date to July. On July 17th, Dennis Barnes, the process engineer for Xylem, will be onsite to provide process training and support Chlorine season is going well. However, we are having issues with the dechlor analyzer and are feeding in a manual set point. The parts for the analyzer have been ordered and we should be back in automated feed shortly. Maintenance- The maintenance staff and I continue to work on creating entries in our computerized maintenance management system for the new equipment. Work continues on preventative maintenance on the process tanks. The maintenance staff and I are making evaluations of the work that needs to be done and the cost associated with it. The work is complete on the aeration basins for SBR startup. As previously mentioned, we are waiting for flows to go down. Edward Poole Chief Operator Motion to approve the Plant Manager’s Report by Diann Potter. Seconded by Todd Morris. UNANIMOUS WWAB Minutes 26 June 2017 Page 3 of 4 Finance: Financial statements and abstracts dated 5/31/17, and 6/15/17, were submitted for approval. Motion to approve financial statements and abstracts by Todd Morris. Seconded by Diann Potter. UNANIMOUS Sewer Grievance: A sewer grievance was submitted by Patricia Noecker on 5/25/17, for property located at 97 Wheeler Avenue, City of Cortland. Ms. Noecker reported that her water and sewer bill had been damaged/lost by the post office and she did not receive the bill until 5/11/17. The sewer bill was due by 5/01/17, after which a penalty charge was added. Ms. Noecker is requesting reimbursement for the penalty charge on her sewer bill. The board reviewed Ms. Noecker’s grievance and a motion was made by Diann Potter to issue a credit for the penalty charge. Motion to approve a credit of $4.49, by Diann Potter. Seconded by Todd Morris . UNANIMOUS Sewer Grievance: Darrin Osborne submitted a sewer grievance on 6/9/17, for property located at 21 Arthur Avenue, City of Cortland. Mr. Osborne reported that he contacted the plumber, W2Operator Training Group, the day he received his water and sewer bill. Repairs were made to the sewer line and water supply on 4/27/17. He is requesting an adjustment to his sewer billing as water caused by the leak went into the ground instead of the sewer. Mr. Osborne’s grievance was reviewed by the board. After discussing Mr. Osborne’s grievance, Gary Thomas made a motion to grant a credit of $129.00. Motion to approve a credit of $129.00, by Gary Thomas. Seconded by Diann Potter. UNANIMOUS New Business: No new business Old Business: No old business Motion to Adjourn at 5:49 p.m. by Gary Thomas. Seconded by Todd Morris. UNANIMOUS Respectfully submitted by: City of Cortland WWTF WWAB Minutes 26 June 2017 Page 4 of 4