East Orange Water Commission

CITY OF EAST ORANGE, NEW JERSEY EAST ORANGE WATER COMMISSION 99 South Grove Street East Orange, NJ 07018 TED R. GREEN, Mayor REGULAR BOARD MEETING July 16, 2024 MINUTES Minutes of the Regular Meeting of the Board of Water Commissioners held at 99 South Grove Street, East Orange, New Jersey on Tuesday, July 16, 2024. I. CALL TO ORDER - 5:13 p.m. ROLL CALL PRESENT: Commissioners Alison Rolling Shantel Harrison Sherkera Lucas Emmanuel O. Awe – approx. 5:25 pm Lauren Shears – approx. 5:14 pm Staff Thomas Matich, Acting Executive Director Joseph J. Tomashosky –Finance Bianca Smith, Business Manager Counsel Denis Murphy, Esq. (Weiner Law) Council Members NONE Public NONE The meeting was called to order, Commissioner Rolling determined that there was a quorum and convened the Regular Meeting. Commissioner Rolling read the Sunshine Law for the record. Commissioner Rolling read the Rate Statement. II. STATUS OF RESOLUTIONS The Mayor has returned Resolutions #73 through #81. All resolutions are in full force and effect. III. ADOPTION/CORRECTION OF MINUTES 7A: The Minutes of the June 18, 2024, Regular Board Meeting were approved on a motion made by Commissioner Harrison seconded by Commissioner Lucas and carried unanimously on the call for the Board to vote. IV. PRESENTATION NONE V. STAFF REPORTS ACTING DIRECTOR MATICH THANKED EVERYONE FOR THEIR KINDNESS AND WORDS OF ENCOURAGMENT. FINANCE – Joe advised the Board that the collection rate went down and that's because our invoicing went up. We collected $1,834,000 for East Orange customers in the month, and we filled $2,093,000 for the billing resulting in an 87.6% collection rate for June. April and May were both above 105% and that goes to the efforts that we made after the state mandated no turn off period. So, we had two great months in April and May. The collection rate for the year is 95.4% versus last month we were at 97%. We increased our accounts receivable by $259,000. We did have some good news, beginning in July, we would anticipate that we're going to have a bigger month as one of our customers paid a large bill. In June, we didn't have any significant or unusual or unplanned expenses. However, we did have a lot of cash that we paid out. We had $2,000,000 in debt service that went out and we spent close to $1,000,000 in sending money for services and for our medical benefit cost, the biggest piece being the medical benefits cost to the City and towards the end of the year, in November, we'll send the balance of what we owe them. We should point out that there have been years when we produced and billed customers when we had lower water periods because it was a wet spring and you don't have a lot of water usage. With the weather that we've all been experiencing lately, I would say that we have an unplanned upside in the collection of future billings for additional water usage during this hot weather. CUSTOMER SERVICE – Bianca advised the Board that they are continuing with the payment arrangements and have continued with the asset management system. We do have a meeting with them at the end of the month. Northstar and Paymentus are coming here at the end of the month on the 30th. We're looking to move forward with those projects as well. We may have one person that's on our customer log that comes in due to high usage. It was a building with about 103 units. They may come in. We have also extended summer hours to 6:15 pm from Monday - Friday. DIRECTOR’S REPORT - Director Matich advised the Board of the following: He had a conference call with Boswell discussing the next phase of the lead service line. In light of our meetings, it was brought up that we actually had to get approval from the Historical Preservation Committee because some of the buildings that we're changing the lines on are impacted by that. Fortunately, they understood that these are non-invasive since they're only service lines and water. We're not doing anything with the actual structure itself. So that's just a simple signature and hopefully we can get some final determination on when we are bidding that. I will let you know that the moment we get clearance on that, we are already preparing the next phase, Phase 3A. Boswell is going to be submitting some paperwork on that so that we can submit that. Since we split up the next phases into two parts, the state control review and approval process should be more streamlined. If you look at the operational overview of the chart, you can see on there that between curb boxes repaired and replaced and gate curb boxes located and operated we are over 100 so triple digits on a regular basis on a regular month is what our norm has been, and we continue with that as well. As far as sewers, we're still doing some in-house repairs some assets between catch basins and superficial manhole repairs. We have a big project that will be taking place or commencing in the next few weeks. I'm awaiting the traffic plan and the submittals for the lining. That's the lining on Arlington. The further stretch that beyond what we have encountered, the catastrophic failures, the last two over the course of the last few years and we'll be engaged in that. Once I have the plan and traffic plan together, I'll submit it to you and also to the City administration so they are aware of it and they can put out notifications as well as to how much that area is going to be impacted traffic wise and how long the duration will be. So, although this is a significant cost, it's far cheaper to line it now and give us some more structural integrity in that area rather than just one small break. Continued in-house meter change outs, the numbers aren't as aggressive as we anticipated. Now with people returning to work, we can realign people into their divisions in order to make that happen. We haven't aggressively pursued the afterhours that we had discussed. Once that kicks in, those numbers should increase, and we should start being able to get back on track with that. WORPS, we had a meeting last week with H2M in reference to the PFAS treatment facility. The original location that we wanted to put it had to be adjusted a few feet because of encroachment to the highway, trees and things like that. This gives us more seclusion from the golf course and from the roadway, almost an even split. They're looking into now the obstacles that we encountered during the Air Stripper project with the migration habitat of some local bat or bird. They're going to see if that will impact us as well. Plus, the mandate to replace the trees that we're going to end up taking down, the area that they shifted over to the diameter of the trees are smaller. So, that helps us out quite a bit. You know, the larger the diameter of trees, they want more for those. So, these are smaller, and we should be able to stagger them along the side. The key thing was that I told them I didn't want open access like we have with the air strippers to the golf course. They become a target for people who can't swing very well. So, once we have that determined and everything in the final footprint, they're going to provide me with a drawing, and I'll submit that to all of you as well. The emergency generator was put to the test last month with a failure of a power line. Trees went down, two power lines down, both for all JCP&L customers and for us proper for one of our well lines. With that being said, the emergency generator did exactly what it was supposed to do, it engaged automatically, providing us with a full run production of energy for every single one of our needed assets for a period of four days with no disruptions at all. So, the money we put in was worthwhile. The system is fully operational except for one new piece and that is the transformer. Right now, it's being run off the old transformer. The construction phase for that would just be to shut down, tie into the new transformer and turn it back on. That should be taking place this fall. September or October is still the anticipated delivery date for those. I mentioned the LSL program that we're working on, the PFAS. Sewer rates, I think that's a discussion that we must have internally. Collection Tower, coordinating the electrician and the two City agencies, the Fire Department and Public Works for access to connect power. The GIS is ongoing. It's organic and we're adding new and new layers to it regularly. QAA is still working on the asset management in house. The I&I study, I believe that the eye trackers were purchased. On boarding for training, how we can install them ourselves so that they can be mobile and move to different areas to do continuous study in different areas of the town. Reservoir inspection and repair the finalizing of valve exercising for the isolation of the two tanks. D4, the final design and submissions should be taking place shortly. D3, was awarded and given to the contractor. Will be setting up a pre- construction meeting for that in the coming weeks to start that evolution. Surge Tower Rehab, waiting for the submittals of the prefab shroud design that we had discussed. Once that's in place, there will be some landscape to be done, but then the deflection of water will be accomplished. The baseline study for firm capacity, we finished Phase 1. We're ongoing with Phase 2 with final plans on the priority listing of the wells involved. SCADA is ongoing integration with that. WORPS pump system, pump 5 has been returned, completed and rehabbed. We have not returned it to service. We anticipate doing that maybe at the end of July or beginning of August. Right now, it's still being run on our master pump one and two. Conversion project, the final punch list items are being addressed. VI. COMMUNICATIONS NONE VII. UNFINISHED BUSINESS Legal Matters to be discussed in Executive Session. VIII. NEW BUSINESS NONE IX. APPROVAL OF RESOLUTIONS The following resolutions 13A through 13G were presented to the Board for approval. A Motion to omnibus Resolutions 13A through 13G was approved by Commissioner Harrison, seconded by Commissioner Lucas, and carried unanimously on the call for the Board to vote. 13A: Resolution ratifying the June 2024 recurring monthly bills in the amount of $2,353,055.09 13B: Resolution authorizing the approval and payment of Operating Bills in the amount of $1,374,475.16 13C: Resolution ratifying the June 2024 Payrolls in the amount of $399,167.44 13D: Resolution authorizing the payment of Capital Invoices in the amount of $117,909.75 13E: Resolution adopting the 2024 Budget for the East Orange Water Commission in the amount of $30,881,911.62 13F: Resolution authorizing the use of competitive contracting procedures and the preparation of a request for proposals for the provision of accountant and financial consultant services for the East Orange Board of Water Commission  13G: Resolution honoring John Liu, P.E., P.P. for his years of service X. PUBLIC COMMENT NONE XI. EXECUTIVE SESSION 15A: Resolution for Closed Session Resolution 15A was approved on a motion made by Commissioner Harrison, seconded by Commissioner Lucas and carried unanimously on the call for the Board to vote. ------------------ The Board went into Executive Session to discuss the following at approximately 5:42 pm: 1. Personnel Committee 2. Contracts and Litigation Matters The Board came out of Executive Session at approximately 7:24 pm. ------------------- There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 7:24 pm. THESE MINUTES ARE OF NECESSITY CONDENSED AND ABRIGED AND DO NOT PURPORT TO CONTAIN THE FULL CONTENTS OF THE MATTERS DISCUSSED. SONYA BUTLER TRANSCRIBER