Utility Advisory Committee

City Hall City of Olympia 601 4th Avenue E Olympia, WA 98501 Contact: Liz Hoenig Meeting Minutes - Final (360) 753-8152 Utility Advisory Committee Thursday, June 6, 2013 5:40 PM City Hall, Room 207 1. CALL TO ORDER Chair Curtz called the meeting to order. 2. ROLL CALL Present: 7- Chair Thad Curtz, Vice Chair Barbara Day, Committee Member Kim Andresen, Committee Member Richard Doenges, Committee Member David Dunn, Committee Member Carol Law, and Committee Member Jennifer Sievert Absent: 3- Committee Member Margaret Drennan, Committee Member Loralei Walker, and Committee Member Chris Ward 3. APPROVAL OF AGENDA The agenda was approved. 3.A 13-0440 Approval of May 2, 2013 UAC Meeting Minutes LOTT Community and Environmental Policy Director Karla Fowler contacted the City to say Bob Jacobs is not a member of the advisory committee for the LOTT groundwater scientific study. He has been coming to the meetings and offering public comment. Chair Curtz would like staff to go back and write the answers to the bulleted questions from UAC members that occurred during the discussion under the business items of the evening. Liz stated that staff would do this before posting the minutes. The minutes were approved as amended. 5. PUBLIC COMMENT - None 6. ANNOUNCEMENTS Chair Curtz noted a book he is reading that he would like to share with the UAC called “Fostering Sustainable Behavior - Community-Based Social Marketing” (third edition) by authors Doug McKenzie-Mohr and William Smith. He suggested that UAC members and staff read the book and discuss it at a future meeting. City of Olympia Page 1 Utility Advisory Committee Meeting Minutes - Final June 6, 2013 Chair Curtz also shared a draft letter for the Comprehensive Plan to send to the City Council related to the policy/goal that was removed from the Plan. UAC members made and approved a motion to send the letter to City Council. Liz Hoenig noted that a letter was sent to the Council General Government Committee and approval was received from them to officially change the 2013-2014 UAC work plan for the September meeting. The new agenda item will include a panel of experts who will attend the September UAC meeting to discuss aquatic habitat improvement priorities related to the Storm and Surface Water Utility. Clark Halvorson announced that Doug Floyd retired from the City of Olympia recently. He had a long history with the City, and was especially knowledgeable of McAllister Springs and the operations of the City’s pump stations. We are currently recruiting to fill his vacated Supervisor position in Pump Stations and hope to have a replacement by early July. 6.A PLANNING COMMISSION UPDATE Kim updated UAC members on the comprehensive planning process. She noted that the new members had received a briefing on the plan and a briefing on reclaimed water and solid waste enclosures. The Planning Commission also recently forwarded a code change recommendation on parking lots and frontage issues with large buildings to the City Council. They also approved a proposed work plan for the Planning Commission to City Council. The Planning Commission would like to review the idea of neighborhood centers, and they plan to conduct research on this topic. They are going to do a walking/driving tour of 17 areas to review local neighborhood centers (for example, the area near the San Francisco Street Bakery). 7. BUSINESS OF THE EVENING 7.A 13-0438 LOTT Clean Water Alliance Capital Improvements Plan Development LOTT staff Tyle Zuchowski and Karla Fowler gave an update on the LOTT capital planning process. They started with an overview of the long-range planning process. LOTT conducts continuous capital planning and updates population projections every year to determine the needs for future capacity. They calculate the needs for facilities using flow modeling throughout the service area. They also coordinate this with their asset management program, to look at the needs for rehabilitation, maintenance and replacement of assets. With population projections this year, the LOTT partnership took a more in-depth approach to looking at how septic systems could be hooked up to the sewer system over time. The partnership looked at different scenarios for hook-ups, assuming only a portion of septic systems would eventually connect to the regional sewer system. Mr. Zuchowski discussed different project categories that are funded through the LOTT CIP. He then discussed some of the project highlights for this year’s CIP (A full draft CIP is not available yet). Ms. Fowler gave an update on the groundwater scientific study and discussed how this study will help guide local public policy and future permitting on infiltration of City of Olympia Page 2 Utility Advisory Committee Meeting Minutes - Final June 6, 2013 reclaimed water in local soils. The anticipated completion date of the study is 2017. Questions/Comments from UAC Members: · Is the equivalent residential unit (ERU) based on actual use patterns in households and businesses and does it automatically assume a reduction in water use? We do monitor flows in households by looking at drinking water consumption results, billing records, census data, and flow monitoring results in different cities, but do not automatically assume an ongoing reduction in water use. · What are assumptions about water conservation and how have these changes been incorporated into the planning period? Ms. Fowler noted over 1 million gallons per day of capacity have been realized since indoor conservation efforts started in 1997, which has allowed new treatment capacity projects to be pushed out in time. Water use is accounted for by updating the per capita wastewater generation rates (gallons per capita per day) which is done annually based on drinking water consumption results, billing records, census data, and flow monitoring results. · How have the reductions in water use impacted ERUs and projections for future capacity projects? Water use reduction provides more flexibility in long-range planning for capacity. Reductions in water use are reflected in the updated per capita wastewater generation rates, which are used to estimate future wastewater flows. Thus, capacity development projects can be postponed in proportion to reduced water usage. The ERU is strictly a unit measure to count the number of connections. · What are benefits of the primary sedimentation basin? Better control over large storm events, replacing a 60 year old structure. Another basin will be added in 2027. Odor control will continue to be a big component of operations at this treatment facility. · Is there anything in the plan so far that might affect the Tumwater reclaimed water storage facility? Is it possible that moving ahead with the facility might undermine community trust before the scientific study is completed? The storage facility will provide Tumwater with reclaimed water for irrigation, and has been in the planning process for many years. LOTT has not moved ahead with any future projects related to groundwater infiltration; the earliest project for those efforts is scheduled for 2017. · Has LOTT looked at alternate capital improvement paths in order not to infiltrate reclaimed water - so we understand what the costs might be to not infiltrate into groundwater? The issue will be more focused on the level of treatment of reclaimed water and the costs associated with that. There are significant discharge limitations to Puget Sound. · Any other bonding to finance capital projects? LOTT did issue a bond for the primary sedimentation projects. There is the potential for future bonding to keep costs down. · Is LOTT addressing sea level rise impacts? LOTT has hired a consultant to do an assessment of the vulnerability of the downtown facilities to overland flow. LOTT has also used the work done by the City of Olympia staff to evaluate sea level rise downtown. City of Olympia Page 3 Utility Advisory Committee Meeting Minutes - Final June 6, 2013 The report was received. 7.B 13-0439 Draft Capital Facilities Plan Clark Halvorson, Water Resources Director, and Andy Haub, Engineering and Planning Manager, gave a review of the CFP for the Water, Wastewater and Storm and Surface Water utilities and of the annual process of review. Clark gave an overview of the planning process and how utility master plans, budgets and rates feed into the capital planning process. Clark discussed the process for evaluating capital projects, and also discussed taking a more strategic and long-term approach to pursuing grants and loans to fund capital projects. Water projects will be mostly focused on transmission and distribution projects in coming years. Wastewater is transitioning from the older master plan to the newer plan. This CFP includes policies and projects from the new Wastewater Plan, which has been reviewed by the UAC. Questions/Comments from UAC Members: · All utilities have asphalt overlay - what is the reason for not dividing up the overlay funding equally - why does storm water pay more? Council made the decision three years ago to provide stormwater funding for sidewalk projects that incur high stormwater management costs. · Can reclaimed water be used for fire suppression? Our current reclaimed water system is not reliable enough - would need a duplicate system (along with drinking water) with storage and pumps to provide this. · Does the new Community Renewal Act have any funding available for utility projects? Federal funds may be available through new legislation. · Is fiber optic cable being put into projects when the road is being torn up? Staff will follow-up with this, our current understanding is that it is only put in in areas where city facilities are being connected. · What does staff consider modest rate increases for Wastewater? 4-5 percent. · We are proposing investing in getting people off septic - but also letting people put in new septic systems. Can we rationalize that the cost of getting people off septic systems are beneficial enough? If we let people on new septic systems - aren’t we just creating a new problem for ourselves in the future? Staff feel we should allow installation of septics in areas where this is the only feasible way to develop - when there is no cost effective way to hook up to sewer. We prioritize septic to sewer connections in areas where there are environmental risks with a failed septic system. · Are stormwater retrofits included in the water quality section of the CFP? What about LID (low impact development) demonstrations? Yes, most of the retrofits have an LID component, both neighborhood projects and larger arterial projects. · Will the different LID approaches that DOE is requiring impact Olympia? Yes, however we have lots of discretion on the types of projects we build for stormwater, except for grant funded type projects. The land development implications will be significant for public and private development. LID techniques will need to be inherent to the design of new development, not just laid on top of new development. We are considered progressive in this area so we are poised to deal with it. We will adopt as much LID as feasible from a risk management perspective. City of Olympia Page 4 Utility Advisory Committee Meeting Minutes - Final June 6, 2013 · Ken Lake project conveyance; is the rezoning being considered? Would that impact this project? Ken Lake conveyance needs to be upgraded independent of zoning changes - this system is currently undersized. The Committee moved and approved to draft a letter to the Planning Commission supporting the proposed CFP and provide specific comments. Staff will draft a letter for the Chair’s review and signature. 8. ADJOURNMENT Chair Curtz adjourned the meeting at 7:52 p.m. City of Olympia Page 5