Buckman Direct Diversion Board

MINUTES OF THE CITY OF SANTA FE & SANTA FE COUNTY BUCKMAN DIRECT DIVERSION BOARD MEETING September 4, 2025 1. Call to Order This regular meeting of the City of Santa Fe & Santa Fe County Buckman Direct Diversion Board meeting was called to order by Commissioner Justin Greene, BDD Board Chair at approximately 4:00 p.m. in the Council Chambers, City Hall, 200 Lincoln Avenue, Santa Fe, New Mexico. 2. Roll Call: Roll was called and a quorum was present as shown: BDD Board Members Present: Member(s) Excused: Commissioner Justin Greene, Chair None Councilor Carol Romero-Wirth Councilor Jamie Cassutt Commissioner Hank Hughes Rolf Schmidt-Petersen, Citizen Member T. Egelhoff, The Club at Las Campanas, [non-voting member] Others Present: Bradley Prada Facilities Manager Nancy Long, BDD Board Consulting Attorney Kyle Harwood, BDD Board Consulting Attorney Bernardine Padilla, BDD Public Relations Coordinator Matt Sandoval, BDD Operations Superintendent Jesse Roach, City Water Division Director Samantha Secrist, BDD Accounting Supervisor Brandi Martinez, BDD Administrative Assistance Jay Lazarus, Glorieta Geoscience Peter Hunt, Glorieta Geoscience Reid Williams, Glorieta Geoscience Larry Pierce, Glorieta Geoscience Kurt Traverse, CLA Accounting Support 1 3. Approval of Agenda There were no changes to the agenda and upon motion by Commissioner Hughes and second by Councilor Cassutt, the motion to approve the agenda passed by unanimous [5-0] voice vote. 4. Approval of Consent Agenda Noting the items had already been authorized by this Board, Member Schmidt-Petersen moved to approve the Consent Agenda as presented. Councilor Cassutt seconded and the motion passed by unanimous [5-0] voice vote. 8. Consent Agenda Items: a. Request for Approval of a Budget Adjustment Resolution (BAR) in the Total Amount of $2,671.875 from the Settlement Funds 801 Line to the Operating Funds 800 Line to cover expenses for the Owners Representative PSA with AECOM Previously Authorized by the BDD Board on 5/01/2025 b. Request for Approval of a Budget Adjustment Resolution (BAR) in the Total Amount of $200,000.00 from the Settlement Funds 801 to the Operating Funds 800 to cover expenses for Engineering Services from Wright Water Engineering, Inc (WWE) previously authorized by the BDD Board on 06/05/2025 5. Approval of Minutes a. Approval of the August 7, 2025, Buckman Direct Diversion Board Meeting Minutes COMMISSIONER GREENE: I have a statement to make to add into the minutes, if I may. For the record, I will state for the record and our minutes: That the only matters discussed during the Executive Session of our last regular Board meeting of August 7, 2025, was the matter as stated in the motion to go into Executive Session and no action was taken. Member Schmidt-Petersen offered the following correction: Page 3: MR. SANDOVAL: It’s gotten to the point that we’re watching it every hour. We’re up to 212 at Otowi now so – CHAIR GREENE: What’s the number? MR. SANDOVAL: 1.50 150 is the cutoff cfs at Otowi, for diversion. With no other changes, Councilor Cassutt moved to approve as modified. Her motion was seconded by Member Schmidt-Petersen and passed by unanimous [5-0] voice vote. 6. Matters from the Public – None were presented. Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 2 7. Presentations and Informational Items a. Monthly Update on BDD Operations MATT SANDOVAL (BDD Operations Superintendent): Thank you, Chairman Greene, members of the Board. I’ll be presenting the August 2025 operations report for BDD. BDD diversions and deliveries have averaged a million gallons per day as follows: raw water diversions averaged 5.26 million gallons per day; drinking water deliveries through Booster Station 4A/5A, 4.57 million gallons per day; raw water delivery to Las Campanas at Booster Station 2A, .86 million gallons per day. And BDD contributed 35.3 percent of the region’s water for Santa Fe for the month of August 2025. And I’ll stand for questions. CHAIR GREENE: Thank you. MEMBER SCHMIDT-PETERSEN: Mr. Chairman, I’d like to ask Mr. Sandoval, so this is actually a much better kind of report than we had anticipated going into [inaudible] and is that because Santa Fe has been able to operate primarily the Canyon Water Treatment plant which previously they hadn’t anticipated – COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Can you talk into the microphone. MEMBER SCHMIDT-PETERSEN: My apologies. The question really is, BDD has actually been diverting a little less than what was anticipated early in the year given how dry it had been but given that it has been very wet since May, the numbers are down and I believe that’s because of Canyon Road Water Treatment Plant operations primarily and I just wanted to check that. Is that true? MR. SANDOVAL: Yes, that is correct. That was all part of the strategic plan. MEMBER SCHMIDT-PETERSEN: I guess my other question relates back to last month, I’ve asked for the San Juan-Chama allocation amount for this year; do you have that or does Jesse have that? MR. SANDOVAL: I’d defer to Jesse. JESSE ROACH (City, Water Division Director): Mr. Chair, members of the Board and Member Schmidt-Petersen, yes, the San Juan-Chama allocation this year is only 31 percent and that occurred – it got allocations in May, June and July that have totaled 31 percent. And we don’t anticipate additional allocations, although, the recent rains and I’m not totally up to date on what the recent rains may do to a potential additional allocation. But the latest I’ve heard is that will be at 31 percent. MEMBER SCHMIDT-PETERSEN: Thank you. And for the Chair and members of the Board, I would just remark that it is probably the lowest annual allocation of San Juan-Chama water in its history. JESSE ROACH: That’s correct. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Any other questions, comments? I will ask a question. I’m noticing that we’re using the City wells and the Buckman wells a little bit more in more recent months; is that correct? MR. ROACH: That is correct. And I think you may be familiar that when we get in the monsoon season the BDD tends to – can have some challenges with turbidity and we would prefer not to divert and treat really turbid water for the sake of the plant. So we generally try and bring up other sources at that time. We haven’t had the capacity at Canyon Road this year because of the Nichols construction project. So we have been leaning on the wells a little bit more than usual. And I would say, generally in the last 5 to 10 years we sort Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 3 of try and shoot for about 20 percent annual from the wells and 80 percent from the rivers. This year we’re at 25 percent from the wells as a result of this. I will say that BDD has been a real workhorse for us this year. If you look at the graph that Matt provided in part 3 of his report, you can see that the green bars which are this year are exceeding in most cases and especially in March, April and May, June and July really exceeding their bit the average production at BDD. So I would tip my hat to Brad and Matt and their team in terms of the amount of work they’ve been able to do to, frankly, to put us on track to produce probably as much as we’ve produced at BDD in any given year. So BDD has really stepped up for us in this time period. COMMISSIONER GREENE: And then we had some pretty substantial storms up into the north which I can imagine did not make the water very easy to work with. Did that affect us much this past weekend or this week? MR. SANDOVAL: Mr. Chairman, members of the Board, yes it did. It was down for about a day and a half. We had a little bit of storage but the turbidity was extremely high. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Thank you. Yes, ma’am. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Mr. Chair and Director Roach, correct me if I’m wrong. It is good for us to use the wells a little bit. We don’t want to just have them sitting there, never tapping into them because then when we need them, we don’t know whether they’re working. So on the one hand, the amount is a little bit higher than normally but it’s also not, I would say, dramatically higher but it’s also necessary just to keep making sure that we can pull from them when we need to. Am I correct in my understanding? MR. ROACH: Chair Greene, Councilor Romero-Wirth, you are correct and 25 percent is a little bit more than 20 percent but we do, as you mentioned, like to make sure that those wells are available. And this year for the first time we started trying to run a well, not just for a day, but for a month so that really we know when we need to turn to those, and that could happen at a moment’s notice, that they’re ready to go. I would also say that the total amount of water that we’re using, very rough numbers, 25 percent of the total demand of about 9,000 acre-feet is somewhere in the 2,000 to 3,000 acre-feet range, we think that the amount that we can sustainably produce is well in excess of that and that the wellfields will continue to rise regardless. The other interesting piece while we’re talking about the wells is that two of the Buckman wells that are really close to the river are actually artesian and we do need to pump them just to manage the pressure in those wells. So there’s a certain amount of operational flexibility we get from the wells, a certain amount we need to pump and a certain amount we want to pump to make sure that they’re ready. The slightly extra amount of groundwater that we’ve used so far is not alarming to us and actually we’re going to try and quote and quote catch up through the rest of the years because we have quite a bit of water now on the Santa Fe River that we want to start trying to treat this year. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Thank you for that answer and thank you, Mr. Chair, I thought it was just good to get a broader lens on pulling on wells. COMMISSIONER GREENE: I want to thank both of you for clarifying that. Great, anything else on this subject? Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 4  b. Report from BDD Facilities Manager MR. PRADA: Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the Board members. This is the Facilities Manager’s monthly update for August 2025. We made great progress on key projects, procurement and staffing in particular. Starting with the Major Repair and Replacement fund, we have a clear delivery date for the front-end loader. It is scheduled to arrive on October 31st . We are also processing purchase orders for several key projects and these include: PLC cyclical replacement project, a new fleet vehicle, a pump rebuild for the raw water system and a new VFD which is variable drive for the two-way pumps. Moving on to the design/build project: we held another meeting with our team and partners at AECOM, Wright Water Engineering and Board legal to align strategies. Following that, we met with the design/build team last week to begin the next phase of the rebuild project. Current job vacancies: We have made some progress here in the fact that we continue to work diligently with City staff to address the open positions that we have. To strengthen our team and improve our ability to attract, retain and talent we are excited to launch two new key initiatives. First, a new pilot program incentive for our certified operators. So we would be offering them incentive based off of their level that they have currently or will attain and that will compliment an incentive. Previously, we hadn’t really done that. We’re trying to look at strategies to keep and retain our employees. Another key strength move, we’re trying to extend the pay plans and make them larger so that we’re more competitive with our near utilities, Santa Fe County, Los Alamos County and somewhat LANL. So we’re excited to work with the City to strengthen our team. This is the strategy that we can up with and collaborated with and I will stand for questions. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: I just have one question, Mr. Chair and Manager Prada. So the incentive, is that a financial incentive and is that – where are you pulling that money? Since it’s a pilot and it’s new and can you just talk a little bit more about how that is looking. I think it’s really important. We’ve been talking a lot about level 4 operators and making sure that we have a pipeline and that we retain the ones that we have and that we get new folks in the queue to help us. I know it is critical and I’m just curious how we’re going about that exactly. MR. PRADA: Thank you, Chair Greene and Councilor Romero-Wirth. Right now, we’re pulling it from salary savings. We’ve done some calculations and we feel like it will be the best place to pull it at this time because we don’t have those positions filled. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Great, that makes sense. Thank you. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Thanks for clarifying that. So budget neutral, great . And then I want to reiterate the opportunity to collaborate with Santa Fe County and the Community College, potentially, to do some training. I talked to Kris Swedin who does the pro tech training over there and she would be thrilled to stand up a program for wastewater, water, everything treatment professionals. MR. PRADA: We appreciate that, Chair Greene, if you would pass on that information or mine to her or whoever. We would definitely like to collaborate. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Sure. And then additionally, just somewhat related just because we’re working with the same pool of people here between BDD, the County and what’s going to be coming with the Pojoaque Basin Regional Water System. Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 5 They do have an obligation to hire tribal members so we should try and get some tribal members on training in our facility and then we can swap people around. Great, thank you. c. Update on Negotiations Regarding the Memorandum of Understanding between the U.S. Department of Energy and the Buckman Direct Diversion Board Regarding Notification and Water Quality Monitoring PETER HUNT (Glorieta Geoscience): Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and members of the Board. My name is Peter Hunt and I work with Glorieta Geoscience. [Adjusted microphone] Recently, the BDD team being Bradley Prada, Danny Carter, myself and Reid Williams from our office at Glorieta Geoscience, engaged New Mexico Environment Department’s Department of Energy oversight bureau EMLA – to discuss sampling in Los Alamos and Pueblo canyons as well as the systems operations. In the past there was a really good operating relationship the Buckman Direct Diversion operators and the DOE oversight bureau I want to rekindle this relationship to perhaps -- their resources for future sampling events as well as utilize all of the funding that they get from DOE to do some of the sampling. And they were extremely positive and open to collaboration with BDD. So we actually have a follow-up meeting slated at the facility with the same team to discuss future operations. They actually sent some of their plans and data to us to review and so we’re really looking forward to collaborating in the future. And I’ll stand for questions. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Let me ask, is this meant to slightly a workaround to the MOU version of the testing? MR. HUNT: Not necessarily. It is more just a collaboration between us and the oversight bureau. We are still looking into that funding as well. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Does it solve the problem at least partially? MR. HUNT: It does, yes. It does especially with focusing on LA Pueblo Canyon sampling COMMISSIONER GREENE: Great. Peter, thank you. Is that your first time being the lead on something? MR. HUNT: Yes, it’s my first time. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Congratulations. d. Update on Negotiations Regarding the memorandum of Understanding between the U.S. Department of Energy and the Buckman Direct Diversion Board Regarding Notification and Water Quality Monitoring KYLE HARWOOD (BDD Board Counsel): Thank you, Chair. We’ve got this presentation split up a little bit with folks speaking in their lanes; sort of speak, so I’m just going to remind us all of what the MOU is quickly. Peter and Brad are going to talk about some of the current work and then I’ll come back up and just remind you all of where we’re at and where we’re trying to go. With your permission -- So we are at the fourth MOU in the 15 year history of this working relationship with LANL which began back in 2010 just before the project was brought online. It has generally addressed two major topics, as I think many of you know. The first is the early notification system in LA Pueblo Canyon that gives the treatment plant operators notification of flows Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 6 coming out of LA Pueblo Canyon. For a long time the project has had an operating procedure where they cease diversions of the Rio Grande to let that slug of LA Pueblo Canyon water associated sediments and legacy contaminants to pass by the intake without being diverted. It is not that we can’t treat any water, we can. We can treat any water that gets down to BDD but in terms of cost and the precautionary principle we have long adopted the policy of not diverting water particularly when LA Pueblo Canyon is running. So that early notification system is a topic of current discussions as I think you’ve heard us report out before. The most recently installed gauge gets inundated from the Rio Grande during high- flow years when we are blessed with high Rio Grande flows and so the technical team and your staff and consultants are working on the EMS provision for the new MOU. Secondly, in the MOU we have long been funded at just under $100,000 in order to provide Rio Grande water sampling. So that’s important particularly in light of Peter’s comments about working with the oversight bureau on LA Pueblo Canyon sampling which is a separate matter. We have always for more. The lab has always offered zero. And in past MOU’s we have agreed to continue the number as you all know from our previous briefings we have recommended a CPI-type adjustment to those funds. So that’s where we have been and that’s a little bit about what we’re working on. I’m going to now hand it over to Peter. We did have a negotiating team meeting six, eight weeks ago and what was identified was that a technical meeting was the next step. So Brad and Peter will talk about that technical meeting. So hopefully that background, and I know you’ve heard it before, but I think it is useful to just remind you of where the edges of that relationship lie in the history of the MOU. Any questions? I’m here to stand for questions on this part. COMMISSIONER GREENE: I’ll circle back after or do you have a question now? COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Just one other thing which is the length of the agreement that is still on the table. MR. HARWOOD: We have been discussing a five-year agreement which is the same as the first 2010 agreement was and that doesn’t seem to be a major point of the discussion. We feel pretty good that it will be a five-year agreement but we don’t know yet. COMMISSIONER GREENE: I know we were talking four years but it’s better than three years, great. MR. HUNT: Mr. Chairman, members of the Board, as Kyle said, at our last annual meeting we discussed technical issues and it kind of became clear that it would efficient to just have a technical discussion with the technical people and that would be LANL’s subcontractors and myself, Reid Williams and Brad Prada and Dan Carter from BDD . So we ended up having a follow-up technical meeting with folks from LANL, subcontractors so that would be from N3B and Tech2Solutions. So we discussed some of the technical issues that we think are kind of outlying and issues that we really care about and reasons that we wanted funding to understand these issues better. And we discussed those issues and had a positive meeting and there’s a follow-up meeting with someone from EM LA present as well. And I’ll stand for questions if you have any. MEMBER SCHMIDT-PETERSEN: Mr. Chair, I just have kind of a general question not having been involved in all of the history. But I’m just kind of wondering why when we’re not really asking to do a whole lot of things different just to kind of continue what we’ve been doing really, why is it taking so long and what are the issues? Have things Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 7 changes/people or have they changed their perspective? MR. HUNT: Mr. Chair, Member Schmidt-Petersen, I think the issue – it’s not as much that the issues don’t exist or haven’t existed or haven’t been addressed, it’s that the way of addressing them – we’ve really developed a really good plan and we have a kind of newer crew at BDD. We have a newer crew at DOE oversight. We have a newer crew at GGI and we’re kind of creating a path forward. We have a really robust sampling program that we want to develop to really understand these issues in the way that they were originally intended. There’s also some confounding factors. There were the floods in 2013 so they didn’t have a fully functioning ENS and that’s really important to understand where we’re getting flows contributed to the Rio Grande. And so that was a huge barrier. We didn’t get that updated gauge until 2021. After that we had the inundation and realized that that gauge wasn’t entirely reliable. So there have been a lot of hiccups along the way. Also, staffing changes and other things. So it’s just kind of been everything coalescing and into the right program of how we want to evolve the sampling and how we want to understand these issues and kind up with a protocol. Another thing that the operators really want to understand is the timing for the shutdowns at the BDD intake. That’s a really important factor because right now we’re kind of doing it arbitrary 12-hour shutdown when we could be pulling water and during these critical times where we’re maxing our storage and maxing our water resources, it becomes really important when we divert water and how we can divert it. So that is really important to understand. MEMBER SCHMIDT-PETERSEN: Thank you. Let me follow up on there. So on the technical side, did you have differences of opinion on methodology and plans or was it more of the funding piece? MR. HUNT: It was primarily funding based. Just them wanting to understand the nature of the funding. What it was going to be used for and then also just planning how – what we really want understood. I think it was maybe somewhat unclear to LANL/Los Alamos Labs what are the factors that we really want to understand here. We have the signal system where we can shutdown our intake but it’s like what are we actually looking to understand from the data and I think we had a good answer for that. MEMBER SCHMIDT-PETERSEN: Thank you. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Just one other question which is, we were hoping that we were going to have an agreement prior – last year about this time or a month or two when the agreement expired and we were hoping we wouldn’t have a period where, I guess we’re operating under the old agreement; is that correct? MR. HUNT: Right. It’s going to administratively continue, I believe. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Okay. I’m just curious, any better sense of the timing and what can be done to giddy this up? MR. HUNT: I’m going to defer to Kyle on that. MR. HARWOOD: So the giddy-up plan is we hope to bring you back something at the October meeting. And that’s what we’re working on diligently right now. I think the technical meeting as Peter described was productive and was a good part of the process. In addition to all of the things that Peter mentioned, you can imagine that this year has been an unusual year for federal staffing. But I do want to emphasize that the colleagues that we’re working with on the Hill generally, as a group, they’re all different silos in some ways, they’ve been a great group to work with. And they do articulate that this is an Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 8 important relationship to them and we’re just not quite there yet but we hope to be bringing you back a substantial matter in October towards the end of the year. The only thing I might mention is I’m not sure the lawyer in me would agree that the current MOU has been administratively continued. Not to tell Peter he’s wrong. That’s not the phrase I would use. We are technically out of MOU and LANL is honoring the spirit of the prior MOU. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Mr. Chair, thank you. I appreciate that. Whatever we can do, just to make sure that we’re not falling down on our side and dragging this out any longer because it’s time to do this And I totally appreciate that it’s been a weird year but all the more reason to giddy-it-up. MR. HARWOOD: Yes, and Chair and Vice Chair’s leadership on this issue has been very helpful, so thank you. COUNCILOR ROMERO-WIRTH: Hopefully, we didn’t get in the way. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Use us wherever we’re useful. Thank you, Vice Chair. So two questions along those line. One, has there been any flows in the Pueblo Canyon this year? MR. HARWOOD: It’s my pleasure to introduce Peter Hunt. MR. HUNT: I’m going to defer that to Brad Prada. [laughter] MR. PRADA: Mr. Chair, members of the Board, yes, there has been flow in those canyons and we have been monitoring it. I think we’ve had two shutdowns so far this year due to flow through those canyons. COMMISSIONER GREENE: And then when you talk to these guys based on a ballpark of $600 million for N3B’s yearly budget, we’re talking about one one hundredth of a percent. MR. HARWOOD: We affectionately call it, pocket change. COMMISSIONER GREENE: And then to remind a short-staffed team that unless they really like seeing your faces the easiest way to get thing – to make less work is to get things over and signed and you don’t have to go back to it. Teach them a little bit about efficiency. MR. HARWOOD: I think we’re close and I’m hopeful we’ll be bringing back something that we can recommend for the Board’s approval at October. But I don’t know that today. COMMISSIONER GREENE: Great. Okay, thank you for your update. MR. HARWOOD: Thank you COMMISSIONER GREENE: Anybody else. Let the record show that we all have fingers crossed. 9. Matters from the Board – None were offered. 10. Next Meeting: Thursday, October 2, 2025 11. Adjourn The Board adjourned at 4:30 p.m. Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 9  Approved by: ____________________________ Justin Greene (Nov 2, 2025 23:05:05 MST) Justin Greene, Board Chair ATTEST TO KATHARINE E. CLARK Santa Fe County Clerk Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 10 Buckman Direct Diversion Board: September 4, 2025 11