i aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all we have the minutes of our meeting in
January is there a motion to approve those i'll make that motion second no I I'm waiting for somebody to make a second because I have a comment on on the minutes well I'll second them okay and um
discussion my comment is um you should flush out discussion a little bit more uh for example the meeting of uh January 28th had a lot of comments from the uh the attendees and uh you know there I know you don't I
don't know who the people are speaking where you I'm sure you don't but you could just say unidentified woman or unidentified man or something and try to include you know comments like that okay no to flush them out a little bit yeah okay with that I with with those
comments with those comments and uh it's been moved and seconded all in favor i I that's unanimous um do you want to set a meeting for June your town meeting
um is if there's something to do jim what do you you think see how it goes over the next few weeks and then Okay if you want we can reach out to the chair and Okay schedule another meeting in June okay all right i think we should move on to the all the
water construction we've actually done um which is which which is a good sign um are are you going to report on that Roger i'd be happy to sure so we've
prepared uh as is typical a uh just an update um little memo that that you should all have in front of you at this moment uh that identifies where we are uh with respect to the project uh so I'll run through that and let me know if you'd like me to stop at any point for
further discussion but uh in terms of work completed to date um so we've installed just about all of the main itself the 8 in and the 12 in um somewhere around 13,875 linear feet of uh both 8 and 12
in water man combined uh that's substantially complete um and that covers the work in Route 6 Gford Road Osborne Greenwood Avenue and Eastbriggs Road um the lateral installations along uh Route 6 are approximately 50% uh
complete so if you're driving down Route Six and you see an excavator um taking up part of the road that's the work that they're doing as part of the laterals um and the laterals of course are intended to allow for future expansion of the
water system within the town to the adjoining streets and neighborhoods so they basically just stub out uh so that if the town decides to expand water in the future you don't have to go back into the state layout to do that um most of the curb stops for service
connections have been installed the remaining connections along Route 6 are in progress um preliminary lumen seed work has been completed at the service connections again those service connections are are the portions of the pipe network that extend from the water
main up to your pro uh property line um however I think we we did want to make a note um sort of just for folks who might be listening that the work the final work is not complete typically what we do is um contractors do is they'll and
and um of course given the time of year they would um do that rough work if you will and then come back and then make sure that the restoration the loom the seed seeding has to go down a certain time of year and we're at that time now um uh gets done as part of the final
finishes and that would include at some point um uh later in the season we're going to we're thinking u late fall I'm sorry early fall for some of the permanent paving on the roadway so that um a lot of these roads we just mentioned they're going to be overlaid
and you won't see the trenches themselves at that point um in terms of just an update on the contract costs uh we prep we prepared just a consolidated budget here that identifies what we're spending the money on as you all know the town has um
realized the $4 million PAS grant and we've identified um how those funds are going to be spent from that particular grant uh the grant itself um as with some of the other um uh um funding sources have uh conditions associated
with with them meaning what we can spend it on and when we have to spend it by so the the following budget considers those and um so as part of the PAS we're going to we'll pay for the base contract the digit change order uh items 1 3 6 and
seven which have been approved by the select board the engineering the resident project inspector uh fern corp which is my my work on the project in um in a small contingency uh when we add those all up that comes up to the $4
million uh total um PAS grant aotment um on the following page or the back of that page we talk a little bit about Roger yes sir i just um ask a question when it comes to contingency is
that the monies that is paid for uh meters and for um digging from the street to the basement uh no I think uh that would we we anticipate we know that there going to be some additional change orders on the project for example the um
culvert crossing um and that design is being finalized okay so that so the main contingency is that culvert crossing that that's one of the that's one of the locations where that money could be spent yep where do the meters in the front yard
digging go in i think the last time we spoke we anticipated and Mr hartner could correct me but we anticipated maybe using some of the opera 1286 funding for some of that yeah 1286 opera and 1295 um we would expand down for those service connections okay the
other side oh oh okay right oh yep forgot to turn the page sorry that does that answer your question mark so just want to f again on the back of the page it identifies some of the
remaining funds in the arper the two arper funds the uh as as Mr hart said the 1286 and the 1295 a portion of each was used um portion or the full aotment of 1295 was used to pay uh change order
2 4 5 and 8 and in terms of those change orders what they represent um and again these were presented to the select board and approved they represent the expansion of the water service for example we added East Street that was not part of the original plan so that
those costs were included there we added uh uh we're going to add fifth fifth avenue and 6th Avenue uh those particular neighborhoods are struggling with their wells and we saw as an opportunity to bring water given the given the uh budget so um those change
orders include more pipe network in the in the system question again um does this assume that the Rodri's money is spent it does not that is still available we still have roughly $380,000
so that's in addition to the uh Bristol County ARPA in addition to the Bristol County ARPA yeah so the Do you know what the number is about 300 i'd say about 375 okay okay um in terms of schedule um so right
now uh as a matter of fact uh going into this weekend they're going to be pressure testing and disinfecting the portion of Eastbriggs that portion of Eastbriggs um and then that will be followed by Route 6 uh the lateral and service connections work will continue
through May there's approximately 30 additional um uh services that need to be installed along Route 6 again those services extend the water from the main to the businesses and the properties uh we're finalizing design work for um for
the completion of Fifth and Sixth Avenue extensions as discussed uh in terms of permitting update and Culver crossing um the Culver crossing permits have been secured so we have all we need to be able to do that
work um the final design for the slip lining work is expected next week and at that point we'll develop as I as I just noted the uh change order for that work um and we'll assign a value uh based on that final design um so there's only
really one permit that's pending and that is for a blowoff connection at the end of the pipe run that's near 875 uh State Road uh and we expect that we expect uh we expect to have that um you know within the next couple weeks and
Roger that that's liing the pipes through the old Felmouth the old Fall River aqueduct right correct so we're utilizing the 42 inch aqueduct to get under bread and cheese exactly yeah yeah
and so it's required a fair amount of you know things like spacers it's It's going to be sort of a cool engineering sort of so they'll be taking myself plenty of pictures but it's ostensibly providing both a water line that we'll be using as part of this project and a
future sewer line yep that could be used for some future connection for sewer if the town decides to move forward with that it's a fairly substantial crossing right because there's two culverts yes and they about 150 ft apart or a couple hundred feet couple hundred feet apart so the crossing underneath is is
significant it's not like we're going 50 feet it's Yeah it's a distance no that was a great idea and in in breaking into the pipe and then getting the water out of it and getting that stuff through that was very good piece of work yeah
it's a we did I think as you noted uh we did a I have one other question here um I didn't know about Fifth and Sixth Avenue extensions and I look on the map and there are probably about 10 houses on those two places yeah i don't even
know if there's that many because a couple of them front on Osborne Street so these aren't when we say extensions kind of glorified okay connections we're not putting full 8 in pipes down those street these are sub roads off of Osborne so we have a couple of houses but we're doing that to pick up a couple
more houses have they expressed interest they have they've already signed up how many oh they have um I want to say I think we have three there okay okay good we had we had one resident in particular I won't say who but was really struggling with poor water quality mhm
and it's just it just was if you know wasn't the right thing to do just to go by and not consider you know extending that water to this particular person yeah really bad okay so we're so design work is at uh Kleinfelder yep and it's
it's pretty basic it's not a we're not looking at a complex design extending a 2in basically water service down those roads yeah well good good um so yeah so the slip lining that that's also under under design um I
think I talked about the blowoff connection in terms of the residential and commercial connections um approximately 85% of the service connections to the curb stops have been completed on Gford Osborne Greenwood and East uh East Bris um for those property
owners who submitted interest forms um early have received right of entry documents in round one of those connection lists is expected to be finalized by the end of April and as a reminder we we sent out we we provided folks with a ostensibly a questionnaire
and we asked them to let us know if there was an interest in connecting those folks who indicated that they did have an interest we then worked with uh town council Mr hart and I work with town council we finalized a right of entry form that allows the project to go
on private properties and describe specifically the limits of the restoration that we're going to do in an effort to bring water to these in uh these residents these early adopters who want to connect to the system um so we're still we're still receiving requests if you do have a
request to to connect uh we are working with the budget and what we're saying is if you do submit a request to connect we're putting you on a standby list we have had some folks and I'll give those specific numbers in a moment here but we have some had some folks drop out um but if the budget allows and schedule allows
it might be a consideration to provide more folks with those connections so as of today out of 60 properties that uh uh contacted for right of uh entry those folks who uh initially showed some interest in in connecting their properties 30 property owners have
signed and returned the right of entry forms um three property owners have indicated they have uh they no longer wish to participate five properties are currently on the wait list pending funding being available as discussed uh
the remaining 22 properties have not yet responded so I think just just as a general sort of retrospective look at this I mean 30 is pretty good i think we we had hoped and for that because it's
part of the connection obviously it serves the system from a from a um feed standpoint but it's also good for the water quality we want folks pulling water out of the pipe um so uh in terms of uh connections the
MA the MCumber school connection has been completed so the the the water line is physically inside the building and ready for the plumber to undertake his work and we did receive an estimate today from the school department um with of
$36,450 for the uh internal plumbing and then I'm estimating maybe a $1,500 charge for the existing well decommissioning um uh we had provided in prior meetings a status or of expansion areas or
consideration of expansion areas these are areas that were outside of the of the contract that depending on the bid results and funding and grants other locations that might be considered so that table just the following table um
on page three just identifies th those locations that we were able to tackle as part of the funding so again that includes Fifth Avenue 6th Avenue Eastbriggs and the Plaza extension that brings the water up to 875 State Road
um and again as part of the grant finally as part of the grant you know one of the objectives is to get as many public water systems off the welds and onto the system um and so we we've already connected MCumber School uh we have the West Plaza they've already indicated
they're going to connect and we're working with them we have their right of entry forms um Mayard Street they're going to connect um we're trying to coordinate with 875 State Road and get to the right folks so so that they might connect keeping in mind that this was
the project extended the pipe up to that property so they weren't given a lot of notice but we'll we'll coordinate with them and then the last one I think is uh lickety splits at 718 719 uh state road and that's it the vice chair
Okay so Roger that was a good report good and um it's a project that uh has a lot of moving parts and it's a project that is actually an element of success for our recent uh efforts for water on
sewer on the Route Six corridor and and I I second that this is a this is a very good update and it sort of introduces this into our next item which is the money that we have left or the
money we will get this this uh on on your second page of the other funding sources federal grant which I think is this coming several years right as far as we
know it's still active we haven't heard anything otherwise and if it is they said I think we can use it um they originally said five years up to five years we're probably down to four four and a half now but um right now it's still available so Bob you had a a suggestion um that
you shared with me and it had to do for about a a small sewer project um which would be a gravity-fed project it would not entail a uh the second pump station at Meat Works and it would be
from Sanford Road downhill to Whites and would you like to elaborate on that that thought my my thought is the we we shouldn't walk away from the
grant that we got um you know it would just be a waste of town effort to walk away from nearly a million dollars in in federal there those are hard to get and at
least for a while Massachusetts is not likely to get more of those so we we've got that the question comes really what is I was very pleased and I know Jim you you were concerned about
will people sign up for the water you know and now we're we're getting slightly more than half the people are willing to sign up and the question comes with that million dollars or almost million
dollars do we do we do a small sewer project that would fit within that do we do more water extension you know that that's really it has to be spent on route
six so those those are really the town options of what we what we should spend that money on i have a question does it matter if that money goes to sewage or goes to water no so it can be used
either way right the way the way the request was originally drafted was for sewer and water and route six and and uh Senator Rodri's money was for the planning and design and management
operation of really for the sword number so a lot of that went into design but this this federal grant was for either sewer or water and it sounded like there was a little bit of flexibility as to going slightly off Route 6 with this grant as well yeah
and and and also there's there's you know once uh because when you look at the other work that we have going on with the climate resilient committee and also the
hazard committee now that now that we have public water into a public building the public school if you look at one of the threats that we have in a in a big storm is a loss of power and we we lose our
power then we're essentially except for the people with public water were you know their people are out of their wells you know and if if we had a real hurricane or
something if you lost your power for a couple of weeks now you know we we would have a real catastrophe you know that we'd need to house people mhm and you know the MOA school lease gives a place where you can
get fresh water they could go there there's you know there's all of that kind of stuff and and the question comes you know would you know would we extend water to the high school oh now now you've got a real
shelter i in my professional career um I was working with the town of Situ when the blizzard of 78 occurred and and you know a significant portion of the of the harbor and waterprint the
homes were destroyed and and they had most of them were not summer homes that people lived there move around just like our you know we have a summer population but we have you know most of our population is here year round so
it's it's just a it's just a a a the benefit of having this public water and the public water brought into a public space gives gives us some some backup
um and and I don't you know if we look at what is the there's There's some value in doing the first piece of the sewer whether or not we acquired the whites pumping station or we did the pumping station and we did
the gravity piece of sewer we we would have made the connection into the Fall River system we don't we don't have many service customers on that first piece of saw but it's the first big it's the first critical piece in the
ultimate source system that there well there are a couple of um commercial properties there um there's um the Edgewater Apartments who want to build a third apartment and um if our zoning won't
allow it they'll go you know 40 that built the first two which would be a shame because Bob Carrick would rather deal with the town of Westport than the state and then there's the um not the Wata Plaza but the same
owners own a smaller plaza that they would possibly redevelop and um going a little bit further um we've got you know Mid City which I think is in that area mid City was sold to a uh I think a rather dynamic
entrepreneur who wants to expand his operations there and and you know sewer would help him and uh and there are a couple of other other well meat works would not we would not get to meat works that once sewer but um
the old motel I think is in that pro that area is not is it not uh Jim just it's just east of Sanford Road huh just east of Sanford Road oh okay so that's not Okay but Mid City is in that area
that's just east of Sanford oh it is okay so really we're down to those two uh commercial properties that I know about anyhow there would be you know some major help there uh we we talk about a need for housing in um in Westport and I know there's a lot of
push back against uh development but I've never heard a bad word about Edgewater Apartments and um it it's 55 or above and um they've got a two-year waiting list and um no and extending the sword down in there opening up the
possibility to to get those houses that are down along it's Bordon Street South up yep you know now you can get you could get them into the sewer system i mean there's there's all this there's you know I was an advocate for the sewer and there's a lot of benefits
by doing that well it's right on the lake so it would end up you know helping the the health of the lake I think well I'm sorry pond wat up a pond up here in New England you all call these things ponds we call them lakes down
south okay okay well good but I but I think that's you know this this coming year those those are things we should think about of we we've had we've had very
even when we bid the sewer project even though it didn't the town meeting didn't vote to allow it to go forward um we got very good bids we're all under the engineers estimate we we got good bids on this so there are people are
contractors that are interested in doing the work and you know all of that's just a you know a very good sign you know if we didn't get bids if there was no interest in doing the work then you know
it's you know I I certainly would not want to turn the money back and I think um I think just the town administration There was a piece in the paper about how
I think the school committee had $6 left of its opera opera money left and I thought you know that's you that's perfect you don't want to return that money right and I in that there was an article in the Globe that like I think
Springfield had to turn back $44 million or something new Bedford 14 you think 14 million in New Bedford yeah 14 million in New Bedford you know that they you know that they they they never get their projects committed they never get you
know and you think well you know this is like once in a lifetime it was meant to be recovery from an emergency you know the the emergency was over like you know not to spend that windfall money was you know well there's
in my lifetime there's not going to be another ARPA fund um and in for the foreseeable future um at least this current administration we're not going to have any more congressionally designated spending
um and we're not going to have Senator Rodericks forever although sometimes I hope so but um at any rate you know there's there's there's two million $2 million there you know less the local match of 239 but we would still have 1.8
million from you know the two ARPAs and the uh CDS so so th those OPA funds I think are going to be pretty much used up on this project those are the 255 the two yes I
Yeah those are committed right i I think those are pretty much committed oh okay so they shouldn't be there okay um they're not under contract yet but Okay still waiting for some change orders on Okay route Six um crossing you know we're looking at some additional patching um to improve what's out there
which will be a little bit more we're looking to uh add as many services as we can so it's mainly the the federal grant that isn't isn't accounted for and there may be some remaining funds left with Senator Rodri's ear yeah okay we just
got that extended for a couple of years so that's still viable um so this is it's north of north of a million dollars that meant is meant to be spent on infrastructure in the the north end of town yes
and the the only issue with the federal grant is we need a 20% match right and we can't use state grants but we can use free cash we can use free cash if it's appropriated and approved at our meeting yep and you know that that may be one one
way to look at this if we can get through this existing project and get some positive feedback from it when we're done with and we see positive feedback too you don't always see it outside of town hall but we receive calls here say on a regular basis asking when they're going to be able to tie into the water because their wells are
that bad that they need yep you know we have at least 30 people that want to tie in right now because their wells are bad and we have others that are just off the system or just outside the limits of what we put in that have already requested to be tied in we had a call from First A last week we had a
gentleman come in on Briggs Road between Route 88 and Gifford Road that's looking to do three connections but he's just outside the area so I think as this thing gets done we're going to see hopefully see a little bit more interest in uh people wanting to tie in and then you know a decision is going to have to
be made you know do you do you put the money towards sewer do you you know put it towards water and what are the benefits and pitfalls to both and we're sure we can use a CDS grant for um connecting to the water line in the neighborhoods it sounds like yes we
can it's like Route Six and Vicinity okay good good so from a political standpoint um it might be easier to sell um the local match to town meeting for borderline exp
extension although it's possible you know if we could put this little piece of sewer in we could sell it as you know we have most of the money and it's very small project and uh we're never going to get this money again in my lifetime i can I
will say that you know Bobby you might join me there so um you know it's kind of now or never but politically I think it would be an easier cell to extend the water line into uh more neighborhoods more
streets but what do you all think i I think one of the things that we might that would be helpful to advise the select is is Roger we could if we could look at what what we think that
sore piece would cost to say "Okay I'd have you know we we had very good bids a year ago." Um if we just did that
piece let's take a because we have a couple of good commercial places in there there there's the plaza with the pizza place in it and those and also the benefit of being able to to get into
Bordon Street and extend out there so um and and I I would say put put the uh the pumping station in that you know if we if we Okay if we did the pumping station and the sewer
what what would that be okay well we already owned the piece of land there um for what was the price $40,000 yeah it was around 40,000 yeah why don't we um
So so this I I think you you've got a very good idea to advise the select board on what we're talking about here because we were created by the select board to make recommendations to them that's right that's what our job is is to advise that's what our job is so I
think we could uh put together a motion with um your sewer idea and well start it with you know this money that's use it or lose it and we're never going to get it again and
and then talk about the sewer project or a waterline extension right i think we should propose those two things does that sound right reasonable Bob well we should we should first of all figure out I mean if if we thought that piece of Sue was two million bucks then we think
we we don't have two million bucks okay so you know find out what does it cost if if we thought the cost was in the order of magnitude of under a million that gives us an option even if it was around a
million with other funds we could we if it was a million two or something we could do that we've got a million2 plus 375 from Rodri we have almost a million six go call it a million and a half just to be conservative so So let's I think
one of the things that we could do and and and report back at our our next meeting is what do we think in today's cost that that sore would cost okay and then we know what we're uh you you've you've got
all the running the the linear pipe cost and you say "Okay we've got a million and a half where should we do we extend in Route Six we reach into new
neighborhoods let's look at the you know up in the old those areas to have an accurate number don't we have to put up the bid oh yeah we'd have to put we'd have to put it up to So I I think this probably would be the first step correct well we have the
bid numbers that we can then develop the estimate off of which should be and then maybe put a little escalation in there but so we have what they already bid that we can look at that bid is what a year old uh the s the bid is a year old the water bid is is a few months old we
we we bid that in January we we can look at recent bids too for other communities and just make sure we're still in the same ball so it's it's an an idea to see all right before we advise the select board we can tell them this this is what the money would buy
and then we can decide as a committee what what is what do we think our recommendation so um Eastbriggs Road cost what was it 350 or something what uh paved it's 400 with an overlay it's
$453,000 so Eastbriggs was $450 mhm and um so we could do four Eastbriggs well no maybe three three and
a half Easts eastbriggs had 26 houses it would be someplace in the in the 90 to 80 to 100 houses that we could serve yeah so so I think Roger we can come up with some pretty reasonable estimates one on what the pump station would cost
based on the previous bid what the gravity sewer up the Sanford Road would cost can Can you do that Roger oh yeah right so you could then we would also need to take a look at the properties abuing that gravity sewer and what are the what the pay payment per year would
be and see how that compares to the average cost of operating the pump station a year you know if the pump station costs 50,000 a year and we're only bringing in 5,000 well that's another Yeah we want to make sure we know that ahead of time whereas the water if we extend the water we're really not charging you know we're not
paying much in service costs right so that's right yes okay you're right that's Paul River is operating the the water system yep and then we can do the same thing with water roger has a per price per 8 inch line and 12 inch line roughly per line foot and we can get an
idea of how many feet we can do so we're not ready to go to the select board yet but you can work on the the sewer project in the Y good and you could come up with a a very educated guess I would assume yep that's not that similar to what we have on that's what
you do pre where we have all the different locations where we've identified if you look at if you look on the rear we we looked we did look at at when when this board decided to do East Briggs we had
looked at a bunch of other neighborhoods yeah well Jim you did a real study because I know you gave us a number of options and well there's still some options here but um an Oakland loop with 24 houses a Pine
Tree loop with 13 houses a Faulner loop with 12 houses and loops are good i know yeah so we we already we you've already got the neighborhood selected almost where the you know the best loops would be
okay um so well that brings up you know an upcoming meeting just to I know we mentioned June but um we could have a a meeting you know in the third week of of May to discuss this
topic after town meeting no no no no after after you said after town meeting yes they did say after yes the only thing I would mention is that I think we'll have a better idea as to where we stand with funding on our existing contracts and another maybe by the end of
May change orders for the um crossing we will have a better idea of how many customers are going to want to tie in and what those actual costs are for time so that that would argue for June I would say just because nothing is nothing that we're talking about now is going to get in this year's town meeting
it's no or it's closed right right okay so so I think it's it's it's so it doesn't matter okay good point it's really um Okay particularly wrapping up the contracts we have now and getting that stuff done and then we should meet you
know this time in June okay while we're while we're on the subject let's just So today's the third Wednesday so we're looking at Wednesday June 18th wednesday June 18th
has a tentative date wednesday June 18th i I can do that is that okay with folks yep okay june 18th here at 6:30 mhm 6:30 yes and Roger you'd be able to have that
report to us before then okay have you both yep certainly um I think that brings us to uh the issue that you had uh raised today in an email about the water enterprise fund
yes i walk us through that we put on the the agenda a discussion of of of the rates of our our current um water line and um this came about because um Jim Hartnett uh went before the select
board when was it in February or early March in March March 14th um saying that the um the water line was running a deficit of about $60,000 and that we really need to uh increase rates and he made a proposal
and it was not passed by the board of selection so um he I volunteered to work with them i've done this before on rates um when we had the old water
resource management committee um we lowered rates then actually it was a a much more friendly environment because uh just a little bit of history here um back in 2015 we were faced with um um polluted water and the need for a
filtration system that I remember was going to cost like 800,000 so at that time the board of selectman basically doubled the water rate from 440 to 880 and we collected at$880 uh for for several years and we built up
a a big cushion we'd always carried about$100,000 or $150,000 cushion in the water enterprise fund so our water utilities run as an enterprise fund you all know that I think so um they raised it to 880 and the rates stood there and then it was
determined we did not need the filtration system that uh you know blowouts could handle the u the level of carcinogen in the water to to an acceptable level so we I remember working with Michael Sullivan and um we
we lowered the rate from 880 20% down to $74 and all this was done not really um recognizing the fact that these the board of selectmen at the time had a
policy um and um here it is public notice effective March 1st 2003 that new water rate is 15% per cubic feet above what Fall River charges
Westport and so this was a policy that was followed but Once the board of selectment doubled those rates and backed them down 20% this 15% premium was never an issue and um since then one
time the water rates I don't know the date were raised from 704 to 728 but they stand now at uh 728 and Fall River is now charging us $721 so we've got basically seven
cents per um per cubic feet um no I mean per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for per for for 100 100 cubic feet to uh cover the operating costs and to keep the uh reserve the the enterprise fund
liquid and Jim estimates um that operating costs are about 50,000 a year there are 35,000 in direct cost and then another 15,000 in indirect costs so that's got to be covered and it's not being covered now we are lucky in that
we don't have any debt because usually a utility has the commodity to cover the um the operation to cover and then the capital cost to cover but we have this is all done on grants and so we have no capital cost we don't have you know a $10 million loan that we have to service
so we're lucky there but still we are not having the uh we're not doing two things we're we're not covering our costs and we're not following this policy so in order to cover our costs and to follow this policy we can take
the 721 and uh at a 15% premium and that gets us up to 830 $830 cents per CCF and that's what this memo is is really all about to
um to to talk to you all tonight about raising the making a recommendation to the board of selectment they are the water commissioners of our town uh for this um body to make a recommendation on the water rate um starting July 1st
we're we're on a fiscal year and the bills have already gone out for this current quarter the the April May June quarter but um we would I I personally uh believe that we should recommend to the board of selection that we raise the
rate now it's a 14% boost from 721 um up to $8.30 but uh just to put this into perspective we did have an $8.80 rate for three years okay and so this is the
830 is not a rate that's unheard of in this town and the second thing is if you adjust that for inflation the 0880 rate would be $11.85 today um so this is not a rate that is um that
our rate our rate payers are not used to i will say it's much above Fall River you know they have a $424 rate to their own residents and um that's pretty comparable to New Bedford i haven't seen a New Bedford rate in a couple years but uh I think New Bedford's pretty pretty
similar but we but they own systems uh we don't they own you know water treatment systems and we don't so we are a rate taker there i put it all into a financial model uh showing the need i've just given the
words here are the numbers i've given some of the numbers as I've spoken but um and and then then and $2 I'm sorry $8.30 would still mean uh a slight deficit of four
$4,000 but um there the this is a forecast for fiscal 26 starting July 1st 2025 through June 30th 2026 there are a lot of variables in play at the moment and um I don't know
if you wanted to talk about the current negation negotiations under way with Fall River but um because you've been you've been doing those yes so right now we're working off an old agreement that was approved in 2013 with Fall River and it's going it was a 10-year agreement and it goes year to year now until we
get a new agreement with Fall River a new agreement with Fall River has not been finalized we've had some initial discussions we're hopeful that our agreement will be similar to what other communities have like Tivid and Freetown where we pay 55% above the fall of a
rate as opposed to 70% which would benefit us and also 5% after we reach a certain number hopefully around 26,000 CCF a year which means our existing customers our existing usage is around
24 to 27,000 a year so these new customers their usage would actually be build at a lesser amount yeah it'll bring down the cost that kind of gets us but again still has to be approved by the city of Fall River and the select board so um until that's done we're we're still we're still a little bit in
flux um we have the other mediation that we've gone through on past building that we're getting close hopefully getting close to finalizing um I think the town of Westport's okay i think F River is still working through it but hopefully that's resolved soon and that's going to eat up
some of our excess funds in the enterprise the uh the reserves will be roughly 140 145,000 of the reserves will go towards that mediation settlement um the remainder will come from OPA funds that we put aside for um I will say with
the rate proposed rate of $8.30 30 when we had our meeting with the neighborhood at the Macka school back in January we had stated that the rates would be around $8.29 so we're a penny off so what we presented to the community is what essentially we'd be presenting to the
select board on and and when I did my model I I round it up a little bit but it was just a penny so if if you think you know 14% is too much on July 1st we could do you know it's called rate design um we could uh
cut it the rates we could increase 7% on July 1st and then maybe 7% on January 1.6 you know that's a possibility these are um the other thing is I think we have proven that you know if if that if
that 8:30 is too much with a lot of if the negotiations with Fall River come in you know very favorably then perhaps we could actually lower it um we have lowered it i personally worked with Michael Sullivan lowering the water rate
back in 2018 um 20% and so it can be done you know might say "Oh rates only go up they never go down." Not here in Westport they actually went down not to get too deep into it but we're paying for River
$721 for each CCF that we use here in town we're billing our customers $7.28 so a seven cent difference the issue is that with any system there's water loss unaccounted for water and you know that can range anywhere from 10 to
20% we want to get it under 10 we eventually want to get it down around five but we're still working to do that so that unaccounted for water that we're paying for a river for but not billing our customers has to be made up in the rates as well yeah that's in the in the model that's a very very good point and
maybe you know we u we just posted the town engineer position on Monday and I know that we probably won't get a town engineer who's a licensed um water quality operator but we could still maybe have a town engineer look for uh
leaks because this unbuild number and it amounts to like 4,500 40 45,000 what was the number 4500 ccf 4500 ccf yeah so um and that that
fluctuates year to year you know it doesn't take much you could have a leaky hydrant that's leaking 24 hours a day that can Yeah add up right so we're going through those procedures as well uh we had a meeting last week with Linda Carrera our water operator and the
highway department and we have a company that comes in and flushes our hydrants and they do reporting on each hydrant that they open to flush um so we're kind of updating that reporting process so that they Yeah we get better reports uh if there is something that you know the
hydrant's not if it's stuck if it's uh they they notice any leaks or any issues it's identified right away so we can address it right away and reduce any of these other issues yeah okay so um
4500 times 7.21 21 is $32,000 worth of water that we have to pay for but that is unbuild and um you know we we we need a rate
increase to cover that on the one hand but also we have to you know Jim has um you know operations in place to hopefully reduce that that water loss and again it's it's not uncommon every system has Yes yes as a
matter of fact you can't you can't have 100% type water systems no but we're losing what you said 15 to 20% so state standard is to have water systems in in the 10 their unaccounted port water is in the 10% range yeah
that's the state standard so when we do our reporting with the state we're actually 5% or under but that takes into account the water that we're blowing off of the meters so when we we deduct that that's a big number so that that amount
that's unaccounted for if we just percentage- wise to the customers it's a bigger number but overall our system they're looking at our system and saying "Hey that's functioning good you're only losing four or 5% of your water which is which is ideal but um when you take into
consideration the blowoff meters then it's it looks different." But we meed that water we know how much we do yeah so what I would like to do is to make a motion and then have somebody second it and then uh to move into the discussion
phase and get comments from from all of you so I would like to make a motion to increase the water enterprise fund rate uh from $728 per CCF to
$8.30 per CCF second okay all right discussion on the motion u I had one you know a couple of thoughts when when I I saw this and this is this is a
a nice piece of work Marie u Thank you and um the first thought is we should try to run an enterprise fund so it actually pays for itself i mean just just the the whole idea of enterprise fund is is that
they that they're not coming out of our enterprise funds are not coming out of our tax levy they're they're they're supposed to operate themselves um and and the second thought was if we're going to raise the
rates it's better to do this now than have people connect you know now now we're connecting a bunch of people and then say after they connect say "Oh by the way we're going to raise your rate." particularly since the 8:30 is very
consistent with what we told the people these people that were now connecting we told them was going to be around around this rate so we're we're consistent with what we told the public
um so I Okay you know and I and I think that the just the fairness out of out of if you're going to raise the rates do do it before people connect you so they know what their Yeah okay
what their experience is is likely to be would would Bob would you come with me to the board of selectment meeting to say things like that do Yes did you do you Jim you you know you're the town administrator and I know that you had
recommended to them to raise the rates i did i think the timing was bad and I I think I could have presented it a little a little better i I thought it was going to be easier than it was and um like I said we're still I think working with Fall River on the agreement and working on past billing i just think the timing
was off so I think if they get a recommendation from this committee it would go a long way okay [Music] um is there more discussion then i I'm finished we have I made a motion joe has
seconded it you've made comments the floor is still open for Evan and Joe and Duncan I guess i mean the only thing I would say is I mean well we're still waiting to hear back from Florida but will that change that amount any to be swayed one
way or the other it really shouldn't i I mean it may be a penny or two it's um Yeah it's not it's not dramatic i mean and we're cutting it close with the $8.30 so with Four Rivers rates coming from what I understand they didn't raise
their rates as of July 1st at their last meeting yeah they had a meeting earlier in this week and they kept it flat at 424 yep so so that that'll help a little bit yes and if we get a new agreement that'll help a little bit too but you know it's a 15% difference um it's
um it's it's not dramatic so I don't see it going down to 820 or 8:15 i think we're going to be right around 8:30 and if by chance we have a little next year you don't have to do the raise if if it works i mean Jimmy if if the price rises with Fall River a little bit with the
new negotiations we would have to take another vote to raise it to raise it a little bit right it's not it's not going to change for a year because they just set their rates for the next year and um with Mory's motion it leaves us a little tiny something to start building up this
the stabilization right well we we we not build up the stabilization we want to stabilize the stabilization we need something to whip because we've got about a little over 300 we're going to pay about 150 of of for this settlement
with Fall River so we should have about 100 plus in this the stabilization account um the enterprise fund right that we haven't had in the past we've actually had we've had 350 for we've been carrying for
years um last you were talking about some figures and you said you need 50,000 to operate and and you weren't meeting that that's why we needed to raise raise it a little right basically I don't think so we have in addition to
what we pay for river we have our own operating costs right like you know fire gets hit we got to replace it um we have our water operator that we pay monthly you said we weren't quite meeting it we weren't meeting it we're running a deficit this year we're running a deficit of maybe close to $60,000 this
year so this rate will get us pretty much even depending on how we do with Forever maybe next year we don't increase it and Forever doesn't you know negotiations don't go as well as we like and that's why we need to raise it a little bit so we got to operate efficiently
joe here are the the 35,000 of direct costs i mean I remember the Westport town meeting yeah where um you know you said your taxes where where you you barely you barely covering things we can't run water and sewer like
that no and there's no money in the operating budget to supplement the price so we got to get it up to even and and like I said this is what was presented to the to the people that are tying in a couple of months ago so it's Yeah
any further discussion are we playing safe by knowing that we cannot change the rates in one year by going to the rates that you guys are proposing so if we may run a slight deficit next year but it would be slight we would have
enough in the enterprise to cover that without significantly impacting that and there's a lot of variables right we don't know how many people are actually going to tie in and what their water usage is going to be um you know we have the school we have a couple of plazas if fairly decent water uses then that will
offset some of that and and in your understanding you were probably doing the best by sticking to that rate yeah you know I'm conservative i'd love to go higher but I think in fairness to the people that are tying
and this is what we presented to them i think that's Yeah and it's also consistent with what the select water proved what 20 years ago 15 years ago that it's roughly 15% above the river's rate so I think that's a good place to to stop in the benefit
not only the benefit to the to the town of having an enterprise fund that that is in balance or pays for itself is is that the more users that we connect the more water we don't have to spill
because we we we have to we have to take this water out now because our water sits in the pipeline and it ages and the and the water quality goes down and the won't let us sell water that's stagnant
in the pipeline it really isn't a health risk but it's a taste and odor risk um so we we end up the more users that we have the less water we have to buy and and spill on the ground right
so um you know that that's that really argues for you know let's extend the water system mhm if there's no other comment uh I'll ask for a vote all in favor i anyone opposed
that's unanimous okay so um we should just as a procedural thing Bob and and Jim we should bring this to the board of selectmen right i think should before town meeting or after town meeting well it's we you need
to start sending out bills so we send those out July I think so we got a little time i You send July bills out in July we read the end of June and we send them out okay so we could actually That's right right go before the board of selectment and Evan does reading so I'm asking because I just
read three weeks ago maybe the end of March yeah middle so So that So we could we could go after town meeting yeah i would say the first or second meeting in May i talk to the chair and see when when she'd like it on the agenda yeah and if we could wait maybe a week
or two and second meeting in May maybe we have some more answers from Fall River too that would just Right okay things a little bit so we'll do that in a in a month monday nights Bob are you available Monday nights i am
okay good so we have a plan good um that's the agenda is there any um further business any discussion um you had presented this the Swansea
upgrading their their meters and stuff just just so the board members could take it home with them look at it something to um I feel Swansea's done similar things to what we're trying to do yep and um they've been very successful so I've
been um keeping tabs at it so maybe we can um follow the lead when it comes time great thanks is there a motion to adjurnn i'll make that
motion second all in favor i will we stand adjourned okay