 okay looks like we're recording it's six five thirty so let's go ahead and convene this meeting of the board of directors in the San Lorenzo Valley Water District for July 21st 2022. How would you take the roll Holly? President Mayhood? Here. Vice President Ackman? Here. Director Falls? Here. Director Hill? Here. Director Smalley? Here. Okay are there any additions or deletions to the closed session agenda? The staff has none. Sure. Let's see this is the time for oral communications regarding the items in closed session but I don't see any attendees other than those of us on the panel so I guess there won't be any oral communications so with that we'll adjourn to closed session. See if she's the attendee. Well I think I'll go ahead and oh there she is okay. Okay with that I'd like to convene this meeting of the board of directors of the San Lorenzo Valley Water District for July 21st 2022 again and we have no actions to report out of closed session. Can we have the roll call please Holly? President Mayhood? Here. Vice President Ackman? Here. Director Falls? Here. Here. Director Hill? Here. Director Smalley? Here. Okay are there any additions or deletions to the agenda for tonight? Staff has none. Sure. Okay this is the time for oral communications by members of the public on items within the purview of the district that are not on the agenda tonight. Are there any comments from Mark Wilson who is our sole attendee right now? I want to congratulate Mark for being here. It's July. All right seeing none we'll go ahead and next item is the president's report. I'll just report that the administrative committee voted to fill the open position on the committee and that the position has already been posted and advertised. Okay so then we'll turn to unfinished business which is our perennial remote meeting authorization and we just need somebody to make a motion to adopt the resolution and or is there any comment on it first? No? How about from members of the public? Then can I have a motion please? I will move the recommendation for to continue the authorization for remote meetings. Okay so we're proclaiming an ongoing state of local emergency and authorizing remote meetings. Okay thank you. Holly would you take a vote please? President Mayhood? Aye. Vice President Ackerman? Yes. Director Falls? Yes. Director Hill? Yes. Director Smalley? Yes. Okay. Motion passes. Now we turn to new business. The first item of new business is delinquent water charges that are to be placed on the tax roll. Rick? Yes thank you chair. This is a a holdover item from our last board meeting as the board knows that we had to cancel the meeting due to power outage. Water code allows the the district to collect delinquent and unpaid charges for water and other services by referring them and collecting them through the county tax rolls. The district adopted a utility billing policy establishing the county's tax roll as the district's primary collection method for the past due balances. The district is moving forward with this being a main means of collection delinquent water bill charges. Attached is a resolution in the amount of 59,751 dollars and 46 cents to be put on the property tax rolls to collect past due accounts. This amount is a total through 12, 31, 2021. The past due amounts remaining after the resolution is 230,000 and that's through May of this year. With that there is a additional information in the memo and I'm asking the board to adopt the attached resolution for the total amount to go on property taxes and the amount of 59,751,46. Are there any questions or comments from members of the board? Yes, Rick with the I would have thought it would have been higher I guess is my my initial reaction to this with 230,000 remaining. Why did we run it to over 500 and you know is there a way to recover more of this sooner than 12, 31, 2022? I'm not sure of that. I mean I get those questions answered. I'll reach out to the district's finance manager who's working remotely to get those questions answered. I know that some accounts are not eligible. We placed on the tax rolls that they have a value of Western G. You can see that in the memo and we're only sending balances to the tax rolls as of 12, 31, 21 with a threshold over 500 dollars and I'm not sure if that's a county requirement or not but I can get some information from Kendra. And then is there a way for us to address the, I apologize for my seem to have some background noises, is there a way to address these parcels that are less than 2k that have a water connection no one's ever going to pay for Rick? Like you know there could be a write-off of accounts or we could send to collection. I mean these are the accounts too that they're not using any water. The meters are just setting out there. It's a service charge over, you know, we are reading the meter monthly. We could review that and look at removing those meters. That might be easier said than done. Speak illegal on that on discontinuing service and write those off. I know not too long ago we did write off a considerable amount of accounts that were outstanding because of abandoned services. I'd have to look back at that. But we could, the finance manager I do believe is coming back part-time in August and we can put this back on the finance committee agenda and start some discussion as well and get more mentioned to you. There's a cost for those and we're not collecting any money. You're very hard to hear. You seem to be muffled on my end. Mark? Yes. Is this the first time that the district has utilized this method for recovering these past accounts? This is the first time in the history of the district that we switch to the property tax rule that I don't believe is the first time that we put in for collection. I'll double check on that, Mark. I think we put in the collection one time before. Okay. Colleen, did you want to answer that? Your knowledge? I was just going to say yes, this was done once before. Last time we went on the tax rolls. And what's the approximate time span for this 59,000 then? Three years? Ten years? Do you receive it? No, no, no. That we've accrued these charges. I will find that out. What's your time? It sounds like Mark may have the same feedback, but is he coming through okay with you guys? I'm going to reconnect. Okay. Any other questions or comments? I've got one. Do we do this annually going forward? I do believe so, yes. Okay. Okay. Thank you. That's all my questions. Okay. So we need somebody to move the resolution. Anybody like to do that? I'll move that we approve the resolution to put the the link with property taxes on the roll. Is there a second? I'm sorry. Seconded. Okay. Thank you. Is there any comment by members of the public? All right. Holly, would you like to call a roll call vote please? President Mayhood? Aye. Vice President Ackman? Yes. Director Pulse? Yes. Director Hill? Yes. Director Smalley? Yes. Resolution passes. Okay. So the next item of new business is the draft response to the grand jury report. And if you'll remember, we voted to go ahead and ask the staff to prepare this based on some input that she got from members of the board. And that Jamie and I would then work with the staff to modify that further. And that's what we did. The product of that is what you see is the draft response here. Jamie, did you want to start discussion of this? Well, first of all, I appreciate all of the work that went into this on the part of Gina and Rick and Carly and Chair Mayhood. I was not as involved as I wanted to be. This was a really busy time for me at work. But I so I just wanted to acknowledge that. And thank you all for putting this together. I think that it, in my view, expresses some of the concerns that we had about the way that we felt that St. Lawrence Valley Water District issues were characterized in the grand jury report without being unnecessarily, you know, I think one of the points that Gina made to us when we were meeting about this last week was that there were some opportunities to agree or partially agree and we wanted to try and do that where possible to show that we were, you know, understanding and recognizing and agreeing with some of the issues as well. So I think I'll open it up to any other comments. Yeah, I think I'll just amplify on what Jamie just said, which was, I think that, you know, even though initially I was kind of grumpy about the grand jury report, I think that Gina convinced us that taking a positive tack was more productive. And I think also it was our opportunity. I think Bob, you suggested this that, you know, we expand some of our responses to hit on the points that we thought are important. And so we did that sometimes even when we agreed, we took an opportunity to say something. And the one thing that you'll see that we hit over and over and over is the conjunctive use plan and how important that is for our district. So I think that that it was successful at doing that successful at being sufficiently respectful of the grand jury's effort. And so I'm actually pretty happy with the result. Bob, did you want to have anything to say about it? Well, yeah, just on a recap of the process, you know, grand jury reports are to be taken seriously, as I think I've said before. But they're also a political document as well. And that's why I think it's important that the elected members have input into the process. And so I'm glad that you and Jamie had the opportunity to do that. Like you, Gail, I'm glad that we were able to put more messaging into the response beyond simply agreed partially disagree, even where we did agree. I thought that was very important. And so I'm really happy with how it turned out. And it's sort of along the lines of what I was hoping it would be. I do still remain a little concerned about the process in terms of input from a broad range of people to get really the true picture. But I think we were able to augment the report sufficiently with our message to do. Okay, Jeff. Oh, this is a question for Gina. From a process point of view, this is a civil grand jury. What happens now? We have a response if we presumably I'm assuming, but, you know, we will vote here. And if we decide to forward this on to the grand jury, what's next? What's the procedure? Sure. And I'll actually be pretty detailed, hopefully not being too tedious. So the board does have to approve this. As you mentioned, we actually have to write in here the date on which the board adopted a motion approving the responses. Then we can send it to the grand jury before the August 22nd deadline. The grand jury will post the responses on its website, along with everybody else's responses to the grand jury report. Something that some of you, I'm sure, are aware of, you may not all be aware of, is that the grand jury turns over in the summer. So the grand jury that wrote this report is on the way out. The new grand jurors are on the way in. It's very common that there's no follow up at all to grand jury reports. The report and the responses just get posted on the website. However, the district has had a different experience. With respect to the grand jury report that was written about the district in 2017, the grand jury did request, had had some follow up request for information, I think twice regarding the district's project progress in implementing the findings in some of the other things that the district said it would do in the content of the responses to the grand jury report. So it's the grand jury could take an interest in following up and request some additional information from the district and other respondents, but overall that's actually not very common. Usually just the report and all the responses get posted to the website and that's the end of it. That's kind of what I thought. Jeff, did you have any comments on the reports, the response itself? I was very happy with the answers. And particularly, you know, when I read the original report, I didn't feel that they had a very good view of the San Lorenzo Valley water district and what we do as opposed to the city of Santa Cruz and some of the other areas they were talking about. And I thought we did a good job of educating people who will read this as to why some of the things they were asking for just don't make sense for us or aren't practical in the time frame that they were looking at. So overall, I'm quite happy with it. Mark? Yes, I have two general questions and two editorial comments that I'd like to go through. On page 62 of the agenda, on finding number one, it references no growth policies in the valley. And it's just for my education. What policies do we have for no growth? The county was voted on I think back in the 70s, wasn't it, Rick? And it's a county policy. Zoning and other restrictions are pretty severe for any new construction, particular septic restrictions, things like that. Even remodeling. So just to clarify it, there were areas that were said to be little or no growth, which San Lorenzo Valley is one versus those areas that are targeted for the state mandated increase in housing. And those include Scotts Valley and the city of Santa Cruz. And so that's the contrast we're trying to highlight. Okay. Moving on then. On page 66, comment for finding F6. We're referencing taking Lachloman water. The statement is made, the district has not used our allotment of Lachloman water for many decades. To me, that implies that we have used it in the past. And it was my understanding that we have not used it at all. No, we've used it. We have stopped in the 70s. I think late 70s, wasn't it, Rick? I think the last time we used it was, I do believe 76, 77. I actually operated that on our treatment plan. I believe we had to stop because of the increased requirements for treatment. And well, we didn't, there was no place to discharge. The treatment facility was inadequate and to treat the water. And we also had a lot of taste and odor complaints. Okay. Two editorial comments on page 67 for finding F8, where we referenced the groundwater sustainability plan. It seemed to me like that should be, those should be capitalized words since it was referring to a specific plan aspect. And I thought we should also include the date when that plan was adopted. So how about, Mark, if we change that to the groundwater sustainability plan submitted in January 2020, was it 2021 or 2022? 2022. Yeah, this year. Submitted in 2022 by Margarita. And yes, that is recent, but to me having a date with it. And submitted because that's when it was submitted. It was submitted. Yeah. Okay. January 2022. So otherwise the sentence is the same. Yeah, otherwise that's the same. Take that as a friendly amendment. Did you get that, Dana? I did get it. Thank you. Okay. And likewise on page 67 for that F8 finding, the last sentence to me I think would be stronger if, for the last several words, as being limited and narrow in scope were in quotes and italics to specifically point to the fact that we're quoting part of that finding statement. And that's what we're disagreeing with. Yeah. I think that's a good suggestion. So I'll take that as a friendly. And I could I just suggest using the quotes without the italics to if we underscore it to an unusual degree, it may start to look a little hostile or something. Okay. All right. I'm okay with hostile. Okay. All right. All right. That's it. Thank you. Okay. So with those two edits, are there any comments by members of the public? I don't see any. I guess then what we're voting on doing is accepting this draft with the two changes, editorial changes that Marcus suggested, and directing staff to submit it to the grand jury. Is that a motion? I think it's a motion. I second it. Okay. Can we have a roll call vote, Molly? President Mayhood. Yes. Vice President Ackerman. Yes. Director Falls. Yes. Director Hill. Yes. Director Smalley. Yes. And is it the case that we're a month early, Gail, in the response? I know. It's amazing. Really great work and a part of staff and you guys. Thank you. Well, the other good thing about this of us having it early is I'm also helping with writing the Santa Margarita one, and it's allowed me to sort of harmonize the, I've actually just plagiarized some of our language in some cases. And so I think that that's been an advantage of getting this done sooner rather than later. So I have to ask then. Yeah. Is Professor Mayhood going to be a few plagiarism? Citing citations? I asked legal counsel about that. She said that that's perfectly acceptable in this kind of situation. Okay. Okay. He's just grinding myself. He's grinding on you. Okay. All right. Next item of business is a letter from the district to Supervisor McPherson about the Bear Creek Estates wastewater treatment plant. Rick. Thank you, Chair. Yeah. I'll try not to wander with this subject. We just recently learned from an article in the local Sentinel that the county has received a $2 million grant funding to investigate or a feasibility study for the expansion of the county's wastewater system in Boulder Creek. That's the wastewater system that's located up at the Boulder Creek Gopin Country Club. The district is trying to and has been trying to work with Supervisor McPherson and county for some time trying to get the county interested in consolidating or taking over consolidating the the Bear Creek wastewater system into the to the county system for some time. It wasn't too long ago right after the CZU fire that this expansion came up as part of a downtown sewer and it would be also incorporate the the areas that the CZU fire impacted homes that were right on streams making their septic systems very difficult to replace or very expensive $100,000 and up per home for an enhanced system. I spoke with Supervisor McPherson some time ago and his aid regarding this project and how the district was extremely interested to be part of this discussion. Um those of you who maybe not know the district owns and operates the the Bear Creek Estates wastewater system. There's approximately 56 homes on this system. The system for probably close to 30 years has not been in compliance and has a compliance order on the uh on the facility not being able to meet uh treatment uh criteria from the regional water quality control board and the county of Santa Cruz that treatment criteria is a 50 reduction in nitrogen. We have some other serious um problems uh in treating wastewater to the point that where the treatment process needs to be replaced. Very expensive process to replace but the expense to replace you know may be covered by grant but the ongoing O&M that was estimated for the new system would probably increase uh by about 30% the already high rate that our customers pay. They pay $257 a month for wastewater service that's $257 a month for wastewater doesn't include their water bill. So they're looking at already very extreme uh what I would call extreme wastewater rates uh out in Bear Creek. We've met with the people many times and tried to work with those people in trying to find an alternative to the type of treatment. We've done studies, we wind up spending considerable funds for uh 56 homes and have not been able to solve this problem. Uh I look at the potential for those folks to tie in to the county wastewater system that's going up to the golf course uh that will start in downtown Boulder Creek as a way to bring those costs down and to solve this problem once and for all. The wastewater system leech field that we have is reaching its life expectancy. We will not be able to find another uh location to relocate a three to five acre leech field. Um you know this is a very positive project. I think it's very positive for the community and I was kind of taken back when I read in the paper that this was moving forward and the district uh was not uh contacted uh to be part of this project. It wasn't too long ago when Director Ackman uh and myself met with Congressman Pernetta and we discussed this right up in in Boulder Creek the importance of this. I do believe Ann Eshew's office has been aware of this wastewater problem as well. I we put this letter together in hopes that the Supervisor McPherson will work at the county to put Bear Creek Estates as part of this feasibility study and get this project as part of that project. I don't believe we should stop with this letter to Supervisor McPherson. I think that we should utilize our contacts with the Congressman Pernetta, John Laird, Ann Eshew's office and get the people at Bear Creek Estates meet with them very shortly, get a letter campaign to uh to the county going and support. Don't take no for an answer this time. Um you know we've moved ahead and done a lot of things and helped the county out one being a Lompico merger and we talked to Bruce about at that time to think about consolidation and taking Bear Creek over. They looked at the system and said you know thanks but no thanks and now we're you know looking at taking over the huge undertaking of the Big Basin Mercher. I think it's time that the county uh steps up and helps the district out and helps the people of Bear Creek Estates. This is also a huge water quality issue but those of you don't know the Bear Creek wastewater leach field sets 100 feet off of Bear Creek off of Bear Creek Road. This would be a huge benefit for the people of Santa Cruz Bar. It's a very very positive project and I'm kind of taking back that we weren't included and I think this should be the first letter of a huge campaign by this district this board in support of getting this turned over to the county and with that I'll turn it back over to you. Sure. Jamie. Thanks um so uh and Rick you touched on part of my comment um in the letter I I think it you know is a good start I I would add some uh a paragraph to the letter about our desire to be a good neighbor and partner in our community and the evidence of that um being you know the our history in in working side by side with our partners at the county to help address problems for our neighbors like we are doing in Big Basin and like we did with Long Pico um and I'm sure that there are other things that we could add to that you know I I don't want to be heavy-handed about it but I do want to make the point that when the county comes to us you know we really do try to be a good partner in solving these problems for these communities and um we're really hopeful that the county will will be a good partner with us in solving this problem for Bear Creek um and you know so that's uh my first comment on the letter um if the rest of the board thinks it's appropriate to add some language along those lines um I would recommend that as a friendly amendment to the letter um and uh secondarily I just you know I want to support the idea of doing some outreach to these communities I think in addition to soliciting some um letters from the Bear Creek homeowners who who could potentially be beneficiaries we should solicit a letter from the city of Santa Cruz as well they obviously have you know some potential benefit if the water coming down the river is cleaner um when it gets to them so it'd be nice to be supporting that uh as well yes I just to put a uh a firmer period on what Rick was talking about rates if you read the report I believe the rates um under the new system operating and this is operating cost we're going to be estimated around $500 a month um and I don't remember if that's year one or year out but it these rates we're going to be escalating at very very rapid pace um I think this is a great to try I mean unfortunately I think this is a recurring uh issue um that we in the San Lorenz Valley um face uh relative to attention so I like Jamie's idea about reminding folks that you know we really do um try to work together and have done so on numerous occasions um at some point there may be a discussion about a line from Bear Creek estates down to uh Boulder Creek um how many miles is that Rick uh couple yeah it's it's a ways I don't know James might know you know I'm thinking it's like a five mile um it's a ways it's a ways and so you know the cost of that is is likely to be pretty big as well my disappointment in the report was that it did not take into account the other technologies that are available for um septic um due to handily county limitations and that um one way or the other this issue is not going away unless the county is prepared to buy people out of their house um which is just would not at all make any sense so we need to be working with the county on this other than um just saying hey you know it is what it is it doesn't have to be this way but it will require folks thinking differently and out of the box and right now um I I'm not sure we're getting that Mark yes um I agree with nearly everything that's been said uh except for one comment that Jamie was making as to reaching out to the city uh and pointing out to the city that if they participated in this it would need overall improve their water quality um the district is responsible for the water quality the district is responsible for that wastewater treatment system um I don't want to point out to the city that oh and part of the reason why water quality might not be so good is because our treatment system it's not the residents it's the district's water system waste water treatment system it's not meeting criteria or conditions so that's my only comment on that thanks okay Jeff did you have a comment a question okay uh circle back to you Jamie um I just wanted to respond to uh director Smalley's comment and and I I appreciate what you're saying Mark I really do you know caution being the better part of valor um but uh I think that the city is probably aware of I mean I'm sure that they're aware of the condition at Bear Creek we've been out of compliance for decades um they are certainly aware that the uh you know that that that they have um a ongoing problem with their water quality as a result of the high concentration of septic systems that we have in the San Lorenzo Valley um but I guess I just don't think that pointing this I don't think we're pointing anything out to them that they're probably not already aware of as an existing condition um because I believe the compliance order comes from the state of California um and uh and so you know getting their support uh in in asking the county to do this gives us more leverage with the county to get this into their their study so that we can potentially benefit from it um so you know I but I appreciate the comment Mark uh Jeff you're muted Jeff so my thought on this is that with the city of Santa Cruz and the quality of Bear Creek water this might be something better uh discussed with them rather than put it right and therefore I don't think I would put it in this letter but we might want to have a an informal conversation with them on the subject I think the plan would be we would meet with them and ask for their support yes all of the information about our water quality and our non-compliance and our compliance order is listed on the regional water quality control board website the city's very aware it's just one of many areas yeah the nitrate comes in from in the San Lorenzo Valley I think we would just look we would look for support and you know moving to get this cleaned up so to speak yeah um if it would come further down the road it wouldn't be putting this letter uh remnant of the early okay did everybody catch that or was it my god he's just saying it's he still has had a santa from the last time so okay um so uh I think my general impression is that we shouldn't put anything about the city of Santa Cruz and water quality I mean our you know the contribution of nitrates from that 50 households is is not a big deal compared to all the zillions and septic systems there are um pouring in the San Lorenzo River so I I and I would not want to put it in writing given our somewhat contentious relationships with the city of Santa Cruz but but I I do appreciate um Jamie's suggestion of maybe adding a short paragraph to the point that uh we're we have been a good partner um but I guess we can say that but then how do you want us to finish that uh sentence like so it doesn't yeah the suggestion for how you would like that worded um I would say something along the lines of you know we we um have stood ready to be a good partner um you know in in addressing some of the the you know critical what I don't know uh crisis is not the word I want to use but maybe Gina we'll find a better you you know critical circumstances some of our neighboring communities have faced um and and we are hopeful that the county um will support um us as we try to address this you know um ongoing I don't want to call it critical but you know ongoing um I think Rick you used a some language when we talked about this being kind of the last opportunity for this community um to get folded into a project of this nature and so you know that's sort of where I was going with we've been a good partner to the county and we're really um looking for the county um to to partner with us in in trying to creatively solve the problem that this Bear Creek community faces something along those lines right in in improving and this is the Bear Creek's I mean I look at this as Bear Creek doesn't have any other options outside of you know talking like you're both good on different types of projects and there's a host of different types of wastewater systems out there um but the county as Bob says the county will not accept something outside the box so I you know I I think looking for the county to to support the district on improving the of our public infrastructure if I could just clarify one thing um and I I agree with um that language uh that Rick was suggesting around this being you know an opportunity for the community to um but going back to the earlier conversation I just want to clarify I did not want to add language about the city of Santa Cruz to the letter I just wanted to reach out as Rick suggested to the city of Santa Cruz and ask them if they would consider writing a letter of their own supporting this so there shouldn't be any message any mention of the city of Santa Cruz or the water quality issues in my view in this letter okay thank you for clarifying that um Gina uh how would you like to proceed on this since we don't have exact wording um do we need to bring it back to the board I I do feel there's a little bit of an urgency thing here to get it sent off to um really the only reason this was brought to the board is because it's drafted to come out under the board president's signature so your you would be acting as sort of the spokesperson of the board to make sure the board agrees with the message before you sign the letter so it doesn't need to be perfectly wordsmith um unless it doesn't even really need a vote if there's a consensus of the board for you to send this as long as the board is comfortable that you're delivering the message of the board um through the floor all right um well okay then uh can we just have um a voice vote uh in terms of um all in favor of sending a letter along these lines with uh Jamie's suggested additions all in favor say aye please aye opposed abstentions okay all right so we'll give it to Gina to craft a couple more sentences I don't think we want to make it much longer I like the idea that it's just a single page you know tends to when you're sending it to a politician we don't want it to get too long I just want to clarify I I didn't I wasn't involved in the drafting so I think you're right I did it okay I'll fix it and I'll I'll run it by you Gina what longer Gina you and Rick okay okay we can redo it again okay there's somewhere too okay uh I've been I've been editing so much stuff recently I've forgotten like what what what's what Bob you have your hand up I just just that I'd be interested in having the response I'm back to the board if there is one sure okay all right all right uh let's see what is our next item of business is uh a board appoint a board member liaison to the Lompeco assessment district oversight committee yes uh thank you we're asking the board tonight to select uh or appoint a board liaison to the Lompeco assessment district oversight committee with the resignation of director Henry who held that post in the past there is a vacancy we're asking the board to select one of the board members tonight to make as the Lompeco liaison and then you both reach out to the Ladoch committee I do believe that they have to review the board selection as you might remember um Bob volunteered to go to the recent meeting on short notice he attended that um and um I I would like to nominate him to continue on as the liaison in this I don't think uh Bob or I think it's going to be a big job um they're kind of finishing up their their work but we do need to have somebody as liaison given the um rules that were established in terms of setting up the Ladoch um so that's that's my suggestion is that a motion or uh well we can discuss it if anybody wants to but if you'd like me to make it a motion I will I'll I'll move that we appoint Bob as the um liaison to Ladoch okay any discussion okay any discussion by members of the public no all right then Holly you want to take a vote is it Mayhood yes Vice President Ackerman yes Director Falls yes Director Hill yes Director Smalley yes with a thank you yeah yes thank you Bob for being willing to do this they're great folks I love them the the committee is down to only three members now um I think as they're winding winding up Holly is doing a good job of kind of getting them organized but we do have this obligation to continue to work with them all right final item of new business is our drug and alcohol policy I think this one is in my court uh Chairman Hood um the reason that this item is coming before you is that the district is required um when it accepts great state grant funds to be in compliance with the drug free workplace act under California law um in the district in particular needs to certify its compliance for purposes of um finalizing the grant to move to the Fall Creek fish ladder so the district does have a policy along these lines that was adopted many years ago but uh I was asked to do a legal review before the district certifies its compliance for the Fall Creek fish ladder project and so what you have in front of you is an updated version of the policy that really just tracks the state law requirements it's very straightforward there's nothing in here really that's beyond what the state law requires there's a lot of additional things that could be in a drug and alcohol policy and the district may want to look at them particularly for purposes of compliance with federal requirements um but in the interest of getting the Fall Creek fish ladder uh grant award finalized we've kept it simple and just ask that you approve this um revision and update to the district's uh drug and alcohol policy Rick did you have anything you wanted to add no it's uh pretty straightforward um I reviewed it um and we're you know moving ahead to implement uh there's a couple minor changes and to make sure that staff is aware of those changes and we'll be contacting individual staff and so forth but it's pretty straightforward as counsel as soon looks like Bob you have a hand up uh just a couple questions um what is the definition of controlled substance I'm sure it's in the code but just for benefit of everybody going to that right now I knew you'd find it faster than I would is is it a federal definition or a state definition um that is a good question and um I believe there are let me let me Bob it because it's in the state code it's a state definition that's not a cross-reference to federal law but I don't have the actual definition in front of me but what I can assure you is that that because of the context it's not a reference to federal law okay good because there are differences and some things are okay under state but as I understand is that correct yes you're you're correct and um that's a great question and uh this is a state law only reference okay and if someone violates or gets convicted but it was on their own time no harm no foul at that point correct no disciplinary action taken well at least generally speaking this is about workplace issues so this is not there's nothing in this policy that would seek to penalize employees for conduct that's strictly personal or off duty and um the last question did we remove the notification requirement because we're gonna get notified anyway or is there some other process for that uh so the reason that it was removed is you know this was written in the 1990s and frankly I think it's a little bit questionable to have without doing a lot of legal research I had questions about the legality of that type of a notification particularly when um it says there's a certain amount of time within which employees must notify the district sure but I'm not sure politics employees have been made aware of this policy for a very long time and so how exactly that would be enforced is a little um it's a little confusing and it makes the the policy complicated but I would also note that that that notification provision um pertains to workplace violations and it's very very difficult to imagine that an employee district employee could have a workplace related drug conviction today that the district wouldn't know about and that's what I meant is that we would know about does it happen on the job so if there was a violation we'd follow up and figure out if they got okay great thanks Amy do we um if a an employee who was driving a water district vehicle were it to be involved in an accident do we require drug testing um at the time of the accident or alcohol testing I guess we do not now law enforcement may I think there's a suspicion but the district has a rule does not it I I guess I don't know what you know the distinctions are but you know in in my past employment because I worked in public transportation you know obviously those were safety sensitive positions and so anyone operating a district vehicle whether it was you know with passengers on board or whether it was a non-passenger vehicle was subject to a drug and alcohol testing um at the time of a a vehicular incident so I just don't know what um the obligations are that we have uh regarding um you know our you know responsibilities if one of our employees are uh involved in an incident like that we have protocol in place if there is an incident that a supervisor suspects drug or alcohol use that we move through um but in the case of an accident most likely that would be taken care of long and or an injury accident requires and I would add that this is an area where I think the policy would benefit from um being checked against federal law requirements but that's a bigger undertaking than um that will take more time that um may not be consistent with getting everything settled for Fall Creek right away understood uh so we need a uh motion regarding um this I guess I moved the adopt the revised uh drug policy as presented by board counsel and uh implemented uh worthwhile and and if I could request if the motion is to we'll just adopt the resolution the resolution sort of okay yeah pointing what exactly is being done I'll second that just looking for the resolution and board chair I just did want to flag a public comment on this item okay can we take a vote please um yeah go out for public comment first oh I'm sorry there will be any given go ahead Mark you have a comment on the drug and alcohol policy that would be no no all right um let's go ahead and take a vote I just wanted to mention that page seven of 23 on this item is the um uh resolution okay president may hood thank you vice president Ackman yes and I'm going to excuse myself because my daughter has been gone for a year just walked through the door director falls yes director hill yes director smally yes it's a blurred background but we might get to see it so that passed um next we come to the consent agenda um is would any member of the board like to pull anything from the consent agenda members of the public with an out objection um it is adopted and next we come to uh district reports um is there a district manager report tonight tonight there is not shipper okay um how about uh any comments on the department status reports mark yes i've got to ask about the fall creek fish ladder and the comment that we see in the engineering report from that um i don't see josh available so i'm guessing rick yes um uh you know josh's comment is is correct we are are working with the contractor uh on getting his submittals and um it's been slow so am i correct no work has started no construction work has started correct okay and the next question is go ahead bud you asked it well the next question on that one is so are we gonna run out of time yeah to get this done this year has serious concerns about the contractor's ability to complete this project uh before um we have to be out of the stream and meet the regulatory deadlines the district uh expects to make a decision about how to proceed soon we have a backup i would like to keep it at that statement for now directors yeah okay thank you okay any other questions or comments on department status reports well mark if you've got more questions mark go ahead you were there first okay um on the redwood park tank uh we've continued to see uh we're delayed in trying to locate all of the piping in the area um have we utilized or considered utilizing a third party outside utility locator to assist us with this well i think the problem now is that we're out to bid but we are not getting any materials from contractors six to eight months without a estimated arrival time and now it is filtering down to the day-to-day parks we are not getting water meters we're not getting any brass we're not getting any steel um we are coming to a screeching halt uh on our projects the pipeline is out to bid and i do believe josh kicked it out another week uh before closing for the redwood park pipeline up to the tank to move it ahead but we are having a real problem with material supply chain um and we're not getting you know uh any type of definite dates for delivery we have some valves out and one of the valves that we're looking for for the bear creek wastefulness month or two that's two to four right i understand the uh supply chain issues that we have industry wise the comment in the report was we're still trying to locate existing and abandoned piping under the ground at that location i do believe that's been completed james do you have an update on that on the locates up at redwood park yeah that's all been complete we dug everything up verified size location okay we're good to go okay all right anything else mark not on the engineering i do have one on the environmental and it's a more global question um and i'll go to bob okay um i see a number of uh permitting grant tracking um conjunctive use plan uh formulating um and and other aspects and rick i have to ask the general question uh is is carly overload with work and in particular i i went back and i looked at one of the items it's the issuing the request for proposals for the bracken brain forest spring's work uh for the environmental aspect which we do have a clock ticking on being end of next year to get the construction completed uh exchanges were yes you got green mid march that we should get that started it's now four months later is she okay is there something else we need to do to support her outside this whole well we've made a a lot of changes in with the management team i will say on that particular item i do believe that's been in my inbox and she has asked me several times recently to get that out it is completed and it's ready to go i just need to sign off on it we have been we do have a considerable amount of work going on we do have a position out to replace carly to give her help uh and her previous position uh as an environmental planner that will help but there's several staff members uh involved and i've been holding that one up uh and that'll move ahead by the end of this week which is tomorrow and get that out and you know working carly and i've been working together to try to organize to try to get you know planning done much better scheduling and so forth you know i'm hoping and and i've been holding a lot of this up because i don't want to race right through it um we want to do it right um so i i do understand that there is it is time sensitive and hopefully that we get a little better uh on track and again that one's my that's my fault um but we've been spending some you know i would consider quality time which takes time on scheduling and putting you know the management team working to get us better organized okay could i just uh rick can you tell us about the specifics of the environmental position and has that been advertised when when is that we hoping to the curly is it is it posted or is that in my inbox as well um i believe don our hr staff is currently working to get that out she was aiming for this last monday but i don't believe it actually ended up posted um so hopefully we'll see it early next week at the latest okay um i think uh more covered all the questions i had in engineering so go to finance and business um so excuse me i noticed that our operating expenses um are looks like they're non-linear which is good given that we are way down on um revenue where where have we been back in our up and do we have an estimate of where we're going to end up i'm sorry bob you you broke up can anybody hear him better than me yeah i think lean in a little bit more bob you're a little fuzzy there okay let me try is this better all right i'm sorry you have to look at my face so big that's that's not a good thing that's why i'm back okay um yeah rick i i noticed that we are um uh lower than expected on operating expenses you would expect with one month to go to be at about 92 or at 85 where have we been able to cut back on the operating expenses a big a big reduction is in since staffing we have several positions not filled um and that uh you know we're moving slow on filling we haven't filled uh the environment the uh water quality manager uh position uh the uh we've had one of retirement right after him the assistant water quality uh supervisor is gone we have about four positions uh that have been vacant uh for some some time we haven't moved yet on the project inspector um so there has been uh some considerable um reduction in staff and that probably is the bulk on labor in the operating cost i mean we're also i don't think uh inventory shows up on that reporting looking at yeah it does not we're not we're not replacing inventory that that's down um and uh but we probably also have some pretty good expenses with fuel and and power in the operating costs but i would say the bulk of it bob is personal okay it also has a big cost i haven't been committed yet well and and that my next question was an estimate of where we're going to end up since we're you know well i guess we're actually over the end of the year so right and but yeah so that that just as soon as we can get some kind of an idea the reason it's critical to me anyway is that the operating margin is what drives everything our ability to borrow money our ability to capital infrastructure and right now we're at two million um you know for the for each year we should be around three you're close to three and we're we're short a lot any impact this agreed okay um kenra is supposed to be coming back part time uh at the first of the month and so that's first of her list okay start getting those right this is out there for you okay a great then on to uh the operations report i was looking at the water that's being extracted out of the south system wells and i wanted to make sure i'm reading this right for june of 2013 we were extracting 13 and a half million gallons and for june of 22 we're extracting six and a half are we are we sending them water from other areas wait hold on let me do you iterate what you just said again yeah so june of 2013 we extracted 13.6 or 13.7 million in june of 22 we extracted 6.4 yeah and that is because we've been able to supplement water from the surface sources down to the south system through the intertize with those being installed after 2013 so the well pumping in the south system has gone down year by year due to that and so we're we're continuing for the for the month to do that i mean this is just last month so no so right yes for last month yes we were able to do that for this month no we are not we had to shut down all of it because our surface sources are dropping dramatically right now and we're able to do that under an emergency declaration then yes you know the the december january 10 inch rain we benefited considerably all the way up into june with that surface water and we took advantage of knowing that we were not going to have surface water once it dropped off because of the cz u we took advantage of that excess surface water and tried to move it down into the south system and the momentary and also knowing that we were going to be pumping water out of those wells back to the north system during that time because of our surface sources not being installed right and so i assume we're we were sending fall creek watered in the north system as well uh we were sending no not so much to the north system we were sending to the south system not so much to the north system lion plant was supplying the north system efficiently we just turned that around about three quarters of the way through june okay great you know that those kind of major events are of interest to me at least in terms of when we go from surface to the well and and it you know it kind of indicates um you know sort of when we started drawing on that groundwater and and that's at least for me that's an important event to know so thanks james i appreciate it and this is where conjunctive use once we get all back this is you know what's going to show the district is probably pretty self-sufficient with conjunctive use and will not have the use that other agencies will be having right and that's that's why it's you know it's uh really would be great to get that done as quickly as possible i unfortunately we've been blocked a little bit yeah getting those emergency usage on the energized lifted is pretty big step forward great james thanks very much appreciate you anything else pa lowering hand thank you i'll move my head anything else from any other questions on department status reports how about uh let's see mark is the one member of the public out there did you have any comments or questions on that or how about on the committee reports no he's there working away on his notes um okay how about any comments from members of the board on uh committee reports not seeing any um we didn't have any written communications for this month so with that um without objection i will um adjourn this meeting thank you all for an efficient meeting thank you thank you good night everyone