Oh geez.

Wow.

That's very price like and friendly and thoughtful and wow.

That's just amazing.

Don't follow my social media.

Yeah, right.

Unfollow.

It's not hard.

Wow.

People are crazy.

Well, good.

How are you doing?

You are the best girl ever.

Well, I know.

You're so the best girl ever.

Shark got it out.

She's fine.

I'm going to go.

Good morning.

Appreciate everybody being here and uh for our uh continuation of department updates, uh budget uh preparatory uh information.

So uh gonna call the meeting to order and councilwoman Scog is going to give the invocation and lead us in the pledge.

So if you please stand.

Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for this uh beautiful day of rain that our state needs lots of water, and we're thankful for it, Lord.

We ask that you would be with us today, that you would give us wisdom as a council and our decisions that we um make, and I pray that you would be with the people that are presenting, Lord, that we would find what works best for our great city.

In Jesus' name we pray, amen.

I pledge allegiance to the United States and to the republic for which it stands undergoing clerk will call the roll.

Here Jingula here, bills, here Reynolds, here Rodriguez, Griffin.

Five presentation five present.

Okay.

We're gonna start off with uh utility billing and alpha Europe.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Good morning.

Um good morning.

Um I work in utility billing.

We bill water sewer trash, irrigation assessments, industrial sewer, and LIDs.

Um by processing bills efficiently, timely, and above all, accurately.

We strive to thoroughly research and answer questions and regarding charges and services provided.

Um, here is our organizational chart.

I have one accounting specialist two, I have three accounting specialists one, four customer service representatives, and uh lead and then a supervisor as well.

Our FY26 goals, um, we want to move towards monthly billing, and so we were evaluating the costs associated with that move and trying to determine ways that we can offset that.

Um we also want to maintain our customer satisfaction, so we had a de-escalation training to help our customer service reps de-escalate situations when they get a little bit difficult.

Um increase our call answered rate.

We did an evaluation to see what is affecting our call answer rate and things that we can do.

We brainstormed to see what we can do to improve that, and then developing a progression plan for the team.

Um we wanted to ensure we have procedures, our our procedures are updated to facilitate training, and then also we want to have a plan for the team so they know okay.

If I start as a customer service and I want to move to billing, here are my steps.

Um we had a collaboration meeting with Waterworks.

It actually was um both teams where we did a training regarding the a Clarometer reading system.

Um we've also developed a monthly meeting for the leadership to discuss any sort of issues that might be coming up and solutions for that.

Um so far this year, we've set 162,786 bills out and processed 149,238 payments.

Um we've developed a small leak detection kit um to help customers if you know possibly identify if they have a leaky toilet, and then we've had our de-escalation training as well.

Our priorities for 27.

Um, we want to finalize our cloud migration for our billing software.

This is going to help us to get one step closer to our monthly billing.

Um our irrigation bills.

We want to reformat it so it has some frequently asked questions.

That way it could hopefully reduce customers having to call and wait on the phone to get their answers when it's already on the bill.

Just a simple little just access to our payment portal.

And then we want to maintain our customer satisfaction rate of 3.7 or higher.

Regarding our budget, we will not have any, we did not request any additional staff for this fiscal coming up fiscal year.

Our operating supplies.

And Alpha, by the way, Alpha does an absolutely fantastic job utility billing.

She manages it, she deals with the crisis.

When you're dealing with people's money, you have to be very careful and cautious and thoughtful in working the process.

And she and her team do an excellent job.

But on the billing costs, she's already mentioned the mailing costs are going up, the preparation costs are going up, everything's going up with that one.

What we've taken to the BOA will bring to council is a proposal that we uh list as an option uh to charge customers a cost for continuing to receive a paper uh bill or the option of going to free online billing.

And that will help us all we want to bring that to council for you guys to help uh add that your thoughts.

The and uh otherwise we're gonna continue to see increasing costs that will be borne by the uh the consumer, and this is a way of mitigating that and the other thing I wanted to bring up.

If anybody knows of um if you're aware of somebody who's struggling with their water um utility account um and paying it, please have them reach out to Napa Shares of CareS at the 208-467-6586.

There's a possibility that they could qualify for some assistance.

208467, 6586.

Okay.

Any questions?

I have a quick question.

Yes, um, I'm really curious about um your letter opener.

Mine's just a sharp knife thing that opens letters.

Do you would you give a tour of your little area so I can see what you have?

Yeah, absolutely.

Anytime.

I just am curious of how what a very expensive letter opener looks like.

Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely.

Now, and please keep in mind, um, we do, especially during irrigation season.

Uh we open hundreds of letters a day, but um during irrigation season, it really doubles because we increase our customer service line by the irrigation customer service.

Yeah, I'm sure you have a lot, but I'm just curious what yeah, any time you want.

Thanks.

Space usage.

Yes.

Yes, we have code compliance.

That would be nice.

Yep.

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay, sounds good.

Thank you so much.

Because we yeah, we are pretty squeezed in there.

I have four people in one office, kind of.

So thank you.

Appreciate that.

Right.

So there is a possibility.

Um I can work with Doug and put a presentation together where we can consider the option of perhaps we pass on those costs to the customer.

Um I know right now we get a utility rate, so we may pay a little bit less for those bank fees than we would with uh let's say another business.

Um, but if we do pass it on to the customers, there there would be a change there.

Um but yeah, certainly we I I don't see an issue with working with Doug and I can put something together and then we'll present that.

President Counselor, we have actually looked at this and talked about this with the banking industry.

Um the cost to us right now is about 2.75% per transaction.

That's for a uh credit card, a little less for a debit card.

And if we can bring in like the the check ACH that you can do, like you do to Walmart, you write a check, they scan it, and they give the check back to you.

That's even less costly.

Um the the hesitancy has been the well, the way we would do it is we would simply let the credit card company charge the fee and keep the fee and keep it off of our books.

We wouldn't even bring it in, we wouldn't show it as a revenue, we wouldn't show it as expense, we would just be external to us.

The hesitant and we do this in development services and other places in the city because we don't want to carry those fees internally.

Uh but the hesitancy has been because we're dealing with a lot of uh customers, some older, some are on tighter budgets.

So this is something we can do if that's the will of the council to to reverse that charge.

And I've thought long and hard about it.

I would like to do it, but hesitant because of who I'm impacting.

Okay, so follow-up, sir.

Uh the other thing is is uh uh when you get on the phone with the city of Nampo water, it takes forever to get on.

You have so many options, and it I uh called the other day because I wanted to talk to somebody about an issue of an 85-year-old woman that had had your water turned off.

And I just wanted to, but it took me forever.

Is there a way to streamline that ugly um the phone tree message?

I mean, that just I almost just hung up and said, oh man, this is terrible.

But we can certainly look at that.

The difficulty there is we have some customers who are like, can't you put it in your message so that as soon as I hear the information that I need, such as um irrigation season or water will be full pressure beginning of May, they hang up where other customers are okay.

Your message is too long.

It took me five minutes to get through your phone tree in order to get to a person.

So we can certainly review that and try to get that balance, because we do we have both arguments.

Well, I know they're trying to explain everything of where to go, what to do.

You need that, I know that.

But my gosh, it just takes forever to and I finally didn't talk to anybody, and I just went, well, darn it, because I had everybody's cell phone.

I called them instead.

But I wonder if we could fix that and maybe streamline that.

Yeah, we can certainly review that.

Because I think the more the minute that we're on that phone, the more we are caught we are in charge, right, Doug?

They um I don't know if you know they have a big TV and screen inside the um the uh utility billing building that looks and tells them how many people in line and how many people are on the phone waiting, give them a cue.

And I think if um if you have somebody that's elderly and needs to help, we're very, very concerned about that.

Anybody matter that back, but the people that are that struggle with the systems and we want to help those.

It's just it's a difficult balance as Alpha said, finding what works for everybody, but obviously we're more than invested in trying to meet the needs of our customers.

Um we want to reduce costs as well.

Well, when you when you look at the people in the queue waiting for from somebody to speak with, then that's that's you should be answering those within what a minute to two minutes, depending on depending on the season.

Um we usually within a minute or two, we are we answer.

However, during irrigation season, when we get flooded with twice the number of customers, um it can be longer.

Sometimes it's been as long as five, seven minutes, just depending.

Because I only have four customer service uh team members.

We did that's where we added the staff last year, if you recall, we added a supervisor over that group, so we have five instead of four in that work now because we recognize the growth.

We're growing at a rate of three to five percent per year in accounts, and we have been.

And this is the first new staff we've added since I've been here.

Um so while you can say that's great to do cost control, the opposite effect is that we are slower to meeting everybody's needs because of the growth in the population.

Yeah, one more follow up, sir.

Um what what does your department bring in in revenue?

Well, okay, so uh the um the utility billing department doesn't necessarily bring in revenue.

We we incur costs and we charge those costs.

So you've got um I think it's uh what 1.5 million somewhere in that to run your utility billing budget for the year.

Yes.

Now all those costs are the the are for republic services and for um administrative costs for the water, the wastewater irrigation and so forth.

We take those costs and we allocate them back to water, wastewater irrigation and I guess that's it.

Stewart sewer, yeah, storm.

Do we do streets?

No, not to no, we give back to streets.

So we we take that mil that money, that 1.5, and it gets charged into the utility rates that that people are paying.

Now on the public services side, there is a bit of revenue because when we collect the uh garbage cans, or when we're public services collect them, we act as their billing agent.

We actually generate the bill and we do all the work.

For that work, we get a rebate of 18% from all of our public services costs.

That's about two, two and a half million dollars a year.

We take 100, well, 99.5% of that money, and we give it back to the streets department because the big heavy garbage trucks are doing damage to the streets.

So we take that revenue and we don't keep it, we give it right back to the streets for them to use and repaving and whatever.

But we don't generate revenue.

Is there a re is there a way to uh put some of that back into the employees?

Rather than send it out.

Um I think that's a very good question.

Yes, there is there is a way.

We have um it's the same with utility billing with and Alpha, please.

Um if I miss anything, please add yes.

Supplement my comments.

When we create the billings that go back to water waste or irrigation and so forth, um any increase we incur in our budget is passed back to utility billing uh utilities that are billed out in the rates that you approve later on.

So a water increase, uh sewer increase, those eventually factor in what happens in utility billing, another cost and thing.

So yes, we can increase the wages.

We are careful to do so because of the impact, even though it's almost immeasurable.

One one body on a rate of of 70 million dollars is hardly measurable, but we're very cautious about that impact and aware of it.

And that's why we've taken so long to add a new staff.

But in as we go, if we go do go to monthly billing, and there are pros and cons that we will need another staff.

The pros are you're taking people who struggle with bi-monthly billing, and we have a lot of collection costs because they can handle a monthly bill, but a bi-monthly bill, they may default on it, then we have to send out water department to disconnect and then water department to reconnect.

And so we're hoping that by going to monthly billing, we can minimize the number of disconnects and reconnects that we have and make the the flow of cash a little easier on the consumer.

Monthly billing will also sorry.

Monthly billing will also help streamline some of our current processes, like the the collection process and um we are hoping to then be able to offer other source services, like perhaps once we get stabilized in monthly billing, doing a um like a what is I'd hope power call it basically where it's a flat amount each month and then each year we just a level pay, yes, thank you.

Right.

And the the cost of going to monthly billing is fairly significant because you're doubling our mailing costs, which is why we want to get ahead of this by converting to online billings, reduce that cost so that when we do convert, the the net impact to us is is much minimized.

But we want to bring that before council and show you the numbers and get your inputs and thoughts on that.

Um but if we do go to monthly billing, we will then have staff there.

And to do that, we need to kind of look at the as you've indicated, Councilman Bills.

The the building needs a little bit of help.

It's not it's it's a little we're packed in there like sardines right now.

Well, uh what I'm referring to mostly is about when they have four employees, and and we have increased our population by about 60,000 over the last 10 years.

We still have four employees.

And so customer service is gonna lack.

So I'm thinking take that, take that what you need from the fund or the the ballots that we receive in reserves.

Not reserve, I mean pay and and and and get another couple of loads.

So that doesn't hurt the general fund.

That's what's an enterprise fund, never mind.

Well, you are correct, it doesn't touch the general fund at all.

It would go straight with the impact would go straight through out in the billings, whatever we do to the uh the customers.

But we just added the one staff in 25.

25.

We added our uh customer service lead, yeah.

Customer service lead, so we can increase that.

Um I think what we should do is bring back before council the transactions, the number of transactions, the wait times, and if we can do that in the budget process, and if council would like to have another staff out there, we can present you with the facts and let you make a fact-based decision.

This is the wait time, these are the number of calls that we take on average, these are the uh ups and the downs and let council make an appropriate decision on that.

I was hoping you'd have that report about about that, you know.

But um, could I just go over there and look at talk to you about that?

Or yeah, I I mean you can certainly come.

You're you're more than welcome to any time.

Um yeah, we'll we'll put the report together and then we'll just have it there for if you want to review it and then I can share it with everybody else as well.

Um thing with certainly I I agree with you, we're going to need more staff when we go to monthly billing.

It's a space right now.

So I you know that I can hire somebody, I just don't have anywhere to put them.

Oh, I see.

I so that comes back to the beginning with code enforcement.

We gotta work out space.

Yeah.

So we're gonna want the information, we're gonna want to look at it from a budget, but the space issue.

Uh we're we're we're gonna need to confirm what we're gonna do over the next uh short while.

So Alpha, thank you very much.

Really quick.

Alpha, can you remind me the timeline of going to monthly billing?

We wanted to go to monthly billing and FY27.

We've had a little bit of hiccups and trying to figure things out.

So my goal is FY28.

The hiccups have been completing the software upgrade and um funding the space uh in the for staffing inside.

But uh well, I want to go back to one of the point.

Uh uh Alpha gave you a phone number where people can call to get cares and shares help.

I don't know that the council understands how that is funded.

So there's what I think there's probably 350,000 or so left in that fund.

When typically we would take divert part of the money that Republic Service would pay to us, they give us like a $60,000, $70,000 rebate that they get from the government on uh the use of natural gas as a as a propulsion uh method in some of their trucks, and we would take part of that.

But during the original COVID funding that came out in 20, we allocated about three, no, 450,000 in in three 150,000 segments into the cares and shares program that will help the individuals who qualify uh get that 250 dollar rebate.

But that's a limited funding, and the 350,000 will probably last us three or four years at this rate, but um we have no permanent funding mechanism for that as this stands.

We just look for the opportunities and we divert funds there as we can to make that so that as the customer and this this covers also the seniors who who need assistance um can go to this this program.

Yes, we have two programs.

We have um a senior program that helps with 20 dollars a bill, and then there's also another one where a customer can qualify for up to 250 dollars assistance.

Okay, we gotta keep moving.

Thank you very much, Alpha.

Thank you.

So Alpha, I'm also proud to tell you that I have not had my water shut off since I last saw you.

So I'm doing okay without monthly billing, but I'm looking forward to having it.

All right, thank you.

Tom Good morning.

Morning, council.

Thanks for having us uh for the record.

Tom Point, senior public works director, and so I'm gonna help co-present this the water and environmental with John Spencer, our water director.

So order of business, he'll come up and talk some details about each of the budgets, and I'll come back, talk about public works as a whole and infrastructure.

We added some things in the end on deferred maintenance and needs we need to take care of right now, some things about project management that we've done in the past, um staffing needs and potential funding sources, and then the future goals for the department.

So I'm gonna turn it over to John and he can take it.

Great.

Thanks, Tom.

Yep.

Morning, John.

Morning, Council President and Council.

You're looking pretty distinguished this morning.

I tried.

Uh we got a we got a lot to get through, so I'll try to get through it uh quickly and and respond to questions as we go.

Um, first we'll start with uh water and irrigation division.

Uh the department overview is um we have our mission statement, which is to ensure the city of Nampus prosperity for decades to come uh to come by providing safe, clean, affordable, and abundant domestic water, affordable and abundant irrigation water accompanied by excellent customer service.

So the staff strives to do that every day out there in the field.

This is our current organizational chart.

Um we'll get into some of the challenges with staffing uh all of these positions.

Uh currently we have some operator positions open, uh maintenance technician positions open, uh admin position open, and utility technician position open.

Um, but we'll get into some of the details later on.

Uh FY26 goals.

Um, you know, it's it's critical that we meet EPA requirements.

Uh the water water division does that.

Uh we meet uh the 100% regulatory compliance uh goals that we've set.

Um we've also have been working through exercising hydrants and valves.

That's a a maintenance requirement for the system.

Um the hydrant side with the extra staff that we were uh provided two years ago.

We have definitely seen an increase in the number of uh valves exercised.

We actually increased our goal because we surpassed it last year.

Uh so we're on on on pace to get close to 10,000 uh valves exercised this year.

Um that's still less than half of all the valves we have in the city.

Uh the hydrants have been a little more challenging.

We've had some turnover in those positions.

Uh I believe we have that stabilized now, and so we should see those uh hydrants flushed uh those numbers increase.

So the infrastructure we have is about two billion dollars worth of infrastructure out there with uh wells and pump stations, those 27,000 valves, the 6,500 fire hydrants, and over about approximately 1,200 miles of pipe.

Uh that's what we're maintaining uh every day.

The new water tank has been completed and is operational.

Um so that was a big push and a big task that was completed uh the end of last year into this year.

Uh our customer service.

We have three admin uh that take calls, and as you can see, we get about three thousand calls a year.

Um, and then of those three thousand, about twenty, eight hundred.

We send someone out to the customer to um handle whatever the situation is.

Typically, they're flooding calls of some type.

There's also water quality calls, uh low pressure calls, those are the sorts of calls we get.

Um, operators take almost 1,400 samples a year to ensure that we meet those EPA requirements.

Uh those numbers are going to increase with uh new EPA requirements that are forthcoming, and we'll get into some of those as well.

Uh you can see the last year we did over 8,000 uh valves exercised again.

The hydrants were about 1,300, and uh we also deal with backflow assemblies, and so we certified over 7,000 of those.

In uh 25, we served 12.4 billion gallons of water.

Um 9.1 billion was irrigation, and 3.3 was uh the domestic water.

The water building is still currently under construction.

Um the move in date for the the new facility portion is uh to be in June.

Umce the staff has moved into the new portion, the uh existing portion will be renovated, and that's a two to three month process to finalize the uh entire building.

So just for some information, um, you know, as we as we grow, um we obviously uh use more water, but what we've seen since 2008 is actually a reduction per capita, both on the irrigation side and the domestic side for use.

So per capita people are using less, but overall we're still increasing.

But it it's just an interesting fact to see that people are looking to conserve water to some degree.

Also demographic changing.

Yes.

Sure.

I mean, we've had a tremendous amount of uh what would be one and two-person household move-ins.

Looking at it from a real estate point of view, and and that uh brings about that change in demographic, yeah.

Just it does, yeah.

FYI.

And I think also some of the the water saving uh appliances as people improve their their houses and their um that those type of things.

I think that has helped contribute to that as well.

Yep.

So we also uh on our water side, we still provide tremendous value to our customers with uh with the water rates.

Um we get this study done every year, and currently we're still the second lowest in rates for water rates um throughout the region.

Um including and this includes that 10 percent increase that uh was approved last year.

Question.

Yes, council.

So maybe John or it could be uh Doug.

So when we talked about covering some of those costs and can conjunctional utility billing, is it the water rate that would increase to help cover some of that?

All three water irrigation and sewer would theoretically increase, but the increase would be almost immeasurable because you're talking billings are probably 60 to 70 million dollars a year, and if we're adding a new UB person or whatever, 1200,000, you'd have a hard time quantifying that as a percentage, but it does flow through to them as a dollar.

Yeah.

So where we're so low just from that standpoint, we should be yes, we should be doing some type of incremental.

I completely agree, yes, absolutely.

There are deferred needs that could be covered with that use as council looked at this, and I I completely agree with that.

I think we are lower than we should be, and we're courting some degree of future problem if we if we don't uh start now.

Okay, so then I know I'm interrupting, but from the standpoint of replacing taking a hard look at the lines that need to be replaced, et cetera.

Do we know yet what that projected cost is and can we divide that back into and what incrementally we would need to increase those rates to start uh systematically replacing those old lines throughout North Tampa and slightly the south?

Councilman Council President Bills.

Um there's two two things that we're doing right now.

We're finalizing the uh rate study with FCS.

Do we want that completed here on the next month or so?

We have that those numbers for you.

Um we also are analyzing the um we'll say the deferred maintenance or the age of pipe and and going through that.

There'll be further discussion in this presentation on some of that um, some of that those efforts that are ongoing.

Um we've we've started that process.

We do need to get into uh further analysis of the age of pipe is one aspect we have to really come up with a uh defined approach on how we look at and prioritize uh especially water and uh domestic water and irrigation.

The sewer, we have a fairly good approach, um, but domestic water and irrigation, we need to define that.

So we're working towards that.

All right.

I'll be a little more patient.

Keep going, thank you.

Uh so some of the the vulnerabilities we have um in water and irrigation, we we we still struggle with some um turnover.

Um so that's a challenge in FY25.

We had two thousand two hundred and nine domestic brakes and eight hundred and forty irrigation breaks.

Not all of these are due to age of infrastructure.

There's a lot of there's a lot of different um types of brakes in here and leaks, some are um service lines that are old, but then there's other service lines that get damaged by uh some of the fiber groups that are in there.

A lot so there's a number of the brakes that that are contractor um a result of contractors.

But these are all uh items that we we have to manage every year.

So here kind of gives you an idea of that age of infrastructure.

Um so in the ground right now, there's there's domestic pipe that's between 50 and 70 years old.

We have about 40 miles of that to replace a mile of of domestic pipe.

We're roughly at 1.65 million.

Uh that's based on an analysis over the last five years of construction costs for replacement of domestic lines.

The irrigation pipe over 50 years old.

Uh we have 48 18.42 miles.

Um slightly cheaper to replace irrigation, but still at 1.3 million per mile.

And then you can see that uh pipe that's gonna be 50 years old in the next five years.

There's 72 miles of domestic pipe and 77 miles of irrigation pipe.

Again, this is just providing you an age, um, an analysis as to the priorities of replacement of pipe still needs to be uh completed.

One item that we've we're focusing on is the downtown area.

We know that's some of the older pipe in town, and um it's also uh needs to be up upsized as well.

Uh so we've met with uh NDC and economic development and making sure that we coordinate with any redevelopment that's going down there and um looking at where are the best options for us to replace water line and also look at the road improvements that would occur uh simultaneously.

So we're evaluating that right now and trying to get projects out on the water side.

We're not requesting any new staff this year.

Um again, we've had some challenges just filling positions.

So what we are asking for is uh approximately $64,000 to help with a license and uh promotion policy that has been drafted, and we're working that through HR and then finance.

Um really it's a um all of our operators require are required to have licensures and there's different levels of licensures to get um the more the higher level of licensure, the more experienced and the more um efficient typically the the staff is so having a policy in place to um provide some additional uh wages for those licensures and uh potential promotions from those during the along those uh different levels of licensure.

Um we would like to have that in place so we can uh continue to retain staff.

Um we get to the water renewal side, water renewal has been doing uh that to some degree, and it has shown to uh increase the retention of staff, and the funding would be would come from the growth that occurs.

So the new dollars that are anticipated to come in from growth.

Some of the larger uh equipment purchases typically we do replace um our our water maintenance vehicles that 142,000 um should be for three um vehicles, half-ton vehicles.

Um so we're looking to do those replacements.

Um we also need to replace our front-end loader, so we're looking to do that next year uh 450,000.

We have pushed that one back as it's not really been necessary, but um at this point in time staff has has indicated that it is time to replace that loader, and we've worked with Doug over at Fleet with that as well.

President question?

Yes, sir.

Uh John, how much can you use from impact fees for purchase of vehicles?

Or can you?

I council.

Council Rodriguez, we certainly could on, but we don't, it's not in our impact CIP for water.

Oh we did we do have some plow trucks that we put in our transport transportation impact fee, but we haven't gone that route yet for water.

We can what are you anticipating uh when?

Um well we've been talking internally, we need to do a um impact advisory committee here soon.

So as soon as we can get the team together, then that's possible.

Okay, so this this purchase of vehicles comes from within the water department revenue.

Yes, it's coming from enterprise funds as well.

Yes, budgeted so far.

Yeah, okay, thank you.

Replacement um really needs to come out of operating yes and the billings side, not from impact.

Impact is for growth related.

Well, that's that's what I was thinking.

So the typical maintenance side, we've got to just upgrade and do so through our operation of the utility accounts.

What I was thinking uh uh president was was maintain our level of uh uh of uh vehicles and get new altogether.

If if the growth is the growth is requiring the additional vehicle uh then we can do that through impact.

That's just what I was thinking.

Okay, okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um so that we put together uh a five-year budget outlook um for both domestic water and irrigation.

Um thing I do want to point out is that it it appears that you know our our fund balance might be slightly high in this this fiscal year.

Um what's what's really driven that is we got we received those ARPA funds, and so we used ARPA funds, so that increased our fund balance, and so now we're looking to uh use that fund balance.

Um, there's we'd love to use it all uh immediately and put put infrastructure in the ground, but we do have challenges um staffing-wise to to manage all of the projects and and further discussion on that will be coming.

Uh President, it's worth just a small comment about the ARPA funding.

Um we got eight seventeen million dollars, the vast majority of that went to public works.

The water tower was primarily funded by that.

But cities and communities across the the nation are trying to figure out how to make ends meet without those funding right now, and we're not we're not immune to that.

So you'll see more challenges coming to our fund balance as we move forward.

We have fund balance, but we have more needs than we have fund balance.

Yeah, it's great when Santa Claus shows up, but uh we also get used to what's come, and then there's a belt tightening, so to speak, or readjustment.

So keep going, John.

Okay.

Thank you.

So there's also um I wanted to present some external, I'm calling them external budget costs.

Um really costs that uh are coming to us that uh um a lot of it we we don't have a lot of control over.

Uh Nampa Meridian Irrigation District has come to us to reevaluate their contract that we have that's um from 1980 um and to re-evaluate how their administrative costs are divvied out among all their constituents.

So we are we're working with them on on we have a draft contract that legal is is reviewing, and we will be presenting that to council in the coming uh months, but uh essentially it it will increase cost to the irrigation department and ultimately our our citizens about 300,000 dollars a year.

Uh a number of these are EPA requirements, so PFOS testing uh we anticipate about 22,000 dollars a year um in this next fiscal year um due to those requirements.

Um there's the lead and copper improvement um that's that's ongoing that will cost about six thousand dollars a year.

Um in FY28, one of the requirements for the lead and copper rule improvement is that we evaluate all the unknown service lines we have in the city.

So we've done an evaluation of the best we could to evaluate what we have, and we have approximately 8,000 unknown service lines that are on the customer side.

We are still required to evaluate those and provide a determination to DEQ and EPA on what that material is.

Looking at approximately eight eight hundred service lines a year by staff.

And we have that requirement to do it within 10 years.

So there's really no recourse for anyone.

So that'll cost us dollars.

They have not finalized that rule at this time, but we know it's coming.

And through grants and through the EPA, those have been being cut dramatically, and so they are looking to evaluate their fees uh schedule that they currently have.

They have not evaluated, they've not raised fees in I think it's been close to 20 years.

So they're reevaluating that.

Um I'm engaged with them, and we're going through these uh conversations about the this rule and these and this fee schedule.

But we're anticipating those costs for for the city of Nampa to be approximately 200,000.

Again, we're we're still going through that process, so the ultimate uh cost will will be known as we we vet that process.

So done with water.

Any immediate questions for on the water and irrigation side.

John, we appreciate it very much.

Tom?

Well, we're we got a watering.

I will continue, yes.

Okay.

Sorry, you're stuck with me.

No problem.

Water renewal.

Water renewal.

Uh department overview.

We have about 49 employees, um, two billion in infrastructure.

Uh our budget this year is approximately 46 million, and that comes from we pay for that through revenue from rates and grants, uh serving about 11,000 customers.

This is our current organizational chart.

Um, these are our goals for this year.

Um, we really strive to look at the preventative versus corrective maintenance.

Um, we are at a 50-50 right now.

We'd like to be at 70 percent preventative.

Um again, we we continue to strive to get to that goal.

Um, we're looking at we also inspect, so this is where it we have a better process with Gravity Sewer where you can actually inspect the sewer lines.

So staff goes out and inspects sewer lines every year.

Currently, we're at 46 miles that they've inspected, and so we should meet the goal of the 72 miles this year.

But that uh that provides us a good way to prioritize needs uh on the sewer side.

Um, and then we also look to clean uh the pipes that need to be cleaned out, and so far we're at 80, 48 miles, and so we're on track to meet the 84 miles of cleaned pipe this year.

Um, and then the the replacement of pipe or the CIPP process that we do.

Um currently we're working towards building an in-house uh crew, and we'll get to some of those details here.

Uh some of the accomplishments, uh the MOS pipeline was completed that was needed for the reuse permit.

Um rotary press is underway, the headworks project is underway, um, the digester lid and clarifier repair and recoding.

Um we received uh some awards, and so it's it's it's been a lot, but it's been a good year.

Um we manage uh maintain almost 1900 uh equipment units out there at the plant.

Uh there's approximately 40,000 samples that are taken out at the plant uh every year.

Um then also there's in-house engineering and and replacements that are done by staff uh all for to save uh costs.

The sewers uh system has about 450 miles of pipe, 13 lift stations, and about 10,000 manholes, almost 11,000.

So the new headworks is proceeding.

Um and so it should be completed by the spring of 2028.

Uh the City of Napa's recycled water program received the reuse award for the Pacific Northwest uh for that reuse pipeline.

We also had a Pacific Northwest Collection System Operator of the Year, David Allen, also a Southwest Idaho laboratory operator of the year, Jordan Travino.

So we're very proud of those accomplishments that they've achieved.

Um the staff does an outstanding job.

Last year was the first year we took the reuse water and put in the Phyllis Canal for the for the irrigation season so we could evaluate how the system was working and work out any bugs, and so um we'll be doing that again this year.

How did how did the integration district fare with that?

Cooperating, working.

Councilman, Council President Bills, yes, they've they've been cooperating, they've had uh we haven't had any challenges with them.

Um I think they enjoy the water.

I mean it's helped them, but also has it worked far as the redistribution as far as their canals can handle only so much, so the water's gotta go.

That was one of the questions we had if they could handle the peaks and the and the lows, and they were able to handle it just fine, and it was worked out perfectly.

They were in fact I got a text from Pioneer Irrigation District um Commissioner President the other day saying, Great work getting this water, we're really gonna need it this year, so they're super happy about it.

Excellent.

Yeah, excellent.

That's a real kudo in my mind as far as what's been done.

Uh and and yeah, big help, especially in the drought times and so forth.

Yeah, that's great.

Okay, and so this is a study for the it's the same study that we do, but this is on the uh uh sewer rates.

So we're about at average uh across the region.

Um thing that this study doesn't take into account is those uh cities that have not yet done the work to meet the EPA requirements that are that are coming up.

So we anticipate some of these rates to to mod be modified as those cities have to expend those dollars to upgrade their facilities.

So this was some of the evaluation we did on the sewer pipe.

Um they anticipate that 3.5 miles needs to be replaced in the next seven years, and that can cost between 10 and 20 million dollars.

If we if we do continue to proceed with our own in-house lining crew, that that number should decrease significantly with the pipe that we can use that cure in place process.

If we have to do open cut to replace damaged pipe, those costs are usually a lot more.

Question, President.

Yes.

Um has there been because of the increase of growth, has there been uh uh a disruption of flow because the amount of sewers that's being I guess flushed, and or is there a backup that takes longer to get to their sewer plant?

Rodriguez, uh when when growth comes in, the the sewer lines that are put into place are put in in such a way and a size in such a way to accommodate the flows that are that are anticipated with that growth.

So currently there's not been a challenge with flows to the plant uh obviously, and then the plant has been uh upgraded to handle the flows that we anticipate.

Okay, thank you.

President, yes, John.

That flesh tank removal is that also on the seven-year timeline.

The the flush tank and the manhole repair is not necessarily on that seven-year time frame.

They those are just um items that need to be addressed.

Um the manholes, we we need to do a that that's one portion that we really don't have a great evaluation on the um on the priority.

Um so as we were going through this uh analysis, we we found some of the gaps in our analysis that we need to work on, and the manhole one was one of them.

The flush tanks are not critical, but they do need to be removed uh from the system.

Thank you.

And then um, you know, beyond seven years, there's approximately 72 miles of of sewer line that would need to be replaced or or using that cured in place process.

So with the with the proposal, um this this first item, the pipeline and crew.

This was introduced to council last year.

Um, and so we're can we we're continuing with that process.

Um we uh are working through that process and uh appreciate the continued support to get us to having that crew um available to do uh cured in place pipe replacement uh next year.

There's a couple positions within the the water renewal division that we'd like to modify.

There's a half-time position in the lab.

We'd like to convert that to a full-time position uh just due to need the need of the samples and the requirements for sampling and and testing.

Um and then we're looking to convert a lead position into a supervisor position.

Um, and that's uh that's due to the size of the the group that's out there, uh, it made more sense to split that into two groups and have two supervisors rather than one and multiple leads.

So we're asking for that.

Um again, as I described with water, this uh licensure and promotion policy, we're looking to get that approved and have a line item for uh funding that.

Um again, this would the funding source would come from the anticipated growth.

Uh council president Bills can ask a question here.

Yes.

Um, on this, with respect primarily to the three pipeline construction crews, but also referentially to the remaining, what would this do to the totality of your budget?

Would it increase, would it decrease when you shift funds from construction?

Did this pay for it?

What how much would this actually increase your net costs, not the revenues, net costs?

So the analysis that was done last year um showed that we were expending about 1.5 million dollars a year for the cured in place uh process when we have contractors in, that would get us about a mile of pipe.

So we deferred for two years that cost so that we could then fund it, and uh um that 1.5 million is the is the dollars that we would be using to fund the the crew, the equipment uh moving forward.

There would still some of the there would be some money that we'd still need to budget for some of the repairs that the the cured in place could not handle, but overall it should not increase the budget.

So that was the the goal of introducing this crew.

So without going into deep detail, if you if that was a 1.5 pardon me, 1.5 miles to cured in, I can't remember.

How much was that in terms of miles of pipe you you deferred to get the 1.5 million dollars in revenue?

So we were we were putting in about one to two miles?

Right.

So if you go internal and you bring those three staff on for the same cost, how many miles can you do?

We anticipate being able to do three to five miles.

Okay.

Thank you.

President?

Yes.

John, how much turnover did you guys experience last year?

Councilwoman Jangula, I don't have the percentage of turnover in water renewal.

I know it was reduced from previous years due to uh the work that Andy Zimmerman has done with this licensure and promotion policy.

So I know that the retention has increased and and turnover has been has decreased.

I just don't know the the percentage.

Thank you.

Council President.

Yes.

Uh John, I'm having trouble with the licensure and policy.

And it's costing $76,000.

Why?

Why do we need that?

Why can't our HR do that?

Councilman Rodriguez, uh, we're working with HR on uh this policy and working with finance on funding the policy.

Um, but that those dollars would come out of water renewal and water to fund those.

The licensures, um, you know, if you uh if you bring in um staff that had there's there's various levels of licensures, there's one through four in both water and wastewater.

Um so uh providing the ability to for staff to increase or take those tests um and and get those licensures only helps our system because they're more efficient, they're more educated, they have they have better uh understanding of the needs of the system, and so we're looking at ways to compensate staff for achieving those licensures that we really want staff to have.

We want we really want staff to uh achieve those levels of licensure.

Um and when you when you achieve that licensure, then there's also a promotion that can it doesn't it's not an automatic promotion.

There's have to evaluate levels of experience and skill and knowledge that this policy really represents.

Well the uh so what you're paying for is certifications of excellence, I guess, but the re-evaluation of the employees' salaries, uh I think we already do that, and so I think we can reduce that amount and make better use of that money.

I mean, or just my opinion.

What do you think?

So the the way we got to those numbers um both on the water and and water renewal side, um Lindsay and Andy went through their staffing and looked at the potential um for staff to achieve those different licensures and potentially achieve um uh promotion and yes, this works hand in hand with HR to do those evaluations, it's not um in a bubble in in water renewal or water.

Um so they went through that evaluation, and and these are the numbers that they believe we can achieve within um the next year um with those licensures.

So I think what you're asking HR internally analyzes what the wages should be for us using the data from other cities, and then this this 76,000 dollars is just the funding that we would pay the employees when they achieve those licensors.

Oh, okay.

And it helps retain the employees.

And this is super important.

I I want to bring this point up for the for our water departments because of all the demand in the valley, even outside of the silly cities.

So we've got the meta, you got the micron and all the those folks and all their water systems.

So they're they're in high demand, so we need to make sure we're funding that this program.

So that's going right back into okay.

I like that.

Okay, thank you for very much.

Make a comment, Council.

The um we have made closed the gap quite significantly on wages.

We need to keep moving because we we have been a training ground for other municipalities around the city.

We train them, get them certified, and then if we don't pay them enough, then they get a job three, four more dollars an hour somewhere else.

So this yeah, this is this is better.

I uh thank you.

Uh I needed that explanation.

President?

Yes.

I was gonna email you later, but while we're talking about it with those licensures, if we invest in that, is there some sort of a contract that comes with them so that if they obtain they have to stay with the city for X amount of years?

Um we we have looked at that and we find a lot of legal hurdles in doing that.

So we we're trying to pay them the wage, build a good culture, do what we can to do to keep retain them, but legally we really run into problems when we try and contractually obligate them to stay based on a certification pay.

So the answer is no.

Okay, thank you.

Um and and we currently do still see challenges on the water side.

We we offered um, we've offered three operator positions that were declined due to salaries.

Um that would have filled our operator uh side of things and would help would have helped things, but it was really challenging just due to salaries.

Um, bottom line, bottom line, I'm gonna interrupt because our time's going, but the bottom line is uh council.

We've we've got to treat our utility system uh competitive in the valley, and we've got to it it's uh 24-7.

It doesn't ever stop.

Right.

And we've got to have folks who are uh trained, we gotta acknowledge their additional training thereafter, continuing education.

Uh at times uh your team and people are behind the scenes, people don't notice it, they don't get the congratulations, they don't get the thank yous.

And uh we certainly need to acknowledge it, and we need to keep competitive, we need to have a good work environment so that we have people here who say, I appreciate getting I get up and go to work and and candidly uh sometimes we just forget some of those who are behind the scenes keeping the lights on, so to speak.

So we're we're grateful for for the supervisors, but also for everybody who's in the field.

So in all candor, we're gonna support, we're gonna figure out a way to support because public works, we need to make it a priority.

Um there's other things that have all the fluff and a lot of a lot of event.

Everybody can get excited about some of this stuff, people don't get excited about, they don't see it, but gosh, if somebody shut off their water sewer, uh the toilet didn't flush, not because their toilet didn't work, but because we put stop gaps in there or we didn't do our job.

You guys would hear about it.

And then when you're doing such a good job, did it did they come by and tell you thank you?

No, you know, it's not glory work, candidly.

There's tough days when you got to get in the water and in the goo and and so forth and and fix a problem.

And so I just want the team to know that uh it's appreciated, it's not shown at times, and this council's got to step forward and help in in these matters.

So thank you for that.

Let you keep going.

Appreciate it.

I'll speed up a little bit.

Yeah, well, we got uh 20 minutes left.

So okay, so the other pipeline crew, which we discussed.

Um, it's about 60 percent savings to do it ourselves.

Um, so this is the proposed org chart with the construction team uh moving to a supervisor and a full-time lab analyst.

Uh we do have to replace an existing back truck, these get used every day by staff for a cost of 85,000 dollars.

Uh some of the epic economic opportunities, um, you know, the 248 million dollar upgrade that there's a capacity up to 2040 that equates to three materns coming into the city or one amalgamated sugar plus capacity for commercial and housing growth to 2040.

Um the URE reuse water has a potential for uh industrial use, um, which can increase tax base and jobs.

Uh the Purdom Eustach sewer main.

Uh dug in a previous meeting went through the the funding sources and the long-term benefits uh of that project, so I won't go into that.

Yep.

Uh some of the ongoing large uh projects that we have.

Um we have the NAMPA Water Garden, it's primarily funded.

There's a EPA grant for 3.5 million.

Uh IDEQ has provided 440,000 for design and another million dollars for construction.

We have pending uh donations, private donations, um potentially over three million dollars worth of private donations.

We're still working with foundations and additional grants.

Um, and then I uh ITDE is looking to provide us a lump sum for their wetland credit so that we can um maintain and have personnel maintain that facility.

The design is about is 100%, so we're doing the final review on the plans.

We're currently doing right-of-way uh negotiations for the pipeline.

Uh permitting for this project is nearly complete, and we have a conceptual parking lot and pathway plan that depending on on funding, uh, we'll finalize here in the next few months.

We're looking to adopt a bridge, uh, so we're evaluating the condition of a bridge near Peck, Idaho.

It says a an opportunity that LTAC presents.

I just got a letter from uh the city of PEC.

They're supportive of us adopting this bridge.

So we're looking at the condition, grant funding, relocation costs, and then a potential savings for the wetland project to put this bridge in rather than constructing a brand new one.

Uh 44 million total in cost.

We spent about half of it to date.

Um that 2027 isn't correct.

It's 2028 that we anticipate completion.

Uh Pertham sewer.

Um we've gone through this at the last council meeting where we're at with this project.

Uh this is the phasing for that.

I think everyone has seen this.

Um, we do need to work, continue to work on evaluating biosolids disposal.

Uh disposal to landfills is not sustainable.

Uh long-term solution is needed.

Um the EPA is out there, and I know they're evaluating biosolids currently, so I I don't think it's if I think it's when we see regulation on this.

So we need to determine potential cost savings or revenue source solutions.

Environmental resources and capital projects.

So our environmental resource group.

And then also there's a group that does the plant engineering.

This is the organizational chart.

And our environmental compliance group does that extremely well.

So we keep all that in-house, and then also we meet the uh environmental permits compliance.

So they the accomplishes are they complete all permitting and program management in-house, eliminating all consulting costs, saving about 345,000 a year by doing that in-house.

These are some of the projects that are currently being managed.

They also helped out with water and irrigation projects.

Again, there's no new positions requested.

We do have that line item again for retention and recruitment within this division.

Now I'll turn it over to Tom to talk a little bit more about project management and some of the deferred maintenance.

Thank you.

John, thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, John.

Okay, I've got 15 minutes or less to close.

So one uh so for those who've been um at council for a while, you might remember five, I'm gonna look back five years ago.

Um, you know, we were a lot smaller team, six project managers, one inspector, one contract administrator.

One of the things that we asked council back then, could we start doing stuff more in-house if we if we would did less consulting and we promised that we'd be able to deliver more projects and have a delivery.

So you can see the progression over the past five years, how what we've done with that.

We've increased their team to 12 project managers, two inspectors, one contract administrator, and then uh at least double the amount of production.

So uh the team is very busy, and uh I when I walk through the floor, I just see a lot of activity, and I get a little concerned actually because they have some there have 10 plus projects per project manager now, which is a lot for for them.

And so uh, you know, we're talking about we need to do more work, and that's one of the things I want to bring up is that we're kind of at capacity as far as what they can accomplish, and also on space.

So I want to get into some of the numbers for you here in a second.

Um, so with infrastructure challenges, we've we've heard John talk about some of our aging infrastructure.

I want to talk about current needs, so things that we think are failing or near failure, deferred maintenance.

John talked a lot a lot about the not being able to inspect every asset completely, so I'm not gonna cover that that much.

Uh staffing needs and potential funding sources.

So these are big numbers.

It's first time the council's actually seen these numbers.

You've been asking for us to, you know, over the years we've given you the water.

This is how much we need in water, this is how much we need in transportation.

You know, seven years ago, I was saying we have a 14 million dollar gap per year in transportation, which is still there and it's still growing.

We've done a good job on transportation on funding through grants and impact fees on congestion and safety projects, but our pavement maintenance is mainly what is in this number on payment.

So this is we're not just talking water anymore.

I'm combining transportation and water into everything.

So John mentioned we've got a pretty good idea on sewer lines, what needs to be replaced.

So 13 miles of that at 20 million, irrigation lines over 50 years, water lines over 50 years.

So again, we can refine that number down a little bit.

This is your worst case number.

That's just based on age.

One of the things I asked the team to do is take the age number, overlay it with um risk of failure.

So if it's a north side or a different remainder of our arterial, let's focus on that, and then you know, bring in soil condition, pass breaks, and run that through GIS.

We can come up with a priority system and try to hone that number down.

Um payment conditions, so payments already failed or poor.

We got a lot of uh failed payment on materials in the core of our downtown area.

Those those were all failed and residential roads.

And Crystal's talked about culverts, so that's that's your culvert number on what we see immediately.

So 245 million dollars.

Um so deferred maintenance, we looked at it.

Well, what's coming up that would be needed in the next five years, and we came up with this.

That's yeah, would be over 50 year old in the next five years because it's a rolling clock.

Every every year things get older.

So you can see the numbers there is about 362 million dollars.

So you add those two numbers up, we're looking about um six hundred million dollars and in needs across the city.

So it's it's a very large number, and um, like you said, we're working.

John talked about we can we can on the water side of stuff, let's put it put together a planning matrix to figure out what to make most sense to try to get that number uh a little bit better for you.

And then one other the thing on the disclaimer we did not add in the stormwater infrastructure because we have not done a master plan on that yet.

Historically, we've just funded about 450,000 annually to go take care of stormwater issues, but that's a whole nother um thing we need to add in.

We have not done that yet.

So, Tom, quick question.

Yes, so GIS-wise, we know where every catch basin is in the city.

That's correct, and we know what type of storm bed is sitting either in the ground or swells or overflow ponds, etc.

Yes.

From all that's gone on.

There's obviously stuff that before the GIS stuff started happening.

So we're able to identify right, yeah.

So you've got that part in hand, so to speak.

The question mark is is life of those beds and or issues forthcoming.

Is that what I'm understanding you say?

Right, yeah.

So when I say master plan, it's just taking all that data and compiling it into a document that's the team can use to help identify the total amount they need to spend, and then how much each year we would spend.

Right now, what we do is we when we plan projects for stormwater or any of our assets, we we sit down annually, look at all the GIS data, talk to operations people of what's working, what's not use our camera inspection, and then try to get the worst case one done first, and that's what we program.

Okay, yeah, thank you.

Yep.

Okay, so this is a scenario.

So let's say that there was 25 million dollars new into infrastructure.

That would be another another 10 to 12 projects we could do in water and transportation.

We talked to the team about what would that look like for project managers?

So we need two, two of those, two inspectors, more public communication, um, and then some business support and and right-of-way.

So the but part of the issue, just like you talked with utility billing, we're we're capped out on the second floor.

We've got every space taken with what we've already asked for.

So if we're gonna add, you know, start adding more infrastructure into our program, we'll need to add more people, but we need to look at a building.

And so these are all discussions that we did not put in the budget this year, but I'm just kind of forecasting for the next set the next one, and we need to be looking forward towards that.

Um interrupt you.

How much square footage do you need?

Um I had I'm not sure yet.

I'm gonna have to how much is how much square footage is the top floor that you're on right now.

Does anybody know that is in here?

That's not something that we find.

All right, there's nobody real estate in development in the room other than the van chair.

So let me just think here.

So that there for this 25 million dollars.

We got one, there's uh two, four, five.

Well, we got to know.

So the bottom line is uh come back to me, please.

Um, and identify if you're gonna add X number of people or you need certain things, how many workstations, and to fit those workstations in, yeah.

What square footage do you need?

And and we need to do it because we got a building coming empty here soon.

We got another building that sits half empty all the time or three-quarter empty.

So council's desirous to look at shuffle boarding, some office space and other uh facility needs and identify it.

So if we're if this issue and other issues are coming, we got to start thinking about how does that program in.

And before we get rid of a piece of property or a building, then we need to know uh what are the needs and how we're gonna shift things.

Yeah, so we're looking at uh some that have been sitting, some that aren't are underutilized, some that are used by groups that we don't need to continue to subsidize those groups.

So we need we need uh good information from you.

So yeah, and I apologize for not having that number.

I just wanted to bring this up for council president to see if there's a desire for us to start planning towards this if we're gonna look at funding more infrastructure, we need to do that analysis, and we can.

Correct.

Yes.

We got to know what that is so that we know we don't want to hodgepodge and you know, somebody's over here, somebody's over there.

You know, if we're gonna have to do something and move a department somewhere, then we want to do it succinctly and properly.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um potential funding sources.

So, you know, we've there's been some discussion on levy override.

We don't, you know, we there's options there.

We're not um that's we'll take council direction from that when when and if you want us to do that.

Uh we can also look at rates.

You know, John talked about we have some of the lowest rates in the valley on the water side of things.

Maybe there's some things we can do there.

Um we can certainly look at impact fees again.

We've you know, some of our impact fees on the on the what water side are low.

You know, our sewer and our irrigation are probably right where they need to be, so there's some things we can do there.

And then the registration fee for transportation, that's you know, there is a lot of different ways of fund transportation.

Some of them are not easy and and very political and hard to get figure out how to do.

We've looked at all the codes and collectively thought registration fee.

That there's a code that allows us to do that.

I've we've talked to you that in the past, and we are continue to work, continue to work with uh other Canyon County agencies about this topic, and we want to bring this one back to you this year.

So that'd be great.

Yeah, I would encourage uh yourself and your team, obviously, to continue to dialogue with Doug and Finance.

And uh so it's really coming down to say what issue, other words.

If we did an if we ran an override, how much we gain, what that cost is versus user rate side of things, and it may be a hybrid, it may be uh, but candidly, we've got to put some energy towards that over the next uh short few months and know our you know, for council to have the information and make a decision if we're gonna do something in that direction.

Um it's just important for us, but we got to deal with the infrastructure candidly from my perspective.

I know council has full council has to weigh in on the on the whole issue.

We gotta get the facts for for council.

Sure.

Um President.

Yes.

Tom, in that additional deferred cost in the next five years, the 362 million-ish.

How much do you already have in fund balance out of that dollar amount?

Um, let's see, John, do you have those numbers?

You can get them, you can email them to me.

He's got them in his packet, I think.

Well, let's not take the time.

You find them, email them to all of council if you're look while I keep going through the slides.

That probably answered by the end.

Thank you.

Um, okay.

So I want to talk about future goals for the water and some of the things that we've been talking to the team about.

So as we talked about with the reuse, that's great.

We got irrigation water, we got a drought coming, we got some options.

That's the highest and best use is actually pay back that investment is industrial customers, and that's our next next push is to find a rate structure for industrial water, help find some customers.

Uh, you know, lar you can't use it on ag, but you can use it on cooling and industrial processes.

So, and then those types of industries bring a lot of value in tax base.

So, that's we're gonna try to target that.

Do the planning for the pipeline and the tanks, also try to um get a master plan and get some grants going to try to pay for some of that infrastructure.

So that's one thing you'll be seeing us work on.

Um, and then you've already we already talked about the wetland and and how we can self-fund that.

We're gonna continue that with some other projects for some floodwater recharge projects.

So taking some of the the water that generally seven out of ten years goes to the Boise River as uh flood release.

There's about um 500,000 acre feet that flows by us.

We've been talking regionally on places we could put that and then do groundwater recharge, and that would help our irrigation systems and um also uh peaking ponds, so to help what we're planning on the golf course is to put a peaking pond to help with the um the peak demand on and off on irrigation so we can store water when we need it and put it back in the system.

So these projects help our system, but we can also get funding from them, and we've been very successful from Idaho Water Resource Board.

They're they're very supportive of us.

In fact, I had one of their um members come up and say, when is NAPA gonna bring in another innovative project for us to fund?

I'm like, well, I will just wait and have them for working on it.

So that's great to be at.

Yeah.

Um, you got conservation folks, environmental foundations, and then a new one I want to spend a little bit of time on that we've figured out the formula on how to uh fund some of these water projects through private donations like John talked about on the wetlands.

We can take all that water quality benefit and water conservation on on quality and volumetrically calculate it and then put that out there and say, Oh, do you want to have it take this as a credit for your facility?

Because they need these large companies have water goals.

They'll actually buy that credit.

And we've got a way to actually volumetrically calculate that now on these projects.

So that's uh we'll it's a pretty cool thing, and as I'm pretty excited about it.

I think we could put it on an RFP on some of these and get some good competitive funding coming in.

So any questions.

Council anything, Council President.

Yes.

For sake of time, good morning.

Thank you.

Just for sake of timeline.

September 4th is the last day that we could put something on the November ballot.

Uh I would highly encourage if we're able to get a time well before then, likely June, to discuss our levy override options, numbers, uh, the cost per citizen if we are able to gather that uh and then potentially a public hearing in August, if that's the route council would like to go.

From what I've seen and heard and wrote down today, I think the only option would be a permanent levy override.

However, we have many options.

In my mind, a permanent levy override is something that we should be looking at rather than a bond for a 20-year bond for the specific amount because this is uh uh a counter that's going to keep clicking in the foreseeable future, at least this next five years and five years beyond that.

So permanent levy overrides, but I'm thinking Doug, if you could prepare what $50 million of a permanent levy override would be cost-wise per uh household in the city of Nampa.

I think that's a starting point.

What was the back from there?

50 million at once or over time?

Over time, permanent 50 million each per annuum, just so we can start uh just based off the numbers we saw today.

It's gonna be 50 million dollars per year for the next five years, and then it really will be 60 to 70 million per year after the next five years.

If we look at the two 45 and the uh 364 number that we were given self.

I'd just like to look at that.

I know it's gonna be a significant amount, but at some point we need to present something to the voters, and maybe that's in November.

And if they are close, we whittle down for May.

Uh, if we're way off, then maybe we have to reevaluate completely.

But we just need to be thinking timeline because it is a time crunch.

Okay, I can do that.

Yeah, we'll work with Doug on that.

Thank you.

Tom, thank you.

Thank you, everybody, for being here this morning.

Meetings adjourned.