Jason doesn't let you do that.

Jason doesn't let you do that.

Okay.

Yeah.

Members, we'll go ahead and get started.

Roll call.

Yep.

Good morning.

Councilmember Hughes present.

Council Member Morel present.

Councilmember Harris present.

Councilmember McCarrin present.

We have a quorum.

Okay.

So for the first item, we have this is a joint climate change and sustainability committee with public works.

So we're going to start with um agenda item number two, which is for discussion.

This is a resolution for consolidated billing.

Um this committee will discuss a resolution directing Entergy New Orleans to implement consolidated billing as a part of the community solar program.

And today is a big day for community solar as the committee will discuss this resolution that will direct Entergy to implement this consolidated billing as part of the community solar program.

And I will be setting the first and final deadline for implementation of consolidated billing.

This is eight years in the making.

The resolution and this is the final step in the docket.

From the beginning, the council has set out to develop a community solar program that makes clean, cheap power accessible to all ratepayers.

Net credited consolidated billing.

This is just a fancy term for all on one bill.

After a year of filings, conferences, and evidentiary hearings, the council finds that net credited consolidated billing as part of community solar program is in the public interest.

This means one bill for customers that show their savings and no separate subscription fee payment, and direct payment for power from entergy New Orleans to the developers.

In September, and then ENO will be expected to present regularly before this committee to show ensure that we stay on track.

So with that, um Ms.

Spears, would you kind of go over the resolution briefly, and then I'll allow for um comments from the dais and then public.

A lot of very impactful feedback from stakeholders and members of the community to ensure that we got to this point.

This was the final step to ensure that we have a successful sustainable program.

Consolidated billing makes this easier for subscribers and subscriber organizations to participate one bill, as Councilmember McCarran said.

You once fully implemented consolidated billing will allow you to see your savings on one bill and will allow entity to make direct payments for the power to the subscriber organization.

Councilmember, I think we covered it.

Do you have any other questions?

Any questions from the other members?

Excellent.

Thank you.

Okay, great.

So with that, I'll start with public comment and then I have some final thoughts.

Good morning, esteemed council members.

Thank you very much for this opportunity to speak.

Together, New Orleans and the Sisters of the Holy Family are developing a community solar project in New Orleans East.

That project will allow for families to not only subscribe and get benefits and credits on their bills, but it will also allow them to have that option for at least 20 years.

This has been a long time coming, as you have stated.

Years of fundraising, finances, community commitments, investment on our part.

The project is already underway in July of 2024.

You all, the council, gave a deadline to entergy of September 30th, 2024 to allow a continued delay into March of next year.

One allows entergy to defy what you have already set in place.

Two, it impedes the project because we're already underway.

We'll be ready and functional in October.

To go beyond December will mean that there are tax credits.

It will cost our project $730,000 more, waiting again.

It's not acceptable.

It's not acceptable for the people, it's not acceptable and respectable of this council.

Our mayor has said very clean plainly we are not going to be bullied.

We're not going to give to bully tactics any longer.

And what I'm asking is that we not do that.

The fear of lawsuits and things like that.

Stand up for us.

We will stand with you.

Our ask is simply that we support consolidated billing, but we do not need a delay beyond December 2026.

Thank you.

Council members, I apologize.

I have a housekeeping item.

Item three on this agenda has been deferred to July 14th.

That is the discussion of the Lincoln Beach project.

I meant to make that announcement at the top of the meeting.

I apologize.

Deborah Salvador, followed by Staniel Wheel.

Good morning.

My name is Deborah Salvador, 616 Cadiz Street, and I am here to speak on behalf of the low and middle income households that could be eligible to participate in community solar.

One of the goals of the program is to have 50% of the subscriptions go to low and middle income households since they are in most in need of reduced energy bills.

However, in most cases, these are the same people who are least likely to be able to be here today to testify as to their needs and constraints that they could face in participating in this program.

Without consolidated billing, the way the program works is that they get a credit on the monthly bill and then separately pay the subscription fee.

While the net would be a positive amount to the subscribers, they would incur additional costs in terms of time and money, both of which are in short supply to them with dual billing.

Having two bills instead of one for electricity is a major constraint.

First, this would be confusing and inconvenient.

Dual billing adds a burden for the very folks targeted for this plan.

In particular, for those who do not have a bank account, this means they would have to pay for two money orders instead of one every month.

Their payments would go to two different places, likely also on different days.

Many low and middle income folks are either worrying who cannot afford to miss work, they're working multiple jobs, they're taking care of children or others at home, and they do not have reliable methods of transportation.

Also, with dual billing, one or both of these bills are likely to be missed.

Therefore, the lack of consolidated billing at the rollout of this program could prevent a main target audience from being able, willing, and able to participate.

So consolidated billing is essential to the success of this program.

Thank you, Deborah.

Daniel Wheel, followed by Mary Ellen Burns.

Sorry, I couldn't hear my name over the applause after the last one.

Good morning, Council.

My name is Daniel Weil.

I'm a software developer.

It sounds like I've been doing software development longer than community solar has been in the works.

And I'm here today to talk to you about the technical feasibility of consolidated billing and am in support of it.

The idea that it would take eight more months to implement consolidated billing, I think is absurd and could be done in probably a weekend, if not a month.

Definitely by the time that the Community Solar Project is ready to be up and running by Together New Orleans.

They have access to anthropic clawed AI accounts, another product that I use daily and has tremendously improved everybody I know's productivity.

So I see no reason why, based on that, they couldn't achieve this with significant speed and pace definitely before the end of the year.

Thank you.

Thank you, Daniel.

Mary Ellen Burns, followed by Harold John.

Good morning.

So in honor of our 250th anniversary, I would like to quote Ben Franklin who said you may delay, but time will not, and lost time is never found.

These delays starting nearly a full year ago, if allowed to continue, will cause the Sisters Community Solar Project to flounder financially and will represent another example of how the resilient citizens of New Orleans, especially our low and middle-income sisters and brothers, continue to suffer economic hardship at the hands of our government.

Time lost and never found, indeed.

We recognize these delays for the lame.

Childish excuse that they are f that they are, and we respectfully request our elected officials and entergy New Orleans to come together like adults and provide consolidated billing for the Sisters Community Solar Project in a timely manner.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mary Ellen.

Harold John, followed by Barrington.

Good morning, members of the council.

My name is Harold John.

I'm here on behalf of Together New Orleans, and I'm at come here asking and looking for a win.

We lost Calais.

We lost the clerk of court seat that was lawfully elected.

We lost judgeships that were lawfully elected.

We lost revenue with Folgers because they did an end around on us.

We lost good city workers who had to be furloughed.

I'm asking that the good citizens of this city not only uh want to win, not only need a win, but they deserve a win.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Harold.

Barrington followed by Calvin Lawrence.

Good morning.

My name is Barrington Gidney.

I'm one of the pastors of Lover Ground Community Church in District A and also a resident of District A and a part of Together New Orleans.

Um it's interesting.

I was reading on IntroG's website about their community aspect and how they say they take care of the community, not because it's a good thing, but because it's the right thing to do.

It's been the right thing to do consolidated building for over eight years.

It's been the right thing in 2024 when we said they were going to when they said they were going to propose and have it done by a certain time.

It was the right thing last year, and it's the right thing right now to have consolidated billing implemented here for New Orleans residents.

Not eight months from now, but we can do it right now.

Continue to push a delay is causing a financial burden on your residents on the people that elected you to take care of them.

We can no longer have a delay as a hospice chaplain.

I go to families' houses all the time, and I see people who are struggling financially to take care of their own mothers or brothers or children who are on hospice because they don't have the financial means to take care of all the different uh things that are coming on to them.

We can relieve that burden by making sure this uh consolidated building happens now so our residents don't have to continue to have to fight um to live.

I'm here to ask our elected officials to listen to your residents to take care of them and to make sure there's no no more delays, but to make sure the right thing is done right now by having consolidated building implemented as soon as possible.

Thank you.

Thank you, Barrington.

Calvin Lawrence, followed by John Christopher Brown.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the council.

My name is Calvin Lawrence.

I reside at 6054 Madrid, Courtney Walls, Louisiana, longtime resident.

I'm here again speaking on behalf of this.

Uh I know y'all are gonna do the right thing, man.

I've looked in the newspaper today and see what the Supreme Court ruled, firing those people, man.

We don't we don't have that type of society here in the city of New Orleans, man.

The people elected y'all and y'all do y'all job right to delay this stuff.

Uh if they don't, if they have a good reason to delay, they didn't bring it forward, man.

And it don't make no sense for a stall tactic to do that to hurt people to end up prolonging the job, to cost the job, more money, the people that's out there working counting on this, and then look in the future for people who count on more jobs to produce with this, man.

So I just I know y'all are gonna do the right thing, as y'all always do, and just want to thank y'all for y'all time again.

Thank you, Calvin.

John Christopher Brown, followed by Becky Merriweather.

Good morning.

I'm John Christopher Brown.

I'm a homeowner at 2227 Pine Street in New Orleans.

Uh personally, uh the community solar would not help me financially, but it's essential for us for our city and for our society for this program to succeed for three reasons.

Number one, uh, community solar adds greater resilience into the electrical system.

Number two, it helps uh low-income people pay their uh electric bills and and live a decent life.

And number three, uh, it helps to uh combat climate change, which is uh a crucial problem facing society today in spite of the people who pretend that it doesn't exist.

Uh, you know, science is real, whether you believe it or not.

So we have we have the council has previously issued uh a requirement that consolidated billing should be implemented.

Uh enter G has passed that deadline.

Now they claim, oh, it's technically so difficult, it's impossible to implement in a timely manner.

But I don't believe it, and uh I feel that our elected representatives who we voted for and support should support us and hold energy to the original agreement, make them implement consolidated billing, which is technically not that difficult.

They they're they're a line through their teeth when they claim it's impossible to do in a timely manner.

Thank you, John.

Good morning.

Um council members, you guys have been trying to do the right thing for on this for a long time.

But InterG has had a strategy to undermine every direction you have given them.

The key to getting this done is proper regulation, which is your job.

You all are required to regulate in the interests of the ratepayers.

There is nothing in further delay that is in the interest of ratepayers.

In fact, there's nothing in this delay that is in the interests of the people, the citizens of New Orleans who elected each one of you to your jobs.

So I'm here today to ask you to stand up to the bullying, to the threats, to the blackmail.

Stand up for the people.

Sisters Community Solar has invested millions of dollars in this city.

The project is underway.

We're bringing renewable clean energy to this city, generated right here so it can't be blown down in a storm that takes down those towers.

We need you to make sure this comes online in a way that survives and incentivizes other community solar programs.

You told them to have this done by July of last year.

A month before they asked for an eight-month delay.

Sound familiar?

It's time to do it right now.

It will cost not $730 million.

That's just an excess penalties and interests.

It'll cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

And they are trying to kill the baby.

Thank you, Becky.

Reverend Jeff Connor, followed by Wendy Beck.

I'm Reverend Jeff Connor.

I'm uh retired United Methodist clergy, a volunteer at St.

Mark's and with TNO.

Entergy New Orleans has stalled several times when they have been told by this council who regulates them on a number of occasions to create a consolidated billing mechanism to make it easy for customers to pay their bill and know what discount they have received from solar power each month.

We at TNO say no.

It is time to make this a viable, easy to understand, and easy to participate in program.

The longer the stalling goes on, benefactors are denied, badly needed lower bills, the cost to the Sisters of the Holy Family project goes up significantly without consolidated billing and with the more delays.

We urge you to stop tolerating energy's delays and instruct them on behalf of the ratepayers, the people of this city, and your constituents, stop the endless delays and get this done now.

Do the right thing.

Thank you.

Thank you, Reverend.

Wendy Beck, followed by Osa Hudun.

Good morning, council members.

My name is Wendy Beck.

I'm a project researcher with the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice.

We are also part of the Energy Future New Orleans Coalition.

Dr.

Wright already submitted her comments on this, and we support strongly the consolidated billing for community solar program.

To make community solar truly accessible to low-income households and renters, consolidated billing is critical.

Reasons behind adopting community solar are grounded in forward-looking, fiscally smart and resilient thinking and planning.

It is a strategy for diversifying our energy portfolio past fossil fuels and nuclear energy.

Solar farms are the most affordable generation facilities that we can build, and it is clean energy that doesn't exasperate our already uh dangerous position we are uh here.

Adopting consolidated billing streamlines paperwork, it eases adoption across all sectors of ratepayers.

Deep South Center for Environmental Justice strongly support supports the adoption of consolidated billing as part of the community solar program.

From hearing this morning's comments, we would also encourage uh speedy um adoption of it before December of this year, please.

Thank you, Lindy.

What's uh doing um Apple Street?

Uh Council, I just implore you uh in the midst of momentous global shifts, hundred degree weather in Europe, uh, and undeniable climate change um that you remember uh and pay attention to how you are remembered in the future.

Um it's undeniable that renewables are quickly outpacing fossil fuels as um a sustainable energy source.

Um they're proving to be more cost-effective than fossil fuels um globally.

Uh that's really all I have to say.

I just implore you to uh pay attention to how you are remembered uh and your legacy.

Uh please represent the people of New Orleans justly.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah, I wanted to ask um intergy a couple of questions.

I don't know if they need to come down or if they just want to stand up there.

Interjee.

All right, thank you.

Um were you guys first ordered by the council to put forward an implementation plan for consolidated billing?

Good morning, council member.

Good morning.

My name is Keith Wood.

I'm the director of resource planning with Energy New Orleans.

The council issued a resolution in the summer of 2024, uh directing us to file some sort of a proposal for consolidated billing.

Our role in this in this program is to administer the council's program, and at that time there were no rules that the council had adopted uh laying out the way that consolidated billing was supposed to work.

And so, in the absence of rules, we could not put together any sort of a proposal for how we would actually implement it or how it would work uh going forward.

So the since the summer of 2024, we there have been many, many rounds of comments back and forth, and we have asked the council to promulgate rules which would be we would be able to react to and develop a program around.

And so yesterday, the rules that are attached to this resolution were were uh issued.

So we're obviously going to be reviewing those in detail to understand what's in there and what we're gonna need to do to implement the program as quickly as we can in good faith.

So the main holdup and the delay was because there weren't um required rules that were promulgated since 24.

That's correct.

Back in this phase of the rulemaking started four years ago with a request from Madison Energy to ask asking for a number of things.

Among them was adoption of consolidated billing.

Uh there the rules as they exist existed up until today, have contemplated dual billing, and that has and that was what we were prepared to be able to implement as far back as 2024.

So four years ago, when Madison asked for the rules to be changed, that began a rulemaking process which we've been participating in with other uh with all of the interveners.

As of September, as of the summer of 2024, there were no rules that adopted any sort of guidelines or requirements for consolidated billing, and so that's where we've been for the last two years.

Now there are going to be rules adopted today, and we can move forward with that.

So for the last two years, has entergy done really anything, any work, any cost estimates, estimates for consolidated billing.

Yes, so we filed a letter in in 2025, early 2025, I believe, which uh which provided an estimate for consolidated billing costs based on our understanding of how consult net credit and consolidated billing might work based on based on comments that didn't filed and our understanding of what other jurisdictions were doing we pro we provided pro forma red line rules with that filing some of which it seems have been adopted into the rules that are going to be adopted today um other provisions of which seem to have been changed but but yes we have we have been work on the consolidated billing issue we have been uh engaged fully in the in the rulemaking since then and we have been working uh continuously with developers regarding the projects that they have applied to build including the sisters of the holy family and other projects that uh are not yet in the queue there's an application queue with I believe it's 15 projects in it there's only one project today in the construction queue that's the one at the Sisters of the Holy Family site for five megawatts and so as we go forward uh those those projects will need to make the decision whether they're going to whether they're going to move forward or not and and move into the construction queue.

Okay.

And now you say you need eight months to implement the consolidated billing is that accurate well what we said in the in the file well you said eight to fourteen I believe.

I bel I believe we did because this is a program no we've not implemented any sort of program like this in the past none of the other energy operating companies has implemented something like this either and so in the absence of rules which which we had we had no rules and so we put forward pro forma rules and I believe that we said in our filing that we would assuming that the rules that were finally adopted conform to what we had put forward and what we were assuming for purposes of developing that cost estimate we would be able to do this in eight months or so we said if the rules that were finally adopted which varied that we would have to review them we might need longer 12 to 14 months is what I think we said in that filing.

Okay and I know you're on the regulatory side but do you have any idea of um what would it what's gonna have to go into it to drive it to eight months like why would it take so long well the first the first step is for us to to unpack everything that's in the rules that are being finally adopted today because there's a lot of detail there every and and so but certainly there's going to need to be uh there's going to be need to be IT coding work to our billing systems there's going to need to be back office processes to make sure that we can get the the right credits calculated and rendered on customers bills and and issue the payments to the subscriber organizations in accordance with the with the the rate schedule that has been approved by the council um there's going to need to be um any number of other internal groups and and perhaps external groups that we have to try to to interface with to understand it so we're going to work in good faith and we have a requirement within uh I believe 60 days to file an implementation plan and and so we're gonna we'll we'll file our plan in 60 days after the adoption of the resolution with our with our implementation plan and we will do all that we can to make sure that we can implement this uh accurately and make sure that we do what we need to do.

The last thing I would say is you know um I know inter G New Orleans and inter G Louisiana are separate entities but um it it seems like when when there's a major thing going on um related to infrastructure entergy can turn things around and and move at lightning speed um and then when there are things like this that involves the community it's a much slower process um so that's a concern of mine um I'm I'm getting a little frustrated and um you know I look forward to to working with you guys and hopefully we can get this done uh before the deadline but thank you for coming down and answering my question thank you.

anybody else have one more public comment and then I have some final comments.

Um, Jesse George.

Council member, there's also one online comment.

Okay, and then one online comment.

Good morning, Council uh Jesse George, on behalf of the Alliance for Affordable Energy.

Just want to say uh we uh thank the council for moving forward with consolidated building.

This is something that we'd have been strong proponents of.

Uh, we also support together New Orleans call to uh accelerate the pace of implementation as quickly as possible.

Where we would differ is we would not support the use of AI in that acceleration and implementation.

Um, we're here trying to create a more stable grid and create energy savings for this city, and the use of AI is directly contradictory to that goal.

Um, one thing I haven't heard addressed this morning, and I haven't had a chance to review the resolution that's being voted on because it wasn't posted online and it wasn't available on the table here.

Uh, but one thing that hasn't been addressed uh in discussion this morning is cost controls for this implementation.

Uh, we want to see it implemented as quickly as possible, but we don't want to see it used as an excuse for integers to go hog wild and raise rates on ratepayers.

So I'd like to know that if there are cost controls within this resolution.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Jesse.

Monica.

Hi there, I'm Monique Gerhardt.

I'm executive director of Gulf States Renewable Energy Industries Association, and I apologize that I'm coming in late and so I don't want to be redundant with what other speakers have shared.

I would just say, in terms of just we are Gulf States Renewable Energy Industries Association is a trade association of companies in all parts of the supply chain that are working hard to implement these solutions, and I would say that um the, you know, obviously dockets take a long time, but the significant and um repetitive delays in implementation and things like consolidated billing, which we know is good for ratepayers to receive a single bill, that the challenges that that creates, as I'm sure you've heard on the financial side, is folks have had to invest, reinvest, refinance.

It creates in terms of a market signal in the in the ways in which New Orleans is trying to, I hope, issue a market signal to participants.

It makes it very, very, very challenging.

And there are changes that would have been unforeseen, right?

Like changes at the federal level that impacted the tax credits, but have had real um real impacts on the ways in which um these projects are able to move forward.

And so I think that it's really up to us to move very quickly, move in a way that is most beneficial to ratepayers, and um help get some of these electrons to grid in a way that can really save households money.

That's it.

Thank you.

Can you read the online comment, please?

Sure.

The online comment is from Beverly Wright, representing the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice.

Um she says, Dear council members, my name is Dr.

Beverly Wright, founder and executive director of the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice.

For nearly 35 years, DSCEJ has worked alongside communities across New Orleans, Louisiana, and the Gulf South that have faced disproportionate industrial pollution.

I'm encouraged to see our city advancing fiscally responsible energy efficient and community-driven initiatives such as the community solar program.

I strongly support requiring enter D New Orleans to implement consolidated billing for the community solar program.

A consolidated billing system will make participation more accessible by allowing customers to receive community solar benefits through a single utility bill.

This streamlined approach will increase public participation, enhance the customer experience, and support the program's long-term long-term success.

Consolidated billing has been discussed for several years.

It is time to advance this important component of the program.

I respectfully urge the council to require NTG New Orleans to implement consolidated billing within a reasonable time frame and at a reasonable cost, so that residents can fully benefit from the community solar program.

Thank you for your leadership and your commitment to expanding equitable access to clean affordable energy for the people of New Orleans.

Sincerely, Dr.

Beverley Wright, founder and executive director at Deep South Center for Environmental Justice.

Thank you.

First, I want to thank the community members for being here.

I hear your frustration.

And Turji, do you hear the frustration from the community?

The community is speaking.

The community is frustrated.

We are all frustrated.

As OSA talked about in his comments, our legacy, our collective legacy in this room, entergy, council, and community for this project, can be to get this implemented prior to the eight-month deadline.

And I know that the innovative team at Intergy is going to work really, really hard to get that done for us.

And I will work hand in glove with you all.

I will have meetings as much as I need to to check in and to see if we can get this done before because the community needs this historic event to happen.

There are going to be 700 subscribers by the end of this year to this project that will be coming online fast.

And I really would like to see us work towards a goal of getting this done prior to that deadline.

So starting next week, if we have to meet weekly, I will meet weekly.

I want this done and I want it done fast.

We are not voting on this today as we will vote on it at the council meeting in case we need to make any additional amendments to the resolution.

Thank you all for being here today.

I appreciate your efforts and your advocacy, and I look forward to getting this done.

Thank you.

Okay, with that, we will move on to we have quite a bit for sewage and water board and um entergy, so I'm just gonna ask that representatives from sewage and water board and entergy come sit at the table because I'm sure we'll have questions on each thing.

Um the first one is a presentation regarding the district E outages, followed by the presentations on Tropical Storm Arthur from both Entergy and Sewage and Water Board.

Since we have one item first, can we have the table then switch up with sewage and water board?

Sure, yeah, that's fine.

Yeah, I want to sit next to me.

Good morning.

Waiting on.

And we are happy to present today on the work that we have been doing on our reliability plan, and I'll turn it over to our president to get us started.

Good morning, everyone.

Um, I'm happy to be here.

Deanna Rodriguez, President CEO of Entergy New Orleans.

Um we're here to share with you some information about entergy service during and in the wake of Tropical Storm Arthur.

Um, as you may know, and perhaps the public does or does not know, we'd like to start over from the beginning.

Just to give you a framework, we have ninety-five thousand distribution poles, nearly eighteen hundred miles of distribution line, approximately thirty-five thousand transformers, nearly 2200 transmission structures, about a hundred and forty miles of transmission line, and 24 substation equipment numbers.

Madam CEO, I don't mean to interrupt you, but Madam Chair.

Um, I think we're gonna get into tropical storm author next, and that's gonna be a joint discussion with you all and sewage and water board.

I think for the sake of this agenda item, we are focusing specifically on the outages of district.

I apologize.

We'll we'll go ahead and get started on this.

I do want to share our reliability metrics within the storm.

And part of this is dealing with uh what happened with the Sweden Water Board and our response and uh and reliability in that role.

Right.

But the but the conversation around tropical storm author is going to be a joint discussion with sewage and water board, not going to be a separate discussion.

The distribution of the outages, okay, all right.

Sorry, I I was reading the wrong one.

Um, so what we'll do right now, then I'll switch over to our reliability metrics.

And as shown in our last annual reliability report, enter D New Orleans has met the council's metrics for number and duration of outages.

We've been uh have been doing and completed a number of projects in district e to enhance reliability, which we will cover in this presentation.

Uh again, uh it I would like to, and we'll reframe it again in the context of the number of polls and number of of equipment that we have out in the community.

It will give you a good insight into what we've done and um and what we're doing now with what's happened in district E.

So, with that, I'm gonna turn it over to Dan Calamari, VP of Reliability.

All right, good morning good morning, and uh we can go to the next slide.

Um, in the month of June, we we came here to talk about uh some outages and how our system performed in the month of June.

We had 82 outages in district E.

This includes outages from weather, equipment, vehicles hitting our poles, mylar balloons, and any animals that may have caused outages on our systems.

Um these do not include our planned outages that are necessary to perform work on our system.

Uh these outages may have been to an individual customer, or it could be a group of customers on a single street or inside of a neighborhood.

Of these 82, 25 of them occurred during tropical storm author.

So on that one day, June 18th.

Uh the Kenilworth neighborhood has seen three different outages in uh June, one on June 10th, the sick, the late night on the 16th, and on the 28th of June.

This area is served from an underground grid.

The causes of these outages were due to damaged connections and a damaged cable.

And if we go to the next slide, we have a plan to address these outages, and this is also across all of our districts.

We have a similar uh plan and execution.

But the execution of the plan starts with a comprehensive inspection of our facilities in specific spots along our feeders to identify the scope of work that we need to perform.

The data that's collected in these inspections is provided to our design engineers who create construction packages that are eventually issued to our crews to perform work on our system.

You may have seen our crews in the neighborhood as all this work has already started.

We are modernizing our system by installing hardened poles to withstand extreme wind loads.

We're installing self-healing networks, which will lessen the impact to our customers during unplanned events.

We have continued our vegetation management plan, our substation arrest or replacement program, and we are continuing to secure our substations by installing security fencing around them to prevent theft and vandalism.

And as you look at the slide there, there is a uh a map of district E.

And this is an example of the amount of work we're doing on our system this year.

Um, as you look at the different colors, the uh the green and purple markings, those are spots along the district that we're actually working on our feeders, replacing uh assets and modernizing it.

And then when you look at the purple and green lines, that's where we're actually doing vegetation trimming and uh spot trimming on different feeders as well to improve our performance uh when the trees are moving and brushing against and preventing them from brushing against our lines.

Um this concludes uh our presentation today.

I will mention um you see a bunch of greens and purples up there.

The green projects are work that's already been completed.

The purples are the ones that are either in progress or um plan to be completed before the end of the year, and holistically across ENO, we have 349 projects that we are gonna complete this year uh on our feeders, replacing assets and improving our system.

We completed 118 of those projects.

We uh have 126 actively working, and the remaining of them will be planned out throughout the remaining of the year.

So I want to just kind of give you know the amount of work that we are doing out there in improving our system.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Uh let me just say while I appreciate the work you all may be doing uh respectfully, it's not happening fast enough for me.

Number one.

Number two, uh let me be clear that the Kenneth subdivision and North Kennelworth subdivision are two very different subdivisions, and so you're highlighting statistics from Kenneth, which is inaccurate, it should be North Kenneth, two very different places.

So the the incident that we had this weekend, for example, you're your highlight is Kenneth, and it's North Kenneth.

So let's separate those two, even though there was an outage in the Kennelworth subdivision.

But where we're seeing the reoccurring outages, and let me just highlight your data that you sent, um, and and this is just a snapshot of a long-term reoccurring problem that I continue to get excuses and no results.

Okay.

So on June 10, 2026, North Kenneth, which you're identifying as Kenneth.

Uh the cause transformer connection failed, action replaced connection duration 8 51 a.m.

to 242 p.m.

Has anybody done the math to to figure out how long that was out?

It's a pretty long time in the peak of summer.

Have any of you spent time in the North Kendallworth subdivision?

Yes.

Yes.

Yes?

Yeah.

If you did, you'll notice that it skews older.

Okay.

So we have older residents, some uh that that are that are pretty fragile facing reoccurring uh situations.

Uh June 16th and June 17th, uh, again, damaged cable repaired the damaged cable duration 11, 11 p.m.

to 245 a.m.

And then this Sunday we know the disaster that we had.

Again, transformer connection failed, replaced the connection, that duration was 7.30 p.m.

to 1230 a.m.

So you we we're having repeated situations with transformer connection failed.

So break that down for me.

What does that mean in layman's terms?

And why does it keep failing?

Yeah, so uh so each in in the kennel work, we have a lot of underground uh uh wires that serve our customers.

Our transformers are both submersible, they're below the ground uh with gradings on them, and and we may wind up having debris uh and different things that get in those manholes that could damage our connections.

Uh what we're gonna be doing here is to go and do a visual inspection of these transformers.

We're also gonna use a thermal camera to help determine if certain connections are going back.

When do you plan to do that?

We're we're gonna be starting this in the in the uh in the next few days.

Uh next few days.

You didn't think it maybe would have been a good idea to do this long time ago since we've been seeing these repeated outages and the same cause of failure.

You didn't maybe think we should have done what you're suggesting.

I guess you're probably doing this to calm me down, right?

No, but no, we're doing we're we're doing it as part of our reliability plan.

So it is being done now.

Some of these things, the good news of having or the nice thing about having underground is it's underground.

The hard thing, the difficult thing about having underground uh equipment is that it takes longer when you do have an outage.

So if you're stringing poles on a Y on two poles that are above ground, that's faster and that's done.

So that is one of the reasons that the outages are as long as they are when they when they do occur.

But this is part of our reliability uh uh program, and it it is um we apologize because I know how hot it is, and I'm certainly not okay any outage of this duration is not acceptable, and we are going to address these.

Apologies are just not good enough for me in this situation.

I'm gonna tell you, I'm gonna tell you why.

Um, you know, people are running their AC units, and when they have these constant power failures, it could be causing damage to the AC unit.

And the first thing you all are gonna say is we assume no liability.

Um, it could cause damage to the televisions, it can cause damage to the refrigerators, it can cause damage to all kinds of things.

And again, you all are gonna just gonna say you don't assume any liability, right?

Um what what I don't understand and what you all have not answered respectfully is if we continue to see the same cost, right?

Um, transformer connection failed.

Why why haven't you all gone in the ground long time ago?

Because while I just identified three snapshots, I am telling you in this particular subdivision alone, and then New Orleans East alone, I represent over 27 subdivisions.

That's not even taken into account the lower ninth law.

So what I want to know is why haven't you all dug deeper into this issue prior to now?

And you haven't even done it now, you're gonna do it in the next couple days.

So I guess because I went ballistic over the over the weekend.

Yeah, and I will add it part of our reliability plan is to re-cable underground subdivisions, and we have multiple ones across ENO that we're doing at various stages.

This particular subdivision that we're referring to is in our reliability plan today.

We are uh working through the engineering of the plan and to replace work towards replacing cable in this neighborhood.

The added inspections is gonna help prioritize where we address the immediate concern.

So we already had a plan to start replacing cable, but these inspections are gonna help prioritize where we will get the most thing for our book first.

Well, respectfully, let me let me just be clear.

Um I'm I'm one of the most patient people in the world.

Um, my patience has run out.

Okay.

Um, I fully expect this issue to be diagnosed, and I want to plan, and I will compel you all to come before this council as many times as I need to um until I have satisfactory results on behalf of the residents of District E.

Um, in June alone in District E, 82 outages, 25 of which were related to author, which means there has been 57 non-storm related incidents in District E and June alone.

That that that that's that's frightening.

Go ahead, madam CEO, but that's frightening.

It is, and and um there is also a difference in and when you see the each instance, it's not gonna fix anything, and I know this is and I appreciate your patience, but it could be minutes, and it could be the ones that you've that we are all should be concerned about, the ones that last hours.

So of those 50, there are several that are you know instantaneous, but it is captured as a moment.

So I just I don't want you to think that all those 52 were lasted three hours.

Madam CEO, just last week, I I uh my my power went out for less than 20 seconds, okay, and a thousand dollars later out of my pocket, which I didn't even call you all about, okay, because it did damage to the motherboard on my AC unit.

So, you know, you you you may look at it as oh, this is only a couple seconds.

Right, that's but that could be a few thousand dollars out of the out of the residents' pockets, okay?

And I lived it, and I didn't call you all about it because I'm never gonna look for favoritism.

What I am gonna do, what I actually get paid to do is advocate on behalf of the residents of district E.

I've been doing that for the last six months, and I'm most certainly gonna do that today, and I'm gonna do it each and every day until this problem is fixed.

Okay, the responses that I have gotten thus far are grossly unacceptable.

What I want are results, what I want is a plan of action, and and and the residents of North Kettleworth have suffered for far too long, period.

Okay, I do want to highlight on a positive note, Jessica Williams.

Thank you for your extraordinary work.

You've been beyond responsive, and when nobody else is responding to me at 2 30 in the morning, I appreciate that that you actually take time to respond uh and to follow through.

Um, so with that, um I'm I'm gonna calm down a little bit, and thank you, madam chair.

I'll I'll yield for now.

Any other comments from the diason here?

I do have a couple call.

Well, I'm sorry, looks like um I wanted to to just get an update on the real-time reporting for um outages affecting fewer than 500 uh households.

Yes, um, council member, and I think um I've spoken with you and a couple of other council members in our standing meetings about this.

We've been doing some internal testing on email notifications to um kind of do troubleshooting on whether we can get the contemporaneous notifications to you all um without um delay.

Um we did some internal testing as we talked about during tropical storm Arthur, um, the testing showed that we were getting too many notifications and some of them didn't have accurate information.

And so we're doing some additional tweaks.

I've asked our team to try to roll this out to you all next week.

Um with that said, even if we get it rolled out next week, you'll still continue to get from me the weekly outage reports that will have causation data.

Um, and also we will still continue to do the texting in terms of outages, which um all of you are on the different text chains for your respective districts and you're on all the districts.

So that's where we stand.

The goal is to roll that out next week.

Are we gonna get the text notifications for fewer than 500 as well, or will it just be email?

It'll still it'll be emails for the fewer than 500, but you'll still get the text messages as you've already been getting, as a well as the weekly report that you've been getting from me.

Okay, we can't we can't um do the text for fewer than 500.

That's what I want.

That's what I want.

You want the text messages for that?

We'll look at that as well, because we're still continuing to tweak because we want to get the information to you as quickly as we can.

But we're gonna continue to tweak the email notification as we are continuing to work on this and roll it out, so there may be some tweaks along the way, but if that is what you desire, we'll look at that too.

Something we spoke about a couple of months ago was the source of outages, and sometimes you know it's attributed to vegetation or or whatever the case may be, but it's um uh after effect of you know lightning and and all that confusion.

Have we made any progress on that front?

After our meeting, I actually emailed um your chief of staff with um some responses that we had done in the course of advice, and um I think that the conversation got more complicated than maybe it necessarily should have been.

It really is a basic discussion about if there is a heavy lightning storm, any kind of equipment may have some kind of residual damages that might not be immediately viewable.

And then we communicated that there may be some latent damage that manifests in an outage that we don't categorize as lightning necessarily, it's categorized as equipment, but potentially the lightning might have caused the equipment failure because it was a heavy lightning storm or something of that nature.

So it's kind of a common sense way of looking at it, but I think in the context of how we responded to some RFIs, I think the conversation got more complicated than it necessarily should have been.

And just to clarify, Sharonda, for for me, I want to um have the best information possible.

And what I don't want to have occurring is entergy saying we're having these outages because of latent impacts of lightning storms when it could be preventative maintenance issues, and so that's that's where I'm going with this with this point.

And I think in the communication that I sent to you, we talked about some of our technology that we're using for thermal imaging and thermal imaging, correct, um, to identify potential weaknesses in equipment.

Um, and so we'll continue to do that.

Um, and we again categorize them as equipment failure in spite of the fact there could have been a lightning incident.

So that's what we'll continue to do as well.

Is just categorize it as equipment failure.

Yeah, please please do the equipment failure in uh in light of uh tropical storm, Arthur.

Did you guys use the thermal imaging to check for any of your infrastructure for vulnerabilities?

So we started uh a process late last year, and we have continuing it where we look back at where we have repeat outages, and we go out there and do these thermo inspections and and look for latent issues that could be out there, and we've uh inspected numerous feeders uh over the course of last year and this year and made these uh priority repairs uh for for situations like this.

And some of these um can be caused by a car hitting a pole, too.

So that is we get a lot of those in district D.

Well, and and you may have and what we're and this is actually one of the ways that we're starting to use AI where it is predictive in nature, where if there is an accident in a certain area, what we're starting to do is enter that data to know exactly okay, well, where where would that reach be if there is latent equipment failure somewhere else?

So that's also new that that Dan and his team to have brought to bear, and we're trying to use technology in a way that is predictive, more predictive, and then also you know, this is a very um hands-on for the most part, visual inspection kind of business, and it's been around for a hundred years.

So it's this is where we're trying to use uh new technology and also AI to help us look at and find the repeated outages so that we can address them more quickly.

Um but we're learning that part of it.

Okay, so for me, after a storm, I just want you guys to be more proactive, look for freight wiring, lose connections, use your thermal imaging, whatever the case may be, because doing that proactively can uh prevent outages, like councilman Hughes was just talking about, it could prevent future outages if you spot something that occurred after a storm or whatever the case may be, and so that's that's what I'm trying to get us to do to reduce the number of outages that we have in the city, and I think that's something that can go a long way.

And certainly, council member, that is our goal too.

Absolutely.

It is it is not in our interest to have any customer out ever in the and we have to improve and and we are trying to improve our our efforts on reducing those outages.

Okay, thank you all so much.

Thank you, madam chair.

Thank you, Councilmember Harris.

Yeah, I want to turn to the uh Lara Garden District.

Where are we with AT and C coordination and moving wires from uh from naked poles?

Um I think um we and we've communicated by email.

Um we do have our weekly resilience meeting today with further updates on that, but the last meeting that occurred um essentially they were coordinating and increasing their level of coordination between our contractor and ATT.

I think the last count that I saw is like fifty around 50 naked poles had been removed.

I think my email to you said 15, but I think I uh our contractor provided us an update last week that it's closer to 50 at this point, um, and so they are proactively going out every week with their people looking for naked poles, pulling them down, and they're improving their coordination efforts with ATT to make sure communication wires are pulled as soon as the work is done.

And what about the relocation of the two uh we did a walk through the two problematic poles that were literally in front of a fence that was an entrance in e-grass, and egress.

And the other one that was just randomly placed?

Our contractor committed to moving both of those poles, okay.

Um, and I'll get you an update on the status of that work, but they've committed to moving both of them.

And when will you be out of that community?

I mean, right now it's just roads are torn up, you guys are there, Swebnos there, DPW is there, and so people are just really frustrated.

This work in that community is scheduled to be done by year, year end.

I hope it's before that.

Um and I hope that we can schedule a walkthrough.

I know it's hot, but I think it's important to schedule a walkthrough to see what has been removed, what's left to be removed, and get ATT on the ground with us.

I was so disappointed that they weren't there for that walkthrough.

So I'll have Matt reach out to coordinate that again with you all.

Yes, we will do it.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Okay, I think we have two public comments on this one.

Uh yes, Madam Chair, Jesse George, followed by Sage Michael.

Jesse George, once again, on behalf of the Alliance for Affordable Energy, uh, again, we thank the council for addressing this important issue.

This continues to be an ongoing frustration for New Orleanians.

Um, you know, Entergy likes to point to uh balloons and lightning strikes, but I don't I don't know if you can see this bar draft that I'm holding, but this is integers' own reporting on outages.

That big green section is equipment failures.

The big yellow section is scheduled interruptions.

So basically, their poor maintenance of their system is the leading cause by far of these outages.

And I agree with Councilman Hughes' uh uh sentiment that the pace of these uh repairs is not going fast enough.

Um one thing that we would encourage you to do, and we've heard uh talk from the dais before from Councilman Willard and others about strengthening the reliability standards that are in place currently.

Uh Ms.

Rodriguez rightly pointed out that energy has been in compliance with those standards every year they've been in place, and yet we continue to experience these frequent outages.

Um one way that you could strengthen those reliability standards is by closing the major loophole that energy enjoys by excluding what they call major event days from that calculation of their reliability.

So outages caused by major storms uh are not included in that calculation.

And that totally denies the reality of the situation that we're in, which is that extreme weather is the new norm.

Excluding those extreme weather events from the reliability calculation gives energy an out, and that is the reason that we continue to experience these outages.

I encourage you to strengthen those reliability standards and close that loophole.

Thank you.

Thank you, uh Sage Michael.

I don't see Sage, oh there's Sage.

And just you told me.

Thank you.

Um just to echo Jesse right quick.

Y'all remember the pole falling in the river.

Y'all remember the the gas plan not working when we needed to work.

All those failures come for us that we pay for.

Um and so I really want to talk about I'm thankful for um Consumer Hughes, you're really speaking for New Orleans, and really demanding accountability.

I really appreciate you speaking for us, in New Orleans, the frustration that we all hold.

Really, thank you for that, and everyone up here.

Um, and and what I did hear from energy, almost like a scramble plan, not an upfront work order like process.

And so while they're having a weekly resilient meetings, instead of like getting a call going, run up and find it, that should need to be if you replace the pole, then there's a mechanism of majors that follow us with that coordination that must happen on a pole replacement plan.

And so, um, and I agree.

Uh you have polls with um that's dangling in a sidewalk.

So I've seen that.

That dangling from the sidewall wires just dangling.

It's a safety hazard for many people.

I've documented that as well, and um, with no accountability, and we're waiting on some coordination from some entity to come by while the community can't use that sidewalk, and it's uh it's not ADA accessible, and that's not safe.

And so we have to leave work sites in a safe vehicles and safe file pedestrians at all times.

But also, while we have Switzer Waterboard here, when you're doing some poll replacement, sometimes y'all hit a wall line.

And I've documented that as well.

They got one on loan of Dwight Canal right now.

So when y'all have these agency instances, well, a poll get hit down, and it's we gotta find out who's really culpable of that.

But I want to think energy in a matter of when you know it was C energy and enter to coordinate with me.

We went out to the site, it wasn't entered.

And I'm thankful for energy, who did coordinate with me, and soon the waterboards occur.

But once again, sewage and waterboard is here.

Eastbrook site, while it's getting repaired, must be left in a safe condition for our city citizens.

It's an OSHA violation.

Thank you.

Thank you, Sage.

I have one more from Morgan Cleppinger.

Good morning, Council.

Thank you so much.

First, I real quick, some housekeeping.

There are no agendas uh anywhere.

So thank you, Jesse, and thank you, Sage.

Um, I want to thank Jason Hughes, Councilmember Jason Hughes, because what you're saying is um an indication of what's happening across the city.

We know that uh hurricane Ida five years ago, the biggest cat for unassessed, unaddressed hurricane to ever hit New Orleans.

We are still not recovered from that.

In District D, particularly around the seventh ward and broad, um, drive by the broadside theater one day, and you're gonna see that integral at a 60-degree angle, and it's been like that for five years.

Um, we were reporting cross arms, we were reporting dangling wires, you know, for the last three years, and then we stopped because nothing ever happened, nothing ever got fixed.

And um it is entergy, the cost of utilities is probably one of the highest cost burdens we have in this city for everyone.

And it is not fair to the community to constantly be experiencing these outages, uh, the failure of infrastructure.

And lastly, I would just like to say at this point, um, the impact of Tropical Storm Arthur is significant, and I urge and implore you all to declare a state of emergency because we know we have many homeowners and residents who are severely impacted by this, and it's not being talked about.

It's there are no resources stood up, and it makes people feel like there is no plan for the next thing that happens.

So let's take it more seriously, and I thank you for your advocacy.

Uh Madam Chair, the council president has the moment.

Yeah, I apologize.

Uh we're having once again issues with granitis where we can't actually log into the meeting, so we're having to like flag each other down with like smoke signals to speak.

Um, I do want to comment on some things that were said.

Uh, I think it's important to note, and it wasn't really highlighted, and uh unfortunately, some groups have been here for a while and would have caught this.

This was the basis of the argument with entergy under the previous council regarding the resilience plan, which is that there is a con there's a there's a conflation of resilience versus reliability.

The council and the public is willing to fund new resilience projects.

The challenge we have, and it's the fight we've had with energy for years is we already pay for reliability.

When you're paying your bill each month, you are it is it is incumbent upon our provider to do preventative maintenance to avoid outages that can be prevented.

That is not resilience, that is reliability.

When a lightning actuator, and we've had this debate many a time, when a lightning actuator has been struck so many times that eventually it goes out on a sunny day when there's no lightning, that is a maintenance issue because they are not properly doing the inventory of existing equipment to make sure that it is being rotated out on a timely basis.

Um, as Council Ward and I was discussing a second ago, if you drive in front of Dillard right now, there is a pole that is sitting there at a 60, 75 degree angle.

And the challenge we have nationally as regulators, it's not a challenge, it's just the battle we have with those we regulate, is there is a tension and it is a bad tension between doing preventative maintenance or doing emergency repairs.

Emergency repairs are more expensive and more profitable.

And so you could replace the pole, which was inconvenient for residents, is a planned outage, pole goes down, new pole goes up.

That is cheaper for us than the pole falling down, the whole neighborhood being wiped out, we're all calling screaming at energy to go fix it.

What's frustrating for us, and it's part of right now, I know the chairwoman right now has received the request for the next resilience plan.

Our struggle as a council is we do not want you to pay extra for reliability, because reliability is not resilience.

So part of how we comb through the prior resilience request is we are not going to build in new money for reliability when it should already be covered.

When we want to spend money on resilience, is to do new things, like if we're switching out old wooden poles with poles that are more wind resistant, that's one thing.

If you've waited to replace a pole that's laying at a 75 degree angle, and you're trying to figure out a way to get around that cost by either getting the new wind resistant pole that we're paying for under resilience when it's been unreliable for five, ten, fifteen years because you haven't replaced it, how is that fair to residents?

Because you're ducking the out the actual cost that's out there that you are being paid through your monthly bills to deal with reliability and swapping it out with resilience money.

So part of the reason why, as a council we are so critical and we are so wary of how we deal with resilience, is we do not want to make you pay with resilience dollars for reliability issues.

And honestly, it would be easier for us as a council to process resilience requests if reliability was sound.

But what you look at what happened today, we look at it with Kennelworth with what council member uh Hughes had said, when you see reliability going so poorly, it really makes it more difficult for us to approve resilience plans because that can be perceived and practically speaking, like we're just paying you extra money to be reliable.

And that's a problem.

So when you hear complaints like you've heard from Councilmember Willard, when you hear complaints you've heard from all of us over the years, Ms.

Spears, where are we on the inventory that we were supposed to have, like how many years ago?

Can you give us an update on that right quick?

Can you give me a give the public an overview of what the council made that request on inventory?

Uh councilmember, I believe what you're referring to as is as part of Docket UD 1704, when we initially were experiencing reliability issues based in District D at the time, the council conducted a thorough docket, which will resulted in an investigation of whether or not prudent investments had been made at the conclusion of that docket in 2018, we as I believe in fulfillment of a quanta report, we we requested ordered that entergy begin a better inventory management system.

I believe in conversations with Dan that steps have been made in that direction, but we still have some more work to do.

So is there today a reliable inventory system that shows us that they are taking inventory of all existing equipment and that invent that equipment that is outdated or old is being inventored properly checked and replaced on a timely basis?

The inventory that I have seen does not meet that standard, no.

So when you not to reinvoke something that was a point of, I would say almost council member Hughes esque rage, many of you may recall when I lost my mind up here when Energy had Operation Gridiron, which was a PR campaign to convince the public we should charge you more money for resilience.

And part of my argument at that time, and it's why the council did not approve Operation Gridiron, is until we get reliability under control, we're not doing any blank checks on resilience because we do not want you to pay extra for what you're already entitled to.

And the sooner the entergy can get reliability under control, the sooner we can collectively move forward on large resilience projects.

Because as long as reliability is still a dumpster fire, we can't really look at any resilience request without parsing through it to make sure reliability isn't in the resilience request.

I would encourage you, 2018 significantly predates my time on the council.

The fact that we don't have an inventory plan that we can all point to and collectively agree solve the problem, is going to continually undermine resilience efforts to get robust investment.

Thank you.

I don't have a button to press, but I wish to I'm sorry, Councilmember Green.

I can't see a button, so I couldn't comment, but I just want to be.

Okay, so that's the issue.

So I just wanted to say one thing.

I do want to end on a somewhat um positive note, and I want entergy to know that I'm not being silent on an issue that involves district D.

I've seen the polls replaced.

I've seen the metal polls that have replaced wooden polls.

There are hundreds of them in District D.

What was brought up today was that there are concerns that when we call in about certain issues, for example, the leaning poll that it should be given immediate attention because it's an immediate problem.

But the seventh ward has seen the polls that have been replaced.

The ninth ward has seen some of the polls that have been replaced.

There are still hundreds to be done.

But I want you all to also do maybe a little bit better job relative to the public relations side.

We had a press conference, it was fine, but then there needs to be follow-up.

There needs to be follow-up at your meetings to let folks know what is going on.

And also, uh suggested this kind of before, a regular meeting where people can come and talk to integers and bring up things that you may not see.

For example, the leaning poll on Broad Street, it's been reported.

The leaning poll on Clue, it's been reported at the end of the day.

But it but by Pierce Huff, I think sent that in.

But the bottom line is that look, I want to go to this fact.

I've seen the polls that have been replaced.

I've seen them replaced um on near lesion fields and in the seventh board and the like.

And sometimes a pushing up a poll um is a little bit more difficult for a variety of reasons, but um talk more about the things that have been done so that we as a council have more that we can go and talk to our community about and consider those regular meetings that are just integers.

Every quarter, every every six months, however it is, so that people can bring in their specific concerns that they feel haven't been addressed and at least know that it's been heard.

Saturday's meeting um was attended by 250 people, it involved the sewage and water board and public works, and it was a good thing.

People were able to turn in cards on issues that they felt hadn't been addressed, and that's a valuable component of the communication, and it doesn't have to happen all the time, but it's a valuable component.

People can call in.

And Councilmember Harris started this a few years ago where they can call 311 to report a leaning poll.

Also, of note, we'll check on the polls noted here.

Um they're not always our polls, so it they might be an ATT poll.

And if it were up to me, I'd put you know labels that say ATT because and often also if there are wires hanging, if it it may be communication fiber and not not five, not our wires.

So, because that is an absolute safety issue, we would not allow that and certainly would not want anybody to be harmed.

But and that is for the you know, a confusion often uh noted by the public.

They think it's our wire, our poll.

When we get those reports, we go check either way, and we'll go determine if it's our poll or not.

And then the frustration is where we're noting the polls in the lower garden district.

Then it it takes um coordinating with ATT, uh to or Cox to go remove those polls too, or fix them.

But I think it's fair that you should be able to explain that to the public.

Absolutely.

But a way to do it is not necessarily not necessarily at this city council committee meeting, which is fine.

Yes.

But overall, once a quarter.

Yes.

Just meet at a university and let people come in with their pictures and their complaints about particular items so that people in the public level on the public level can feel that they have an outlet beyond us.

Because interestingly enough, the city council does a lot because we get a lot of requests.

That's not necessarily within our purview to be able to answer technical questions relative to the poll, relative to whether it's an AT and T wire and the like.

Just um just keep that in mind.

Thank you very much.

Yeah, thank you, Councilmember.

I just want to follow up on that question too.

Um, thank you for doing the press event with us.

And our public relations and public affairs team is also in contact with the mayor's office of community engagement to do the next meeting, um, quarterly meeting that you just referenced happened on Saturday.

Um, so that will be an opportunity, but we're also continuing to do our community engagement board meetings, et cetera, in different districts.

So um, you know, we'll continue to talk to you about other opportunities and um ways to communicate through your newsletter letter as well.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Uh Madam Chair, thank you for your indulgence on this important item for district E.

Uh, attorney Spears.

Uh, I will get with you and the council president enter G.

Um I I don't think we've gotten to know each other that well, so I'm gonna compel you all to come before this council on a monthly basis, and you all will appear and reappear and reappear uh until I have the satisfaction that the issues in district E are being resolved.

So thank you very much.

We're happy to do that.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Okay, so next we have our presentation with entergy and SWIBNO on Tropical Storm Arthur.

So um Sewage and Water Board, would you come down to the table, please?

And we'll have the entergy do their PowerPoint and then Sewage and Water Board.

Uh you can do your half of the presentation that is in regards to the power station, and then we will do questions uh from the dais, and then you can continue with the rest of your presentation for the other issues that you have.

Okay, sure.

You go ahead.

All right, thank you.

Um so I started a little bit wrong the first time, but I'm gonna go straight to the information about Tropical Storm Arthur.

We had approximately 6,700 of our 209,000 customers that were impacted, and um certainly we're proud of the team of our the work our team did, many of you are sitting in the in the audience to restore power to these customers.

Our team worked tirelessly to restore our customers by midnight on the day of the storm, and that's less than 24 hours.

In that time, we repaired 12 damaged poles, 20 when cross arms, and we replaced eight transformers.

It is important to note, and we did speak to this a moment ago, that the structures of the structures that were repaired, none of them were our newly installed resilient structures.

Uh Councilmember Green noted that fact that as those polls have gone up, they're more resilient.

As you can see, our work to harden the grid has allowed us to have our customers powered restored more quickly, and we look forward to working with you to continue this work to harden the grid so that we are better able to withstand tropical weather systems.

Now I would like vice president of regulatory and public affairs, Sharonda Williams to address our engagement with the sewage and water board after tropical storm Arthur.

On May 20th, I think was um one of the questions that was presented to us to discuss today.

On May 20th, we communicated that there was an outage on the transmission grid to an equip to due to an equipment failure, and that was a communication made to Sewage and Water Board.

It's important to note at that time the Sullivan substation never lost power, and this is the same type of information that we would provide to any of our customers if asked the cause of a power interruption.

This is consistent with our usual and customary practices.

After the May 20th power disturbance, we did not receive any additional inquiries from sewage and water board about the power supply to the Sullivan substation.

If there is an inquiry, we provide customers with information related to the cause of an outage, but we do not provide engineering consulting services to our customers.

They must seek that type of advice on their own.

I'll note on page five of the presentation that Sewage and Water Board has attached to the agenda.

They noted that there was a conclusion or a statement that there was some anomaly outside of normal operations that exceeded typical ride-through capabilities.

I just want to note that that was not a communication that we made to sewage and water board.

I think that that was an assumption or a conclusion that they made based on our communication to them that there was an equipment failure on the transmission grid.

Post Tropical Storm Arthur, Sewage and Water Board then made additional inquiries about the power supply to the power complex.

Again, we advised Sewage and Water Board there was no power interruption at the Sullivan substation.

We further advised sewage and water board that a voltage sag occurred.

A voltage sag is a temporary drop in voltage that can be caused by some instability on the grid.

Entergy posts its power quality standards on its website that expand explain that voltage sags may occur, and the standards also explain that voltage sags generally last for less than a second.

This information is available for all customers to review prior to putting any of their equipment into service.

Since Tropical Storm Arthur, we have met several times at Sewage and Water Board to discuss the settings on their equipment.

During those meetings, we have specifically stated that as per our power quality standards.

Any setting that instantly shuts down the power complex with a voltage side may not be the best configuration.

To ensure that both Entergy and Sewage and Water Board are appropriately analyzing the issue and taking the proper steps to ensure the equipment is properly configured.

We suggested that a third party expert be retained and sewage and water board agreed to jointly hire a third party expert to advise us on what needs to be done to present prevent this in the future.

And that concludes our presentation on this issue, unless there are questions.

We're gonna hold questions until after sewage and water board has made their presentation on this item.

One second, we'll have someone operate our slides for us.

Yeah, there's a lot of data walking the book over.

I think it's lots.

Oh, same way.

We don't have to do it if you don't have it.

I don't know if you didn't do anything.

Thank you.

Okay.

I don't know why you don't.

Well, about this dog.

Everybody sees how involved I am.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

I appreciate the opportunity to speak before you today.

We acknowledge the concerns regarding the temporary interruption of drainage pumping during the tropical storm, Arthur, and we'll discuss it in detail today.

Fortunately, while the impacts due to the event were minimal, we recognize that it can have very more impactive uh influence.

We are here today to ensure you and the public that we are taking this event very seriously.

We've been in touch with energy to understand more about the performance of the transmission grid, and we have already made adjustments to settings in our equipment, even through this situation, even though this situation did occur.

From relying on older turbines, and that we are still in a much better position than previous years going into hurricane season.

We've incorporated the lessons learned from this event into our planning and operating uh paradigm for the next for the new power complex.

This was a large investment that has been well thought out and designed.

We're at the point now we're making minor changes to it.

We have multiple layers of contingency that will serve the city for years to come.

Next, we will look at the power complex.

Several years ago, we knew that a major investment in the power system was needed due to the age of the condition of the facility.

Our first priority was to address the urgent risk associated with the aging 25 Hertz turbines that we had.

The frequency changers and substations are the solution to that problem.

Instead of relying on older equipment, we are now connected to the transmission grid and can supply the power needed to operate the drainage system.

It has already been used successfully for multiple major rain events with no issue, including the second uh weekend of Jazz Fest and the Memorial Day rain event.

We continue to fine-tune this equipment and make adjustments as needed, which is to be expected with a large electrical system such as this one.

Before we go to the next slide, since we have everyone at the table, if you're not prepared for this question, I sincerely would be surprised considering it was the question of the entire week of Arthur.

There was an interruption of the pumps during Arthur, who is responsible for the interruption?

Because obviously we've heard sewage and waterboard elude that Entergy had some responsibility.

We have seen responses by energy that it is not your responsibility.

So you're both at the table, who bears the responsibility for the pumps tripping.

I would say at this point, we need to have better communications and we need to work together.

Now, what we're doing and have already done is reset the machinery so that it would cover uh originally it was 80% of normal voltage.

We've reset the changes so now it takes 70 percent.

That's below the 72 percent that was already set before.

Now, we're going to have a third party that would look at their system, and this and this answers your question.

The third party will look at their system, the third party is going to also look at our settings and help us develop a system and settings control so that we are not in the situation we had before.

Okay, uh I know me.

I know I'm breaking the rules.

One follow-up.

And energy, I need you to respond.

What apparently you're saying is that it was an equipment issue.

I don't, and it as we've shown, this is not like a council that is particularly friendly to energy, but if it was an equipment issue, was there an interruption of power to the equipment?

The substation that never lost power.

We didn't lose power, but there was a fluctuation, and I'll let our engineers speak.

But there was a fluctuation that was explained to us what an anomaly.

Okay, and I'll let our engineers speak.

But but guys, I see I'm I'm trying to remain so calm today, but but you all make it so hard.

And I've said this repeatedly.

We ask very direct questions at a very elementary level, and we get this technical, academic, pontificated response.

The council president's question was pretty direct.

Who bears responsibility?

It's not a trick question, it's not a Pearl Harbor.

Does entergy bear the responsibility?

Does sewage and waterboard bear the responsibility?

And for the record, while we're being transparent with the public, when I learned by accident, this was not the first time it happened.

It happened before, and we were never notified.

So who bears the responsibility?

That's the question.

Don't give me an engineering technical, all around-the-world response.

Just say entergy bears the responsibility or the water boy bears responsibility.

Not a trick question.

Do you mind going to slide four?

Two more slides, yes.

Thank you, that one.

So to answer your question, I just want to provide this visual regarding the uh the voltage that we're talking about.

I just want to know.

I don't want to respectfully, I I don't want a visual.

See, this is why the public loses faith in in organizations because they just can't get direct answers.

Guys, this is not a trick question.

So who bears the responsibility?

The settings on the frequency changer were set to trip at 80% of their voltage, and on during Arthur, the voltage tag that we saw was at 72%.

Madam President, I mean, Madam Chair, I'm gonna I'm gonna respect you as the chair, but let me just say uh I will I will I will hold everybody in this committee until midnight tonight until we get a direct answer to this question.

So I'll go get some popcorn in case you all get hungry, but maybe you can figure out how to answer the question.

But nobody's departing until I get a direct answer.

And I think let's pause for a second because we keep hearing from sewage or energy.

Here's your opportunity today.

Give a direct answer.

Whose responsibility is this?

So my lawyer hat is kicking in, and I don't want to use words fault and responsibility, but as I stated, there let's think of it as two sides here.

The energy side and our substation never lost power.

The sewage and waterboard side had a voltage sag that impacted their equipment and caused it to turn off automatically.

Voltage sags are common on the grid.

That is why power quality standards for energy are on our website for any customer or business that is opening a business to review them so they can give them to their own engineers who are erecting their equipment so they can tweak it how they need to.

Power to our substation was never lost.

Okay.

This is getting close to an answer.

Did the power sag go below the perimeters that are set in your contract or on your website?

No.

Okay.

That's all I need to think.

This incident in the we have Mr.

Kalamari here, but it was a voltage sag that lasted 64 milliseconds, and their equipment turned off automatically.

Our power quality standards suggest that you have voltage sags that last for less of a less than a second, and your equipment should realize that that is a function of the grid and shouldn't automatically turn off.

That is true, but also at the same time, voltage sags for various levels of voltage sags.

Uh we are set at 80% of normal voltage.

What happened on June 18th was 70%?

It's important to note that what happened on May 20th was 40%.

And nationally, we looked at charts.

That's a very rare anomaly to go that low.

And so while we're responsible for the settings and we take responsibility for that, and we've already within a day of the situation, adjusted our settings.

I think it's fair to say that we are expecting a certain level of consistency of power from integer, and that the 40%, as it was said to me, it would lay to me was an anomaly.

Okay, since we're just gonna do questions now, I'm gonna go into my questions.

We have the rest of our questions.

No, it's all right.

Look, I think we can just go through the slides as we go with my questions.

So, um, how are you working with your regulator, the council to ensure you're getting everything you need from Entergy?

Well, as situations come up, we'll bring it to the attention of this committee since we're here uh monthly.

And we will we've been working very closely with uh council member member Hughes and his staff.

And if there were questions or things that we need assistance with, we would bring it up.

This is the first conversation we've had with the committee since this uh occurrence.

Have there been any other unreported power failures other than the one on May 20th?

No.

So there were two on May 20th, one in the morning, one in the evening.

But that's all that's taking place.

The May 20th events.

Okay, and did you speak to Entergy after that one?

On the 20th, we had some email exchange regarding that specific instance, and um there was there was not a specific follow-up regarding that, other than to understand that the issue that was that caused that issue had been addressed specifically.

And the cause of the issue was power sags?

Um there was something in the yes, voltage sags related to um something that happened on the transmission grid that impacted our facility.

Did you discuss at that time the on this slide the frequency changer operating parameters?

No, I think that that was a um lessons learned for us to to have both organizations to have come together and to had that conversation at that time.

And we were um informed that this was an issue that had you know happened on the transmission line, it did affect our system.

We we took that um under you know, using our data, saw that it was a very low voltage sag, um, and um in retrospect, this was an opportunity for us to get to collaborate together on this topic.

Okay, so while you haven't had any any power failures other than that day.

Have you are you aware?

Was this the first time that you were experiencing voltage sags?

Yes, that the May 20th was the first time that we had experienced that issue.

But it was an only that was the only time that it was enough to actually cause the equipment to shut off.

That was um we'll have to go back and look at our data regarding what other voltage sags our equipment is seen, but this was the the only time that had shut off until then.

So do you know how often the system has experienced these voltage sags?

We are having to look at that now.

Okay.

Um the electrical settings and corresponding events which would lead to the frequency changers tripping, including if the settings can be modified.

Who was responsible for configuring and testing the frequency changers to ensure compatibility with the substation during construction?

Yeah, so I just want to note that the equipment is certainly compatible with the substation.

Uh it was designed to operate within a normal range of plus or minus 10% of a regular voltage, and that is based on industry standards for the transmission grid.

The manufacturer set their trip limitations uh at 80% of normal, which is um you know below the the 90 percent uh plus or minus 10 percent is that the manufacturer said that the manufacturer set that and set that.

Um, you know, the equipment needs to be protected, right?

And so it's it's this is a protective mechanism, and when it sees a voltage sag um, it shuts off to prevent damage to the equipment itself.

So this is a um ultimately a protective mechanism for the equipment.

Um but I want to be clear we have been in touch with the manufacturer and have been discussing um you know changing the settings, how low they can go.

Right now we have already sent them to 70 percent and are in those conversations to see if we can go lower.

Um I don't know how low yet, uh, but we would have to also understand if there would any be any downstream impacts to say the pumps um if there was a much lower voltage, but we're already working through that.

So was any of that testing?

I mean, could this be tested when you guys had the six, seven, eight month delay in the power station coming online?

You did it around several series of testing.

Was this not part of that testing?

So knowing that the equipment would would trip um wouldn't change I think the outcome right of of that.

Um so if it was set at 80, it was it was set at 80 in terms of knowing what the expectation was in terms of the the grid performance, um that's what we're working through now.

And how did you all come up with adjusting it, the setting down to 70 percent?

That was a conversation that we had with entergy following the um following Tropics from Arthur, understanding that 72% was the voltage tag that was seen that day, and um understanding that 70% is uh will I think, is if not the majority, quite a bit of the voltage sags that could be seen, and so that was based on those conversations that we had with Entergy at that time.

And that's based on data that entergy you all have, and that would be the reason why you advised them on that setting.

So we we also referred them to our power quality standards.

That's that's where you ultimately need to go.

And to have ride-through capabilities, you have to accommodate the voltage sag, but you have to give some time for the voltage sag to come up.

This is a in milliseconds is the time that we're looking for.

What is milliseconds?

It takes like a hundred milliseconds just to blink.

So that that is how quickly the voltage came back up to a stable area of where it was.

These power standards that I have here, the this is what you all are referring to.

When was this given?

Was this given to sewage and water board?

That's on our uh customer website.

So any customer that comes onto our uh X's for service has that available to them all the time.

But was it ever specifically given to sewage and water board to follow for this substation?

Um I I don't I assumed as any construction if you're building a house and you go to your contractor, your contractor, all that information, and so that they can work with within our restrictions and requirements of power quality.

So it it is made available to all customers, and we were never asked to have a meeting about that in in particular.

So I'm assuming that that was already something that was uh done in the building uh or in the equipment that they chose, and just one other thing, it that's not just unique to entergy system, it's based off of ANSI standards, so uh it it you know any electrical engineer would be utilizing those same uh standards in their designs.

Okay, so so sewage and waterboard, have you seen these before?

And and I guess this is a 300 million dollar power complex, so I guess why if you haven't seen this prior to today or even in the last few weeks, how was there not more coordination between you and Entergy on this power complex before we even got to this point?

There has been there was many years of coordination getting up to this point, right?

There was a lot of coordination with our two organizations and with previous councils.

Uh we we generally understood that there would be times when the transmission may or transmission grid may not be available.

Um and so I think we're we're learning more about the performance right now of our specific substation and how it interacts with the grid.

Uh, but there was always we always understood that there could be times when it would not be available.

That is not exactly the situation that happened here.

We just want to be be clear in terms of planning for um the unavailability of the grid, that's always been part of our planning.

Okay, what does that mean?

Yes.

What is the plan for if it's unavailable and why would it be unavailable?

Right.

So um, if if you don't mind, I'm sorry, going back a couple of slides to there was one with a diagram on it, actually, of our system one more.

Oh, the direction.

I'm sorry, there we go.

Go forward.

Okay, all right, thank you.

So I wanted to provide a you know, the graphical description of the of the power system just for some for some additional indication on this topic.

Um so the power the substation is our primary source of 60 hertz power.

Uh we take that and convert it to 25 hertz power using three new static frequency changers.

And those are what's uh used to power our drainage pumps as well as some of our puddle water pumps.

In the event that the substation or transmission grid is not available for whatever reason, and we have seen that in the past with Hurricane Ida, certainly.

Uh we have turbine six and now turbo, and now turbine seven is our backup.

And so that is the contingency plan uh for 60 hertz power for the frequency changers.

And of course, we have our older equipment as well uh in the wings.

Okay.

Since we're on this slide, I'll uh actually I want to talk about one of these future enhancements that you're discussing co-generation.

Um wouldn't that decrease the reliability and increase the wear and tear on the new turbines?

So it would not be our intent to do that on a daily basis.

That would be in the event that we were approaching a strong storm uh where there could be concern about grid reliability, and so that would allow us to be able to utilize our turbines in parallel uh with the grid and be able to swap over power sources.

So we have to work with the grid operator MISO to get uh to enter into agreement to do that, and we're already working through that.

But again, that would not be a daily, that would not be a daily item.

Okay, so at what instance would you use this code generation?

Uh our Arthur, Tropical Storm Arthur, would have been a great example for us to do that.

That's considered a big storm.

Well, I think that we're as we're learning and as we're going through this, that is uh an option that we have available to us, and if it's an option, we should use it.

I think it's fair to say if we have Arthur and we think something even stronger is coming, we're always prepared not to use this the frequency changers, but to use the turbines and go into what we call island mode and be more resilient and be able to supply our own uh our own power.

But wasn't the whole purpose of this substation so that we wouldn't have to use the turbines?

That is true, but there are still situations where if the fire if the storm is strong enough, it is best for us to turn on the turbines and use it and have greater confidence in our protection.

Okay, but we use them in tropical storm Arthur and they failed.

So I guess like what what are your plans to prevent this from happening so we can actually use the 300 million dollar power station that we built?

You know, and I want to be clear that we absolutely are using and have been using it very successfully.

Uh so this is this is part of the um adjustments and refinements that we're making as we go along in terms of using the new equipment and and the adjustment for Arthur during hurricane, I'm sorry, during Tropical Storm Arthur, we only had turbine six available to us, and so that would uh only be able to provide about 20 megawatts of backup power.

As of this weekend, we now have turbine seven available to us, and that puts us in a much better position.

I think it's important to note too that at the time of procurement of the equipment, which was in 2021, uh, we would not provide specific voltage variation data for the Sullivan substation as part of the conceptual planning for the for the power complex.

At this point, we're in a situation where we are tweaking what the settings are, and so and I think with a project this large that's going to happen to a certain degree.

Uh we know within a day or two, we were able to make an adjustment that would have captured what happened on June 18th.

June 18th was 72% of normal voltage.

We were able to change to 70%.

That's good.

But I am pushing the engineers and the manufacturer to see how much further lower can we go, how much lower can we go?

In a perfect world, I want to go beyond 40 and lower, but there's always, as I saw and looked at the voltage lag graphs to show the percentage of times this happens, that it is low that you'll get to 40, but it can happen.

And so to have the you I don't know if we'll ever have a system that's 100% we know we'll never go below X, and we'll be able to match it with our settings, but we're trying to get there, and so we are pushing the uh manufacturer and to the contract to do that.

And I think it's good.

I want to say that that energy has been a good partner, that they are meeting with us, that they have a third party that's gonna look at their side and see how they can make corrections, and then we'll look at our side to see how we can better tweak what we're doing.

We've made it through a couple of storms already, confidently.

This one, there was a blip.

We need to go in, analyze it, work together, tweak, and make the adjustments that we can.

But I don't know if we'll ever have a system that's 100% we we can cover all low voltage unless we go to island mode and make the switch to the turbines.

Okay, and how long is this third party gonna take to do?

I mean, it we're in hurricane season now.

I mean, that we have constant rainstorms, you know, in the areas that you know, this gets turned off.

There it's half of my district floods.

So how long is this third party?

It's it's my understanding that he did a uh visit with sewage and water board in their system last Thursday.

He's already got some initial recommendations that I think he's gonna share with us after some phone calls this week.

Um, so that will give us some direction.

And of course, in our week bi weekly meeting, I'll give you further updates as that process goes along, but we don't anticipate it taking too terribly long for him to complete it.

Okay, so like a month?

Oh, certainly, yes.

Okay.

Um what redundancies does sewage and water board have in place for power failures?

So I will I will go back to having turbine six and seven as backup, uh the opportunity for the future co-generation opportunity, and we do have uh turbine five presently out of service, but we are working to get that back in service by July 15th.

Uh we have the older EMDs, they are not as reliable, but they are still there, and we also have rotary frequency changers in our inner system, and so we do have additional sources uh going back to the the uh older 25 Hertz equipment.

Okay, and how does how does C and Waterboard utilize natural gas generally and how was it utilized in preparation and during tropical storm, Arthur?

And what's the current agreement with Delta utilities?

We're working through revising our agreements with Delta now based on uh what we understand is is a need to uh to change our agreements with them based on our change in use.

We're not using nearly as much gas as we had, but we do need to make sure that we're able to we have the gas available to us, and so uh there's some reserve capacity that I understand we need to be uh planning for, and we're working with them now.

And what would that be used for during a storm?

Did you and did you use it for turbine six and seven?

That would be perhaps.

So we we did not use it for uh we ended up not using it for that for that okay.

I think that's all I've got right now for questions, Councilmember Green.

We've heard a couple of times reference to the third party.

Could you explain that a little bit more who it is and what the responsibilities of the third party are?

Yeah, so it's uh electrical engineering company that's uh specializes in protection and control.

Their name is uh PCS 2000.

How are they chosen and what is their responsibility?

So they are uh SMEs that enter G looks for, especially when we're in uh situations like this studying power quality.

They're very familiar with our system and and can do some expert judgment for us.

Is that something that entergy is paying for?

We're we're we've uh we're splitting the cost um with the sewage and water board.

And um and it's a run by a professor out of LSU.

We've used him for large industrial customers and other parts of our corporation, and they come in and the reason they're helpful is because they look at both sides.

So they'll look at our um system and then they'll look at the customer system.

Councilmember McCarran asked all of the questions, the very good questions, but I kind of have a fundamental concern and address it with me so that I understand it, treat me as somebody who just reads and doesn't go through it.

A voltage sag of a millisecond or less than a millisecond, basically compromise flood flood protection in an area of our city, the Lakeview area, and it and it did so it really compromised the entire city, but it affected Lakeview.

Tell me what I'm missing in terms of what happens the next time that there's a voltage sag and it's 72 or it's lower or the like.

What very simple to the public.

What's being done now so that if a storm appears in the Gulf, as it did so quickly with author or tropical storm, that a voltage sag, which I consider to kind of be a power outage, um doesn't make us have the same problem.

I think there's two things we're doing.

One will be watching and measuring the storm to have a better understanding of should we go ahead and turn on the turbines and have that protection.

But also number two, as I said, immediately after what happened on the uh June 18th, we adjusted from 80 percent of normal voltage to 70 percent.

Okay, but the key is if it's gonna go even lower.

Yeah, right.

That's you know what I'm talking about.

Let's say it's 50 percent.

The voltage seg brings us to 50 percent.

Are we gonna have the same problem?

And it's better to answer in a more direct manner.

If we're gonna have the same problem, I just want the public and the council to be aware.

But obviously, you could have a voltage sag that goes below 60 percent, right?

You could have a voltage sag that's below what we could handle.

It could go out completely.

And then we would have to adjust the system and turn on, you know, reset the uh reset the chargers, the changes, or we should have gone ahead and changed to the turbines.

So, yes, and that's what I was trying to say earlier.

There could be a situation where the voltage sag is below what I'm able to push the manufacturer and engineers to lower our setting to.

Now we're still in the discovery stage of seeing how low can we take it.

We went from 80 to 70.

And the last one was at 72.

I want to see us at least go from that down to 40.

That would at least catch what happened on May 20th.

I don't have guarantees yet that that can be done.

But you're absolutely right, and I want to be honest that you could have a situation if you rely on the voltage changers that you would, static changes, you would have a situation where the millisecond would make it jump and turn it off.

Because you can't tell based on the strength of a storm in the Gulf whether or not there's going to be a voltage sag the voltage, unless you tell me as straightforward as you can, because I think the public wants to know what would that do?

What would your ability to measure the strength of a storm do relative to preparation for a voltage sag?

Only this.

To the extent that we know that there is an extreme storm coming, we already know because of the lags that the static frequency changers could become questionable at certain levels.

So I'm being very clear.

So if we know that there is going to be a large storm, it may be best for us to turn on the turbines at the beginning and go, as I said, ice island mode and make our own energy to avoid that question mark.

But you're right, and I want to be honest to the public.

Yes, that if it goes below a certain amount, and right now we're in this stage where we're working with energy trying to reset it, but if it goes below what we're able to reset it to, then you're right, we could have a situation where that millisecond would make it jump.

But I do want my general superintendent to add if she wishes.

Yeah, I just want to highlight the multiple levels of operation that we're speaking to.

And do me a favor, speak to the public when you're doing that.

Not to Aaron, who is an expert in this area, to the public.

The person who needs to know the next time a storm is in the Gulf that there could be outage of um the outage related to a millisecond based on a voltage sag.

Our intent and always has been for the larger storms to be able to use our backup power instead of the transmission grid to avoid any potential issue that could happen.

So that to avoid that.

You sound like an elected official there.

At the end of the day, you didn't answer the question for the public.

I was attempting to make it.

So maybe there is no answer.

So then tell me then if the storm is severe and you recognize it as such, when do you make a determination as to whether or not the uh the change is going to be made?

Sure, we would we would make that far in advance, and uh we're but how come on.

How how can you?

If a storm pops up like author, it's are you saying that you can do it within a matter of hours or is it days?

No, this is something we can do within a matter of hours.

Okay, that's fine.

I just within a matter of hours you can respond.

The public wants to know this.

It involves evacuation, it involves elderly complexes, it involves neighborhoods, you know, that are maybe prone to flooding versus some others.

So at the end of the day, you can make a decision within a couple of hours whether or not the turbines have to be employed based on the strength of the storm.

Yes.

So that begs the question of this was not very complex, I just cut that answer.

Why were we not prepared this time?

And so uh going into to Hurricane Arthur, we only had one of the two backup turbines available, and so now turbine seven, which is a new turbine, is available to us, and so that puts us in a much better position.

But you can still make a decision, yes.

Even on that one turbine in advance based on the strength of the storm.

Yeah, and and it was uh we considered that, and and given the the backup power uh that would not be able to power all of the pumps if we needed, we still felt the frequency changers were the best option.

What surprised you about this incident in terms of the millisecond of outage based on a voltage, you know, the issue?

What surprised you?

What did our engineers, what did the analysts not anticipate might have happened that happened?

Well, I think what there was a number of tornadoes as well, right?

So there was this ended up being a much stronger storm than I think was anticipated.

We we primarily anticipated this being a rain event and not um as severe as it ultimately was.

I don't care so much as the fault, to be very honest with you.

That's an issue that will all work out, and I'm sure it will come back before the committee.

What I'm always concerned about is the people who are most affected, and what information can be shared with them to prepare them for what the possibilities are.

So at the end of the day, we've heard that the strength of a storm, which should be almost any storm that the National Weather Service says has the possibilities of being a tropical storm, but the strength of a storm allows us to give an analysis in advance to at least be prepared to switch to turbines if necessary.

That's correct.

So the public should not feel, and the council should not feel, and you know, I I look toward my left, especially the Commissioner McCarron, because at one time Commissioner De Russo, who had a very strong role in this process, we should not feel that the problems relative to flooding and power that facilitates remediation of flooding have been solved by the building of this power plant.

There are still technical matters that need to be addressed.

Yes, there's still technical matters, as I said, the the lag or the sag could go below where we're able to make the adjustment.

And so again, we're going to work with this third party, see where the issues are and talk to the manufacturer and see how low we can take it down.

And then if we see and believe that there's a heavier storm than expected, it will go to the turbines, again, go to island mode and be more independent and make it our own electricity.

What time frame is involved with the analysis of the SAG the ability to withstand the SAG?

Well, I think that's part of the third-party evaluation that we're working through is to understand more of interaction.

Tell me the time, thank you.

I just need the the straightforward answers.

I want you to not be answering me, but to answer the elderly person who's living in Lakeview right now, who's living in um a community such as in the ninth ward, who wants to know?

They're not going to ask these questions in a tech as technical a manner, but I think it's fair to say what kind of time frame are we looking at.

Do we anticipate that there'll ever be a time where we can get to a level of zero and it's and we're able to cover things?

Not really, I guess.

I think as we do this discussion and conversation with the third party, we'll find out.

I don't know today how low we can take down the setting.

And I'm that's the honest response.

But in a month, I'd like to be able to ask you at a committer meeting, committee meeting what the third party has said in terms of what time frame we're looking at.

Absolutely.

Can we commit to you answering that?

Fault is important, but results and resolution, especially in the middle of the storm season, are important.

Can the public be assured that within a month or so that we'll have an answer as to whether or not a sag of a certain even down to zero can be covered?

Yes, we should have that information in a month because the analysis is going on at this point, and we should have that information in a month.

Be assured I'm going to ask that as a question.

So you might as well start that off as a presentation, you know, um, in your presentation.

Um, and I'm sure that our my fellow council members agree with me that that's an important question to be able to answer.

A millisecond for a SAG resulting in the problems that we saw, is something that's not acceptable, and it's something that needs to be addressed right away.

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Thank you.

Uh Councilmember Hughes.

And then Councilmember Willard.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'm going to be uh brief and thank you, uh Mr.

Vice President, for uh letting me jump the line.

In the interest of transparency, I know we keep talking about this voltage drop on June 18th.

Yes or no?

There was another voltage drop on May 20th.

Is that accurate?

Yes, sir.

Yes, okay.

So, how were the two different?

Or were they different?

They were different in the magnitude of the voltage drop.

So, why didn't we engage the third party review after the first one?

Number one, and number two, why were we not transparent with the public that that even happened?

Because me and and my colleagues and everybody found that out by accident, you all was most certainly not forthcoming about it.

Certainly, it was not our intent to not be transparent.

Uh there was there's really very minimal impact to our operations that day.

Uh, I would say that on the 18th, we were very forthcoming as soon as we knew that the situation was happening.

We were very forthcoming in terms of notifying uh, you know, know some city council mayor and yourselves regarding the impacts uh regarding that.

So it's certainly not an intent to be non-transparent.

Your feedback is is well taken regarding the type of information that you are looking for, and we're taking that, and we'll be incorporating that um into our communication program.

But why didn't you engage the third party reviewer on May 20th?

Why did you wait to June?

Yeah, well, I would say this it was presented to me that it was an anomaly and that the situation had more or less been resolved.

And so we took it that way when it happened again on the June 18th.

Um at that point we realized that we were at 80.

We were not able to go down to 72 where it was, and so now it's time for us to adjust it and go as low as we can to protect the protect the community.

All right, and and just my last question the the the May 20th, you blamed Entergy for that one, correct?

It was the same condition that caused a voltage tag that our equipment tripped offline.

Okay.

Let me just read something for the record.

Um and this came from you, madam, general superintendent.

There was a similar situation on May 20th.

When we realized that the voltage drop was from entergy side and not an issue with our new equipment, we were in touch with them and they confirmed that there was an issue with a nearby transmission line that impacted our substation.

We were not given any indication at the time that we should be considering changes to our settings based on the allowable tolerances of the transmission system and such, I was under the impression that this was an isolated incident.

As part of the overall operational paradigm for the new power complex, it has always been our intent to rely on our own backup power generation in the event of a hurricane.

However, we will be adjusting that approach as we learn more about the environmental conditions that can impact the transmission system.

We are working with entergy now to schedule a meeting, so you you stand behind that response.

It was it was entergy's fault, in your opinion, right?

I'm I'm not here to put blame on entergy regarding.

I'm not here to blame anybody.

What I am here to do is give the public the we we're just with just dancing around stuff, right?

And this whole, look, I'm not here to play the blame game, but I'm not a lawyer, and I get the lawyers one dance around everything.

I'm just a little, you know, McDonald 35 graduate.

I'm just a little urban planner.

But but what I am committed to doing is is giving the public act accurate answer.

So you you stand behind what was said in that correspondence, right?

When we realized that it was the a voltage issue from the transmission line that had that our we that our equipment responded to, that was a new situation to us.

And again, in retrospect, I think this is an opportunity for both to come together.

But I would I do want to add this though.

It's it's easy to point fingers.

And I know you're not, but I'm just saying in this discussion, is it is it one or the other?

The thing is, it takes two.

We have to have the power and our equipment has to work.

And so if the power blips, but our equipment can catch it.

You know, let's say they could make the lowest they'll ever blip.

I have a SAG is 40 percent.

But I can we can set our equipment so it catches 20, then no harm, no foul.

And so it's a matter of how can we work together to find out where that weakness is and where can it work?

So that's what we're trying to do.

I hear you.

But let me just let me just be quite clear with you, Mr.

Executive Director.

Me and and now Councilman Willard were in the legislature when we fought tirelessly for capital outlay money.

And we were assured that if we delivered this capital outlay money, we were gonna have consistent reliable power.

And now here we are, and it's difficult to get answers, and I'm gonna just be honest with you.

You know, these storms can develop and strengthen in a day, right?

So we could have a storm by Sunday.

And if it stalls over the city, I'm just being honest, I'm terrified right now.

Because I don't have the faith and confidence, and you all see this is what else I struggle with you all.

You can never give us a finite date for anything.

It's always well, we anticipate in the coming weeks, and but but we want specificity.

I'm gonna just remind sewage and water board, August 1st is coming, and it's gonna be a new day and a new way, and we're not gonna tolerate excuses on August 1st.

Thank you, madam chair.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Council Member Willard.

Alright.

Um was the first date that the power substation came online?

Operations.

When did it start running?

The substation was um available, um, can't remember in which it would have been September of 20 um five, right?

Or it's been more than a year.

We will our substation was done, and you can I think this uh sewage and water board was writing that.

I'm sorry, yes.

I'm gonna get it wrong.

So I want to Tony, do you have the answers?

Do you know when it was complete, the substation?

No.

Hold on.

He needs to come to the mic.

Yeah, I'm I'm trying to figure out what it is.

I'm gonna get the right date.

We were we were a substation was complete, and then sewage and water board was waiting on their um, so that's what I'm trying to figure out.

What was the date that the substation was providing power for sewage and waterboard operations?

We started testing uh the frequency changers in September of 2025.

Started testing, but when was it turned on?

The substation was was available.

Right, and then we have three different we have three frequency changer units, each had to be tested individually, and in uh September of 2025, we started the first we started that uh the first testing of the first unit.

So, what was going on during the testing of the first to the second to the third?

Everything was uh sewage and waterboard operations were being powered by the substation while you're doing this testing?

It was it was a combination.

Uh we were primarily using our older equipment though.

Okay, so when did the new substation become the primary source of power?

Uh the beginning of this year.

So that's what I was trying to find out.

Yes, thank you.

Beginning this year, January, February.

Um I will have to go back and look at the exact date that we were using, but I it was believe it was in January that it's been our primary source.

I will confirm.

So primary source in January.

All right.

Um I know that equipment before it enters uh manufacturing facility or plant has to go through factory acceptance testing.

Um did the new substation go through all of that?

Our equipment certainly would have.

I'm not sure I can see that.

We would go through a full commissioning of our substation once it's built to make sure our equipment will simulate different uh scenarios and make sure that the equipment responds accordingly.

Okay.

Um how did conversations about voltage sag come into play during the construction, the design of the power plant?

Was that was there ever a conversation about that?

I was not part of the construction of the substation, but that those are normal conversations, I would assume they would be normal conversations to have uh in a design of a system.

I guess speaking to the mic.

I'm sorry.

Um I believe I I would ask the sewage and water board what conversations they had if is you were involved in that project management.

So I don't know.

I was not involved in that.

I mean, I'm I'm re I'm just asking, like, were there conversations about, hey, if the voltage drops below a certain threshold, the system will be tripped and go offline.

The threshold for that to occur is at this, and was that foul factored in, was that calculated in to the design to the equipment to the components selected for the the substation?

So, in terms of those those conversations that happened with energy, I do not recall that ever being brought up during this conceptual planning.

And the the initial settings for the equipment were set to uh trip at a level that is even below kind of a normal operating range of plus or minus 10%.

So, you know, there we there was some uh contingency built in there, uh but once we're learning uh that needs to be adjusted.

So uh when we talk about the voltage sag, the two different incidents, what's the the main piece of equipment that is affected once the sag goes too low?

Yeah, so the the frequency changer itself, which again I'm I'm a photo of so the frequency changer goes offline?

Yes, to protect itself.

Did we did we purchase install the wrong frequency changers for this project?

No, we the we are able to work with the manufacturer, and um they can certainly go go lower than 80.

Again, we've already made those adjustments and and we believe it can go lower.

We we just need to make sure that there's no uh downstream impacts that would be seen about that.

So that was that was my next question.

What happens when you allow it to go lower?

Uh so again we have to we have to working through a third party working through with our manufacturer to make sure that there is no damage, right?

We don't want to set setting that's too low uh that could damage our equipment, either the frequency changer itself or or any pumps or anything else in the system.

So that's part of what we're working through right now.

So none of this was was discussed or factored in during design, uh construction, implementation, testing.

The the 80 percent was was set lower than the normal operating range of.

Is that like industry standard 80 percent?

I think that's the a manufacturer standard.

Manufacturer for the frequency changer?

Well, that's not I mean, for a project of this scale, is there like an industry standard of of like the voltage that should be accommodated?

I mean, the manufacturer's standard could be 80 percent on this frequency changer, but if you bought another one, it could have accommodated the different voltage threshold.

So I'm just trying to make sure that we didn't purchase the wrong frequency changers.

I understand.

And and those conversations we're having happening with them now are very positive, and and so we're I think we're gonna have a good outcome out of this at the end of the day.

I completely understand the concern and the questions, and uh we're going to be able to make our adjustments based on the conversations we've been having with them.

No, I I do not believe, and I haven't seen anything that makes me believe that the we have the wrong frequency changers.

I do believe that we have to make the adjustments that we're making now, and that's where third party evaluation is going to assist us, but we're able to go from 80 to 70.

Hopefully we can go down lower.

Any idea of how many incidents we have where maybe voltage sag goes below 70?

I mean, I know the May incident brought it down to around 40.

So we we don't have uh around voltage sag, it's common on the transmission grid uh to have disturbances, sags all the time.

Not every sag causes uh interruptions or causes issues to customers.

Uh when we do or when we are notified, hey, did you have something go on our system?

We investigate and provide the necessary information.

The transmission grid is very different than a distribution grid.

So the transmission grid doesn't know boundaries between operating companies, it's connected across uh it the whole uh country uh North America there.

So you know, if you have a very sensitive system, your cone of risk is broad.

If you uh allow for some fluctuation and some recovery time, you know, you you won't see the impact is things that would be right on top of you.

So those are the things that the third party will be working through to see how can they less sensitize this system to ride through the services on the grid.

Okay.

Um I guess I would I would say you need to provide us this information in as near real time as possible.

Um, are you concerned at all that that another major rain event could cause the substation to go offline again?

Well again, that's why we or we'll use our backup generation if we feel that that's both of the turbines are working.

Yeah.

Yes.

Okay.

Um, I won't belabor the point when the system went offline in May, we should have known about it.

Um, that is not how we need to conduct business.

Um we expect transparency, and uh the only way we can help is if we know what's going on.

In the future, we will bring that information.

We weren't trying to hide anything.

It was determined it wasn't impactful.

Uh but hindsight is 2020.

We will make sure going forward that we present that information to the uh to the council.

What I don't want to happen is something else, say we have another storm, something else occurs, and we find out after the fact, and then you say moving forward, we'll let you know when this occurs.

Like this is a hundred percent transparency as far as I'm concerned.

When you discover a problem that's going to impact service to the people of New Orleans, we need to know about it.

Don't try to hide the ball.

Thank you all for being here.

Thank you, Councilmember Wheeler.

Council Member King, followed by Council President Morrell.

I have some time.

I was just gonna add, I mean, obviously, uh I just about to take another meeting, but we're all aware of what happens on August 1st, right?

On August 1st, the legislation that was passed by the legislature that gives the council the ability to regulate the sewage and water board is the law and becomes active on August 1st.

So I guess that the the takeaway from today is whereas previously the sharing of information has been conditional and voluntary, it is highly unlikely that post-August 1st any of this information will be a question of whether you think it's important or not.

As you saw from energy, we have had to negotiate down to the point we're trying to get information when a hundred people or more are affected by a power outage.

Um I know that uh Mr.

Hughes is in back, but when you look at what happened this weekend with those apartments and that water being cut off, the fact that that was an utter situation of chaos for a council member, part of what the legislature granted us this past session is that we never had authority over sewage and water board, yet we received 100% of the complaints regarding it.

This entire relationship has to change and it will change on August 1st.

I mean, as you know from the pumps meetings, I know y'all are a part of pumps as well.

There is gonna be a significant sea change on August 1st, and it will no longer be we don't like the way things are going, and so we have to wait nine months to go to the legislature to change it.

If we don't like the way things are going or the way sewage or board is operating, we will change it in real time.

How you interpret what I just said is up to you, but I know how the public's gonna interpret it because being given that authority, being given that level of oversight, the expectation the public is gonna have on the council is that when we say something, for example, like I started this meeting with, and I'm sure y'all also talk about it while I came back in.

When we have a simple question like who's responsible for X, I shouldn't have to walk back in a meeting that I still be talking about who was responsible.

I I know that in politics right now, there is this idea, never take accountability, just deny, deny, deny.

And I am very frustrated, that it seems to be, and I know Councilman has rejoined us.

It seems that that's pervasive throughout government.

Like I think you would be surprised if you told the public, yeah, this is a new power plant.

We didn't have the equipment calibrated correctly.

We have now solved that problem going forward.

This was a mistake, that was our responsibility.

It's easier for the public in this council to stomach that to constantly have this back and forth between groups saying, well, it was our fault, but it's also their fault.

And it's like when neither group will kind of fully accept who's responsible, then not only the public think you're both responsible that you're both, but also think you're both avoiding responsibility.

And so when we ask a direct question, we not only expect a direct answer, it's also the easiest path out of the problem.

So like I said, August 1st can't come soon enough.

Yeah.

Amen.

Council Harper King.

Thank you, Councilman.

If I could switch for a moment before we go to item number six to get an update on on Decatur Street and the French quarter, the French quarter street construction, um, there's been a lot of uh information about the streets construction that I want to really get some clarity on for myself, my colleagues, and also more importantly, um, French Court of Businesses and residents.

So my first question is: when was this project scheduled to originally start?

Let's see.

And could I ask Stephen Yang to join us as well?

None of this is well, never mind.

So in terms of um the start of us, yeah.

I think entergy, I think if if we're done with the um power station stuff, enter G, you guys can get up from the table and and Steve Steven can join us over here for the rest of these.

Thank you.

Afternoon.

Good afternoon.

Oh, indeed.

All right, you want to stop?

Sorry, I'm Stephen Yang, deputy general superintendent for Sujan Waterboard.

Thank you, Mr.

Yang.

Uh, can you tell us when was this project scheduled to originally start?

The project was originally uh scheduled to start back in March in 2025.

In March of 2025, that's correct.

Okay.

So why didn't it start in March?

Well, we had two events.

We had the Mar we had Mardi Gras and we had the Super Bowl events, and so we thought it would be best to start after that.

Okay.

So when did the project start?

So the stuff the project actually started back in April uh of 2025, and it was delayed due to high waters uh in the Mississippi River, and so we were not allowed to start work until that uh water level went down.

Alright, so when you said it started in 2025 in April, what was done?

Oh, yes, sorry.

August.

It started August 2025.

Yes, sir.

And you couldn't start earlier because of the water level.

That's correct.

Okay, all right.

Um the process of opening multiple streets at one time, that that's been a concern.

A lot of people say you should have done one street at a time.

Um, why was the decision made to open multiple streets at the time?

So originally in our contract, we were scheduled to start one block at a time and finish one block at a time.

Uh, but due to our our funding constraints, we actually thought it would be best with the in coordination with our general superintendent at the time, thought it was best to uh start the project all at once.

Uh and again, this was due to funding constraints on our end with uh with the federal money that was coming in.

Can you go into a bit more detail about the funding constraints?

I think that's confusing to a lot of people.

Yeah, so uh back in 2025, we uh were still looking for an extension through FEMA, and uh at the time we were a bit worried that that that extension would not be granted, and so in order to get as much work done and put into the ground, we were we asked the contractor to actually work on all the blocks at the same time, or as many blocks as he possibly could at the same time, and that was to have the ability to have FEMA reimbursed sewage and waterboard for the project?

That's correct.

Everything that was in the ground that can be billed could have been reimbursed at that time.

So why was the why did you what was the cost for the project?

When was the money first available for the project?

Uh roughly 10 million dollars.

No, when?

When was it?

When was it was available back uh when we first kind of started the FEMA program in 2012, but as y'all know, we reached a settlement back in I believe 2016-2017.

All right.

So you have to I just want to give people understand that it was a rush to open as many streets as possible, so FEMA could reimburse sewage of water board, but that's correct.

Originally slated back in 2012.

Yeah, so you you asked about why we started so late, you know, in regards to having the money versus now.

We in the meantime between 2016 and and when we started this project, we actually had other projects that were going on at the same time.

Um we had or in correlation, we had the uh Clayborne projects, right?

We had TM3, TM4, we had uh TM, uh the St.

Bernard project, we also had Leonidas, Fig, Eden, and Dupree that were all transmission main projects.

And so in order to do those projects, we try not to put too many of those transmission means down at the same time because that causes us a high risk, right?

It's that's a high risk, but not very much not a high reward, right?

You if if we were to get a main break while doing these lines, you would have a bull water advisory of the whole city and not just sections.

So there have been a couple of delays that has um a couple of things that has delayed this project.

One, well, can you explain the delays?

Yeah, so the first delay, like I said, was the uh the Mardi Gras event and the Super Bowl.

Then we had the uh high water event uh that we couldn't dig and do any excavation.

Uh we also had some archaeological findings that that caused delay.

That was uh roughly a month worth of delays where uh the state actually came in with their archaeologists and had to do some digging in the site, and we were not allowed to do anything in the area until they were finished finding making their findings and then providing us the results.

So once you started in August, that's what that's concerns I'm more concerned about.

Started in August, when did the archaeological those delays?

Uh when was it the archaeology delays start?

Uh those are fairly recent.

Uh I believe that was earlier this year.

We had two of them though.

We had one on St.

Peter, and I think the other was on the 1100 block at Decatur.

Um then I also want to make sure that uh it's very clear that you know there's other utilities working in this area as well.

You know, right now, like uh right at the 1200 block at Decatur, that's uh Delta that's doing repairs for their system as well.

So, you know, we really looked into how to give the the residents a holistic project, you know, trying to get the sewer, the water, the drainage, and then other utilities done at the same time.

And I know it's it's inconveniencing the residents and the business owners, but you know, we want to make sure we're not coming back to this spot twice.

And before we move on with the delays, do you know what was found or so how long was those that was those about a month for archaeological findings?

And what was found anything significant?

Nothing significant, but uh I could tell you we have pictures of the of personnel on the ground, literally with a little duster like dusting off pieces of um, you know, just like burnt clay and things of that nature.

But originally that what they did find um was an archaeological finding that was significant, but past that they didn't find anything else.

Okay.

So now we're current 2026.

There are no delays.

River doesn't, the tide of the river doesn't matter, the height of the river doesn't matter.

Um what is the expected timeline to finish this project?

Uh currently the the timeline is mid to late September.

Okay, and it was always stated that this would be about a year's work.

That's correct.

So if you were to start it from the time that we started in August, 365 days would have been in August, but with the additional delays of the archaeological findings, we it's pushed back about a month.

Okay.

And we've talked about what can't be done to possibly speed up this project, maybe have more people or more crews work or have them work longer hours.

What is the feasibility of that?

Uh it could be feasible, but I think we have to take into account a few things.

That you know the contractor is not set to do that type of work, so we have to confirm that he has the the forces to do it.

The uh funding is a big uh aspect to this as well, right?

This is working outside of the normal hours, and so additional funding would be necessary, and where that funding would come from is a a question mark because FEMA would not reimburse for expediting a project, right?

Once the days are set, that's that's what we can do the project timeline for.

Okay, and how much is the funding?

What's that?

How much would it cost per day to the crew?

I don't know the exact numbers, but it's is it's generally roughly anywhere between five to ten thousand dollars a day.

Um, but I can get those numbers for you, Councilmember.

All right, so I just want no, I'm I'm I'm good.

Um and I'm almost done.

Councilmember McCarron, thank you for letting me switch the topic a little bit.

Um we have roughly with the beginning of July this week.

Um, we have all of July, all of August, and a week or two in September.

So that's about 10 or so weeks, a month and a half, roughly.

Yeah.

Okay.

Alright, I just want to make it very clear to the those affected that the reasons of the um street construction, the reasons behind the delay, and the most recent timeline would have us done in about 10 weeks.

10 to 12 weeks, that's 12 weeks.

All right, thank you.

That's all I have.

Thank you, Councilmember King.

Um, I had one comment card from Morgan Clevenger on item number five, and then we can move on to the presentation about New Orleans um east water issue.

Thank you.

Um 300 million dollars.

You know, we spent years in this council chamber on the substation on turbines, 20 years.

I'm really sorry, entergy is left because the residents of this city have paid over and over and over for these processes and these technology to work.

We had faith.

You told us have faith, and we did.

We no longer have faith.

I'm angry right now because I'm hearing about lessons learned.

We're watching storms.

You know, as a resident, you're watching that storm too, and all you can think about is we don't have any protection, and we've paid for it over and over and over again.

It's not enough to say lessons learned, it's not enough to say we'll figure it out next month.

Voltage sag, our roofs are sagging, our foundations are sagging, our ceilings are caving in.

We cannot afford this any longer.

We have so many homeowners and so many buildings in the city that have never recovered from the last major hurricane.

Everybody's vulnerable, three hundred million dollars.

It's not acceptable at all.

And I have to go back and tell my residents and my neighbors that there's nothing that we can do to help them.

So I urge you all to be accountable.

I'm tired of hearing, well, it's this one's fault, and this that's one that one's fault.

We can't afford it any longer.

And I urge this council, please recognize the seriousness of tropical storm Arthur.

We're 12 days out, and we have citizens that are suffering terribly because the vulnerabilities of the last five years have made them more vulnerable.

So fix this.

Thank you.

Thank you, Morgan.

Okay, so you're waterboard, you can move on to the chateau Carmel.

Uh Councilmember, just to note.

The online comment received on item number five will be remitted and preserved in the minutes.

Great, thank you.

So, so madam chair, if you don't mind, because I know this is specific to District E.

What we'll do is um we can forego the presentation.

I think we've heard enough presentations.

I'll just ask two questions if you don't mind, and then we can um you know move on.

Sewage and water board for the record.

Um that that should be Carmel.

It's Lake Carmel, not Lake Caramel, and it's Chateau Carmel, not Chateau Carmel.

So let me move on to the water main break that happened adjacent to this apartment complex.

Do we have a specific date for the permanent repair?

Because what sewage and water board did this weekend, and let me um publicly thank you, Director, for being on site.

Let me thank the the hard work and network crew who deployed at 3 a.m.

and was in the hot sun for a long time.

I really appreciate them.

When is the permanent repair going to take place?

Specific date.

So what I want to know, specific date for the permanent repair, how long will the permanent repair take, right?

And then, you know, we we have to do a much better proactive job of informing the residents that they're going to be without water while this repair takes place.

So walk me through that.

So, first off, when you talk about notifications, we will ensure that the residents that were impacted the first time around, if they are all going to be impacted again, will be notified, right?

Secondly, in terms of time frame to get the repair completed, the repair would take a day, if less than a day, in terms of the repair itself and when we can get it done.

I still have to talk to my team to get the parts in.

As I told you when we were in the field, this was a bit of an oddball repair because it goes over the canal, and so we need specific parts for that.

Uh we were unable to secure those parts at the time, so we capped the line and made a temporary repair.

But I I will get you a date on the repair for that.

But at the minimum, we have to notify the residents at least three to five days before we make that repair.

So it won't happen until then.

Yeah, and I that's my point, right?

I I'd love to give them like a seven-day notice.

I will if you want to seven day notice.

And I'm I'm gonna partner with you all to ensure that they're notified because these door hangers in the past, you all claim they happen, but the residents tell me all the time there wasn't anything on their door.

So uh I'm gonna join you all.

My team is gonna join you all on the ground, and we're gonna go door to door together to make sure that the residents are properly notified.

Okay, yes, sir.

Let me now shift.

Uh I'm very uh aggravated today because uh in the 1100th block of Winchester in Lake Forest Estates, um, the the ground just completely collapsed.

Uh it's my understanding this is due to a subsurface drainage issue that you all were well aware of for roughly a year.

Okay, now the street has collapsed.

A resident's car has gotten stuck.

You know the council president brought this up earlier today.

I don't know why, for the life of me, we wait for something to collapse, and now we have to do an emergency repair, which is probably more expensive if we just would have been proactive.

So tell me, and my team has been flagging this since we assumed office in January, which this issue predated me.

Why didn't we repair it?

And and what's the plan to get this?

So from our records, we were made aware of this in April of this year.

Um it is a drainage issue, but what we're also doing is we were made aware of this.

This for the you all were made aware of this for the first time in April.

That's what you're telling me.

From our records, yes, sir.

Okay.

Well, I'm gonna go get you the paper trail to help refresh your memory to to remind you all that um you were notified prior to April.

Yes, but just to make sure you you pull those receipts.

Understood.

But at the time we we we did barricade it off because we knew it wasn't an issue.

Um, but when we found it was drainage, uh, we looked at it and we noticed that it was more severe than that, and we do have a sewer line that runs directly under that.

It's actually uh serviced by a sewer force, no sorry, by the sewer station, a sewer lift station.

And so we want to make sure that that sewer is not damaged that well.

So I instructed my team this week to go get that CCTV ASAP, uh, in order to ensure that we're not just fixing a drain line and then coming back to fix the sewer line right afterwards.

So I guess if the street didn't collapse today, we'd still have your little orange cone in the middle of the street, and we just get to it when we get to it.

Was that the plan?

Yes, sir.

The the street had been that way since we'd known about it in April, and so we've put cones out yesterday.

It's been like that long before April for the record.

Yeah, um, but like I said, I was only made aware of it in April.

And so, like I said my team was out there to put the cones out and la yesterday uh we don't know when the cones were removed but they were uh and so you had a vehicle drive into that uh into that hole.

So the residents car that was damaged are you all going to assume liability for that?

That I can't speak on.

Mr.

Director, Madam General Superintendent?

Well we will do that it'll go through our risk management process.

I don't know.

No no no that's not what I'm saying.

It would be improper for me and unprofessional for me to state when I don't have the facts.

Yeah I can only go by the consistent response that the residents always get from sewage and water board.

My question today is when will this be repair as soon as I have the information in terms of if the sewer line is damaged if it is not damaged and we can fix the drain line we will do so immediately.

Immediately like today?

No sir.

Tomorrow?

No sir.

How do you define immediately?

As soon as I have that information for the sewer.

So it could be a week, two weeks, a month, three months potentially a week to two two weeks at my direction this is going to be a top priority as soon as they know they have an understanding what the situation is and they have the equipment that they need this is a top priority for us to repair it.

Well at my direction if this is not repaired expeditiously my definition of immediate is like let's start today um my response is not going to be very pleasant.

Okay.

And I will compel you all to show up to this council on a weekly basis if I have to until this is fixed.

So I don't want to come back a week from now and this is still an issue.

That's unacceptable.

Okay.

Any of you going on the ground a day to look at this I was actually going to go right after this meeting sir.

Okay.

Great.

Thank you madam chair.

Thank you members and if there's no other questions uh you have a question okay our mission to adjourn thing water pardon.

All right we are adjourned.

I want it fifth A7.

You gonna stay I don't want to be a cracking