Let's go ahead and get started.

So I'm going to call to order the water quality committee for Friday, February 13th, 2026.

Clerk, please call the roll.

Martinez.

Present.

Morris.

Colmives.

Kramer.

Williams.

Two present.

And President Williams did let me know that she would not be here.

And I do have some questions to read on the record on her behalf.

With that being said, Director, I will oh.

Mr.

Ronma, I will you have the floor.

All right.

Good afternoon.

Cindy Geronimo.

Commissioner of Utilities Administration from DPU.

And I have with me today, the director of DPU and Mike Chambers, who is he is the National Director for Business Solutions for NLC service line warranty program by Home Serve.

So he's prepared an executive summary, which he can review with you and answer any questions you may have.

So with that, I'll turn it over to Mike.

Really want to thank everyone for having me here today.

Appreciate having the opportunity to come and speak to you a little bit more about the home service service line program and how it can benefit your residents.

A little bit of a background on the programs.

We work with about 1,500 communities across the country.

But the reason these communities have gotten involved with this type of program is they understand you know infrastructure is getting older and order, especially when it comes to water and sewer lines.

And one of the big issues is while the cities are doing their part to maintain their main water and sewer lines in the street.

You have these miles and miles of lines that connect to your system that a lot of times they don't get any attention until there's an issue.

And that's those residents' lateral water and sewer lines.

And pretty much everywhere we go, we hear the same story.

Resident of a frozen water line, it breaks, or their sewer line collapses, or even you know, it just gets clogged with tree roots.

First thing they do is call the city.

You have to send out someone to take a look, make sure the main line is working properly.

And typically it is because you're doing the maintenance and the upkeep on it.

And that's when it puts you or your employees, you know, in the bad situation to where they have to be the bearer of bad news to the resident.

You know, Mr.

and Mrs.

Resident, we found the problem, it's your sewer line that's causing the issue.

And a lot of times residents become upset because they don't even realize they're responsible for these buried lines that run from their home to the main until you're there telling them that.

And then even the residents that do realize they're responsible, they don't have the five, six, seven thousand dollars it can cost to dig it up and replace it.

So that's kind of where our program comes in.

Uh first off, it's an educational program.

We'll do a free public awareness campaign to all the homeowners here in the community, just letting them know these lines are their responsibility, give them tips on what they can do to keep things working properly, don't put grease down your drains, that sort of thing.

And then also give them the opportunity to purchase a warranty that would cover them should something happen to their line.

Um the nice part for the city, it's a fully turnkey program.

We handle all the marketing, all the billing, all the customer service, all the claims.

Um there's no cost or anything to the city to participate, and then we will share a portion of all the revenue that's generated from the program back with the city.

Uh some of our partners will take that those re that funds that come back and set them aside, and maybe there's a low-income family that has a high water bill that can't afford to pay it, there's money for that.

Maybe they have a break and don't have our coverage, you know, there's money for that, or you can you know put it to a program that you're working on.

It's really up to the city, you know, how you want to use it.

Uh now the nice part for your residents is if the city does decide to participate, it's nothing that's forced on them.

It's just something that becomes available that should they want to cover themselves, then they can.

Uh, we always keep it completely optional because we understand that you know you might have newer sections of the community where it's not gonna benefit as much, but you know, the older ones are are the ones that are really gonna, you know, use use the program more.

Um we will make three products available to all your residents here.

Uh the first is the external water line coverage.

It's gonna cover their whole water line from where it enters the home all the way to the city's responsibility, whether that's the curb stop or the main.

Uh that'll cover leaking lines, broken lines, slow running lines, basically any disruption in their water service.

Um there's no deductible for your residents on that program, and there's also no service fees.

So residents can call out and we can come out and look at their line at any time.