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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2006-07-11 - MinutesCity Council Water & Sewer Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 Page I of 7 Member Aldermen Mayor Dan Coady Ward 1 Position 1 - Robert Reynolds Ward 2 Position I - Kyle B. Cook City Attorney Kit Williams Ward 3 Position 2 — Robert Ferrell Tave e V10 e Ward 4 Position 2 - Lioneld Jordan City Clerk Sondra Smith I/ ARKANSAS City of Fayetteville Arkansas City Council Water & Sewer Committee Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 A meeting of the Fayetteville City Council Water & Sewer Committee was held on July 11, 2006 at 5:30 p.m. in Room 326 of the City Administration Building located at 113 West Mountain Street, Fayetteville, Arkansas. MEMBERS PRESENT: Alderman Kyle Cook, Chair; Alderman Robert Ferrell; Alderman Lioneld Jordan MEMBERS ABSENT: Alderman Robert Reynolds STAFF PRESENT: David Jurgens, Ron Petrie, Mayor Dan Coody, Tim Conklin, Susan Thomas, Gary Dumas, Shannon Jones Chairman Kyle Cook called the meeting to order. 1. Approval of the Minutes Alderman Jordan moved that the minutes of the May 30, 2006 and the June 12, 2006 meetings of the Water and Sewer Committee be approved as distributed. Alderman Ferrell seconded the motion and it carried unanimously. 2. WSIP Update. a. West Side Wastewater Treatment Plant. Jack Carter, project superintendent for Brasfield & Gorrie, the general contractor on the West Side Wastewater Treatment Plant updated the Council on the progress of the project. He said there are about twenty-seven structures in the project and to date they have poured about 25% of the concrete, about 20% of the piping has been done and they have started work on twelve of the twenty-seven structures (consisting of dirt work, foundations, walls, and piping). He said the weather has been good and they are on schedule. He said MWY' s drawings have been very good and they have been excellent to work with, as has the City. Alderman Ferrell asked if the proposed date for completion is clearly realizable, barring any unforeseen acts of nature. Mr. Carter said that he sees no problem. He said they obviously can't control the weather but so far it has been good and everything is on schedule. He said they have the people on site to do the 113 West Mountain 72701 (479)521-7700 (479)575-8257(Fax) accessfayetteville.org City Council Water & Sewer Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 Page 2 of 7 work and the next big hurdle will be getting all the equipment in. He said he doesn't see any big problems David Jurgens told the Committee that representatives from McGoodwin, Williams & Yates were in the audience to answer any questions. Alderman Cook said as long as the information is flowing and staff feels good about the schedule, the Committee is satisfied. Mayor Coody said that from the reports he gets, everyone is doing a great, first class job with both speed and quality. That is very important and he wanted to say thanks. In response to a question from Alderman Cook, David Jurgens said McGoodwin, Williams and Yates is responsible for inspection of the site. He said they have full time inspection on site. A resident engineer is there to answer all questions as they come up. Stan Williams from OMI is also on site about fifty percent of the time performing overwatch for the City. Mr. Jurgens also goes on site as necessary, usually once or twice a month. Jim Ulmer, McGoodwin, Williams & Yates said that Brasfield & Gorie is doing an exceptionally good job. The work is good quality. In the testing of materials that go in, the results far exceed the standard. He said they are very professional and he has been very pleased with how things are going. There are no issues that are not being resolved. David Jurgens said the site is changing quickly. It has already changed since the aerial photos were taken in the update he handed out. Alderman Ferrell commented that he liked the illustration of the thermometer in the update material. He asked if it would be possible to have an additional thermometer that would show start and finish dates. David Jurgens said this is on the website. As the project evolves we will be posting the most recent monthly updates and we will have a thermometer based on each subproject that is underway. He said it is a little more difficult to do a start and finish thermometer for the total project. Once the West Side plant comes on line, many people perceive that as the end of the project. However, that is not the case. There is a lot of work that can't take place until after the plant comes on line. We will only be at around the 75 to 85% mark when the West Side plant comes on line and all facilities going west are completed. Gary Dumas said we hope to get the total project timeline in the newspaper soon. The paper has also promised to put in an updated time line every couple of weeks. b. Subproject WL -5, Force Mains from Hamestring Lift Station to West Side WWTP. David Jurgens said the work on this project is being done by Gamey Construction and is about 22 to 23% completed. They have worked on the plant site and completed the portion by Wedington Drive. They are now working on the portion going north to the Hamestring Lift Station. 113 West Mountain 72701 (479)521-7700 (479)575-8257(Fax) accessfayetteville.org City Council Water & Sewer Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 Page 3 of 7 C. Subproject WL -I and 3, Gravity Lines from Old Wire Road to Gregg Avenue, and from Porter Road to Hamestring Lift Station, combined as one contract. David Jurgens said Oscar Renda is working on these projects. On the WL -3 section, they started at the Hamestring Lift Station and are now laying pipe east of the Bridgeport subdivision. On WL- I going from Gregg Avenue, across Hwy. 71B all the highways and major streets are being bored and progress is being made, although no pipe is being laid at this point. d. Subproject WL -4, Gravity Lines and Force Main from Gregg Avenue Lift Station to Hamestring Lift Station. David Jurgens said Oscar Renda is also working on this project. The boring contracts are being done right now. They are not yet laying any pipe. e. Subproject EP -1, Noland Plant Renovation. David Jurgens said progress is continuing at the Noland Plant. Things are going very well and final completion is expected sometime around May 2007. L Subproject WL -6, Hamestring Lift Station. David Jurgens said this is a 36 -million -gallon per day sewer lift station which will pump the majority of the water to the West Side plant. Bids will go before the Council next week. Work on this project will probably begin in August. In response to a question from Alderman Cook, David Jurgens said that the Hamestring Lift Station will carry approximately fifty percent of the City's effluent, plus all the rain and ground water. The pipelines were designed for ultimate buildout in a five-year storm. One of the charters of the project was to eliminate sewer overflows up to the very severe five-year storm. On an average day they will only be about 20% ftill. But in a big storm they will carry the rain and groundwater. In the event of a problem with this lift station, there is backup power on site and there are seven pumps. He said we have made it as redundant as is reasonably possible - switching gears in place, manual backup on everything in addition to the controls. It is controlled directly from the plant. There are two parallel force mains so if one of the force mains goes down or if there is a leak and it has to be shut down, we can pump through the other force main. No single point of mechanical failure can cause a failure over the entire system. Mr. Jurgens said he is pleased that Brasfield & Gorie got the contract. Because they are also the contractors for the West Side plant, it will eliminate some of the coordination needed between two different companies with these two projects. However, Brasfield & Gorie is aware that these must be treated as two separate projects because of the funding mechanisms used. 9. Cost and Schedule Updates. David Jurgens handed out an updated schedule which includes timelines. He reminded the Committee that this is a "living" document so it has changed somewhat from a month ago and will continue to change. Every time a bid is opened, dollars will be moved around from estimated future costs to other areas. He explained the layout of the information. 113 West Mountain 72701 (479)521-7700 (479)575-8257(Fax) accessfayetteville.org City Council Water & Sewer Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 Page 4 of 7 In response to a question from Alderman Cook, Mr. Jurgens said there are court dates scheduled for two of the easements which have not yet been acquired. In both cases reroutes have been done and the routing is now firm. It is now a matter of how much money we pay for the easement. The eastside easements have been coming in but staff has not put a push on them. He thinks we have acquired about 50 to 60% of the easements on the next highest priority line (from Happy Hollow to the Noland WWTP). David Jurgens talked to the Committee about the project management team for the WSIP project. He explained that with all the help this project is getting from other staff (mapping from GIS, some time from accounting staff, Shannon Jones acting as backup to David, the new WSIP secretary, etc.) he has begun to think it may not be necessary to hire both the project manager and inspector originally planned for this project. He believes if we can bring one good construction manager in, we can complete the project without a project manager. Mr. Jurgens recommended that rather than a project manager and an inspector, a construction manager should be brought on board. He said that there is an applicant who is qualified but he will not come for the salary designated for the inspector. He will need $20,000 more per year to make the move. The salary would be more than what has been designated for the inspector, but not as much as for the project manager. The responsibilities of this position would be construction supervision and management. He said if the Committee agrees, he will move forward with an offer to this applicant. There was no objection from the Committee. 3. Public Information Update. David Jurgens distributed documents and information on the project that has been published in the Northwest Arkansas Times. Information is also on the website and will be updated regularly. Alderman Jordan said he would like to have a mechanism for tracking a particular project along the timeline that has been established. For instance, if the start date is in February of 2006 and it is supposed to be completed in December 2006, he would like to see an update at the six- month point that would allow the aldermen to know whether that project is on schedule. David Jurgens said he would start tracking progress and should have that available for the next meeting. In response to a question from Alderman Ferrell, Mr. Jurgens said the dates on the remaining un -bid projects are based on the funding becoming available in the first week of November, which is the time line for sales tax, proceeding with RLF and talking to Arkansas Natural Resources to get funding from them. If anything changes, it will be reflected on the time line. 4. Sanitary Sewer Rehabilitation Proqect Update. a. Basin 1-5,18 & 19 Sewer Rehabilitation Construction. David Jurgens said T -G Excavating is on schedule and doing very well on this project. 113 West Mountain 72701 (479)521-7700 (479)575-8257(Fax) accessfayetteville.org City Council Water & Sewer Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 Page 5 of 7 b. Farmington Area. David Jurgens said the final design is underway on this project. There is going to be a limit on the number of dollars we will spend on this rehab and that will be incorporated into the design documents. They will design the entire project but we will execute only up to a designated dollar amount, as per our mediation agreement with Farmington. c. Insituform Term Contract Renewal. David Jurgens said he has not gotten this contract done. 5. OMI Budaet Modifications. David Jurgens said this is a follow-up in capturing some of the information Billy Ammons from OMI put out in their annual presentation to the Council. The sludge volume has continued to increase. We now have one wastewater plant doing the work of what we had expected to be two plants. They are doing a greatjob but it is challenging on the plant. When you get to a certain point the biological process can't treat any more so you have to use chemicals to supplement the process. When you add alum and/or polymer chemicals you add volume and mass which produces more sludge. It is possible there may be a contract amendment coming forward for this year because of increased costs due to increased volume. The 2007 budget will be increased during the budget process to allow for the increased loadings. In response to a question from Alderman Cook, Billy Ammons said he doesn't think much has changed since he made the presentation to the Council. Alderman Jordan said he understood there was a 16% increase from 2004 to 2005. He asked if there will be an additional 16% for 2006. Billy Ammons said that would be the case if the increased loadings were to continue at the same pace. He said there is a fluctuation every month so it is difficult to say what might occur. At this point the increase appears to have leveled off over the past couple of months but it would be hard to say if it will level off for the entire period. If the loadings continue to increase at the same level as from 2004 to 2005, the plant would be treating organic waste at higher rates than it was designed for. That has been done four out of the six months so far this year. In response to a question from Alderman Jordan, Mr. Ammons said that over the last quarter the plant is basically at 100% organic loading. He said the plant is still performing very well and still producing effluent that meets standards. They have had to incur some additional costs to make that happen and he wants the Council to be aware that there will be an increase in the budget for next year. But since there is one plant doing what two were supposed to do, it is still millions of dollars less per year than what was originally budgeted. He said they anticipate being able to operate the plant sufficiently to prevent any sort of enforcement action being required by the State. That is not to say that we will have zero permit violations, although the plant has not had any for three to four years. There was some further discussion regarding the operations costs and budgeting issues. There was also discussion about how the added loading could affect the Noland plant over the next two years. 113 West Mountain 72701 (479)521-7700 (479)575-8257(Fax) accessfayetteville.org City Council Water & Sewer Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 Page 6 of 7 Alderman Jordan said he would like to keep a handle on the situation and asked that the Committee be updated in the next few months. 6. Slud2e Tractor/Trailer Purchase. David Jurgens said we have known that we would have to purchase a sludge tractor and trailer for the new plant. Staff would like to purchase it now as the sludge volume remains high at the Noland plant and the trailer would be put to use immediately. A bid will be coming forward to the Committee within the next few weeks. 7. Superior Industries Impacts. David Jurgens said the Committee is probably aware that Superior Industries has reduced production. This has an impact on water and sewer, including a reduction of demands on the pipes (water and sewer). It also reduces revenue for both water and sewer. We don't have a firm idea yet of how much we will be affected since the plant has been observing its regular 4 th of July shutdown for the past two weeks. 8. Water Transmission Sume Tank Paintini! Contract. David Jurgens said this is the surge tank on the 36" and 42" transmission lines which is on Fitzgerald Mountain in Springdale. It hasn't been painted in about 30 years and needs to be. That bid will probably be coming forward next month. 9. Farmin2ton Contract and WSIP Status Update. David Jurgens said the preliminary engineering report is due by the end of this month. We are approaching some decision points in the Farmington negotiations. In order to meet the timeline of tying in the Farmington wastewater system to the new West Side plant when it comes on line, we are looking at being able to bid the project in March 2007. The final design must begin within the next few months in order to be ready to do this. The preliminary engineering, with cost estimates, is due by the end of the month. The project consists of three primary components. One is the transmission line within Farmington, which is at capacity right now. All of the transmission lines were being sized for ultimate buildout of the existing city limits. It involves the pumping station at the west end of Farmington. Farmington owns both of these components. The project also involves the force mains from the pumping station to the new plant site. The financial responsibility will be 80% for Farmington based on flow going through the system, with 20% responsibility for Fayetteville. Staff will be letting Farmington know that we are reaching a decision point on how they are going to fund their portion. Gary Dumas said the ultimate issue is that we are reaching the point where a decision has to be made on the Farmington lift station. Though timing is not critical now, it will become critical soon. So we probably need to jump start that decision making process. In response to a question from Alderman Cook, David Jurgens said they would like to have an answer in September so a final design contract can be awarded. We included basic Farmington design per the master facilities plan in the RJN contract for the West Side plant. We gave orders for a preliminary design again last fall with a final report expected by the end of this month. But 113 West Mountain 72701 (479)521-7700 (479)575-8257(Fax) accessfayetteville.org City Council Water & Sewer Meeting Minutes July 11, 2006 Page 7 of 7 we expanded the scope of that preliminary design because we are evaluating what to do if Farmington makes the decision not to build the lift station and not to fund any of the work inside Farmington. Therefore, there will be a budget adjustment coming forward for the final design. Part of that will be a Fayetteville cost and part a Farmington cost. So if the decision is made in September and the final design can be done in six months, we would be pretty much on schedule to bid the contract in March. Alderman Cook said there are several decisions to be made and he would like to make that a focus of a meeting fairly soon. Gary Dumas said he thinks the critical issue is the 5,000 to 7,500 population. Everything after that will more easily fall into place. David Jurgens said using the census numbers when they officially come out, he will attempt to calculate what we realistically think we can treat with both plants on line. He hopes to have those numbers within two weeks. 10. Schedulin2 the Next Water/Sewer Committee Meetin . The next W/S Committee meeting was scheduled for 4:30 p.m. Thursday, July 27, 2006 with the focus to be discussion of Farmington population and associated issues. Additions to Agenda David Jurgens said he got an e-mail request this morning to do some minor adjustments to the water service territory map between Fayetteville and Springdale. The request is for an adjustment in the area of Clear Creek in Johnson where a golf course and subdivision has gone in Johnson. The area was granted to Springdale a few years ago. Mr. Jurgens said he hasn't had time to evaluate the request but a recommendation from staff will probably be coming forward soon for Council action. Ron Petrie informed the Committee that the 24" water line replacement on Custer and Morningside is out for bid. Bids will be opened July 26, which will allow it to be on the City Council agenda on August 15. Alderman Cook adjourned the meeting. 113 West Mountain 72701 (479)521-7700 (479)575-8257(Fax) accessfayetteville.org