- call the utility service board meeting of January or July 13th to order. Mission our mission yes the
- CBU mission for city Bloomington utilities is to enhance the quality of life in our community by providing
- safe sustainable and high quality drinking water wastewater and stormwater services and
- in a cost-effective manner promoting public health, economic vitality, and environmental stewardship.
- And our vision for our utility is for it to be the leading municipal water utility organization in Indiana.
- We'll start out with any petitions or communications from the public with us today. I see none, so we'll
- move on to the approval of minutes of our
- meeting of June 29th. Everyone had a chance to take a look at the minutes. All right it's been moved
- and second to approve the minutes. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right the minutes are approved.
- Next is the approval of claims and we have
- Long list of standard invoices. Any questions or discussion for the standard invoices for today?
- All right, ready for a motion then. I move that we approve the standard invoices. Second.
- all right it's been moved and seconded to approve the standard invoices totaling six hundred and seven
- thousand five hundred fifty two dollars and three cents all in favor say aye opposed all right motion
- carries next then is utility bills in the amount of one hundred ninety four thousand three hundred twenty
- six dollars and eighty eight cents any discussion or questions on the utility
- it's been moved and seconded to approve utility bills all in favor say aye opposed all right utility
- bills are approved next is wire transfers in the amount of six hundred sixty two thousand three hundred
- twelve dollars and eleven cents any questions or discussion there the wire transfers
- Moved and seconded to approve wire transfers. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right, the wire
- transfers are approved. Next is customer refunds for a pay date of July 17th. The total on that is $4,535.68.
- customer refunds. Second. It's been moved and seconded to approve customer refunds. All in favor say
- aye. Aye. Opposed? All right customer refunds are approved. Next item on the agenda is the consent agenda
- with four items it looks like totaling twenty two thousand eight hundred eighty one dollars. Good evening,
- James Halls is the director of team
- to present the consent agenda to you this evening totaling $22,881. The first item is Siemens industry
- at $17,459 for a variable frequency drive maintenance at Dillman wastewater plant. The second item is
- for course and fire and security for $4,922.
- That's upgrading the intercom system and adding one and a three year subscription for two devices. And
- then the third is for Young's trucking for $500 for lead paint disposal at Dillman wastewater plant.
- Would any board member like to pull any of these items from the consent agenda and discuss them individually?
- Hearing none, if there are no objections, then the consent agenda will be approved as presented.
- Hearing none, the consent agenda is approved as presented. Very good, thanks James. Our next item then
- is to request approval of the memorandum of understanding between city Bloomington utilities and milestone
- contractors and Chris Wheeler is here to make the presentation.
- Department has learned that in advance of such construction we should do well to run video down through
- our lines to see the condition of our lines so that if any of our lines get damaged we can point to
- those videos and say that our infrastructure is in good shape. If you look at the MOU you can see the
- gist of what we're looking at here is the fact that Milestone did the work. We've had a good relationship
- with Milestone over the years.
- but we thought it was more probable than not that Milestone caused damage to our infrastructure because
- we did video everything after the fact and found that there are a couple of points along the line that
- have damage that appear to be consistent with heavy construction. Our understanding is there hasn't
- been any heavy construction on that road for quite a while. We haven't videoed our infrastructure for
- quite a while, and it's old.
- So it's difficult for us to be able to prove positive and point our finger at Milestone. They can't
- completely say they didn't do it. Litigation would likely be costly and time consuming. And so we've
- reached this MOU, which we have subsequently changed the title to a settlement agreement. The settlement
- allows us to go in and do the work. Milestone will compensate us for half of what we anticipate the
- cost of the work to be.
- which seems like a pretty reasonable solution here. Milestone was also going to provide materials, picking
- those materials up from one of their sites to bring over to First Street when we're working. The only
- issue that remains on the settlement agreement, I haven't been able to get a confirmation from the attorney
- that I've been working with, but Milestone seems to be okay with it in principle, is this idea that
- we're supposed to give 15 days advance notice of the work that we'd like to commence.
- Well, we're going to start tomorrow. So I'm still trying to communicate with the attorney. I haven't
- heard from her specifically, but we have heard from Milestone that they don't care, because we're going
- to be the ones picking up the material. The whole idea was give them 15 days so that they know that
- they can make their delivery, but they're not actually doing the delivery. So I don't think it's an
- issue. I am asking the board to approve the settlement agreement.
- If the 15-day thing becomes an issue, we'll have to work that out, but we're asking for approval of
- the settlement as it is written, which includes the 15-day notification at the time. I'm happy to answer
- questions. Yeah, Chris, I'm just curious what the original project was with Milestone and CBU. Well,
- there wasn't an original project with Milestone. Oh, I understand. Milestone was working with the city,
- with the engineering department,
- to reworking of the road itself. So they took the cap off of the road, all the asphalt, whatever materials,
- did reworking of the road, relayed asphalt and whatever else goes on. But our suspicion was that once
- they removed that protective layer of the road and then drove heavy equipment around it, likely they
- damaged our infrastructure.
- The agreement was with city engineering, not our engineering. Okay, I got it. Thank you. It's still
- a good lesson learned. When a city's doing work and we know they're going to be working over some of
- our infrastructure, we ought to be looking at it in advance so that when something happens, we're able
- to show a timeline that shows clean and healthy and then damaged. How did the damage show itself?
- that we ran through the line after the fact and found areas that are dimpled where we can't get the
- camera through, which suggests that sewage isn't gonna flow properly either. So did we know it because
- sewer wasn't flowing and that's why we did the videos? We just did it as a matter of... I think we just
- did it as a matter of to check it at the end to see what make sure that it was okay.
- There was no leak, there was no... No, there's no flow on there right now. You know, I understand. So
- it would be difficult to prove in court, is what I'm saying. If there was a clear, they're there, they're
- doing construction, and all of a sudden there's a main break, that would be easy.
- Yeah, I got it. I got it. So then thinking about all these construction projects that we have going
- on around town, what constitutes like we're going to go check our line because we know this isn't to
- anticipate this is going to be having work nearby or what out of what? Yes. Yeah, I think like what
- Chris was saying, when they start removing, well, depends on where they're removing that
- cap layer of asphalt and other surfacing material. Like on Second Street, they're doing a lot of that
- work, but they're over on the edge. They're not over top of our sewer, but that's something we should
- consider even because there's a lot of trucks moving in and out of there, right? So I think that's kind
- of the threshold that we're at is what kind of work is going to take place? How much of that top layer
- of pavement and surfacing material will be removed? And then when's the last video?
- Right, if we have a video that's two years old, okay, maybe we don't have to go out there. But if it's
- 10 years old, then we should probably. How do we get notified of the projects? I guess I don't think
- about like projects that affect our lines that we're not doing. So we have a lot of internal meetings
- with the other departments with engineering and DPW. Is that monthly?
- monthly meetings and we kind of talk about projects that are coming up in areas that we're going to
- be at. If that's time you'll know oh we got to go check this site. They have timelines usually like
- look we're looking to start construction in this date or this time and so have we done any of these
- checks since? Had a project yet that just came up yeah that met that kind of level again that second
- street was close because they are removing you know partial
- parts of the road, but it wasn't over top of our sewer, so. I understand this, and I know you said that
- we'll be doing the work, but it will be our crews and not a contractor. Correct, yeah, we'll be doing
- it. And then the street department will be milling and repaving the road. So it looks like there's some
- substantial additional
- that we're gonna be doing here besides this reimbursement? Most of it is in there. $40,000, yeah. The
- milling and repaving that kind of came after we came up with this number from downtown asking us since
- the road is fairly new, that's kind of the standard is that if you are going to cut into a road that's
- less than three years old,
- you'll mill the whole thing and and repave it. So that was kind of factored in afterwards. Those quantities,
- though, of of surfacing material is included in there that we ask that we're asking milestone to provide.
- So we're just providing the labor for that. Good. Any other questions for our attorney or staff?
- discussion? All right. I move that we approve the memorandum of or the settlement agreement between
- the CBU. I move and second to approve the MOU between CBU and Milestone. All in favor say aye. Aye.
- Opposed? All right. Motion carries. Okay.
- Is there any old business from the board? Old business from staff? Yeah, I'll go ahead and bring this
- up. We had talked about the rate case and sorry, James Hall, Assistant Director of TND. We just wanted
- to officially announce that August 1st, August 1st, the rate will be implemented for the customers at
- their new rates, depending on what kind of customer class they are.
- looking forward to all the projects that we're able to do with that rate increase and the support of
- our community to see the betterment of our utility. I know that we've had some public announcement and
- that sort of thing about what we'll be using some of the new funds for. Are we inserting anything into
- the monthly bills
- talk about why this is important what kind of projects will be taken on not everybody reads the city
- news releases unfortunately but I don't know if we've had planned on doing that but that's something
- we can do we can look at kind of overall like how much money we think we're gonna spend at the water
- plant how much money we project to spend on water main replacement those are kind of big numbers from
- the CIP that we could easily
- and put in a, you know, in the memo of the bill and fit in there. Yeah. Or a separate printed insert
- like we do. I know it's kind of short notice, but we're, I don't know, you guys might be thinking about
- that already, but when people see a jump in their bill, they want to know why. And like I say, they
- may not be following social media or the news releases or whatever, but they will see their monthly bill
- And I feel confident that the kinds of things we're going to be doing with the rate increase are things
- that they're interested in. We're going to maintain a safe water supply. We're going to make improvements
- to the plan. We're going to make improvements to our transmission distribution system. If we can get
- into some of those specifics, we're not getting into the technical details, but, you know, five or six points
- That helps soften the blow a bit. Transparency like that just builds trust for a public entity. Yeah,
- I think we can definitely put a letter together, like an insert letter with some of the capital improvement
- projects at the plant and within the distribution and transmission system. It can be as simple as one
- of those little one-third, eight-and-a-half by elevens that fits into the envelope. You don't want a
- whole fold over with
- All of that, that's more than they'll read probably. But you can put that detail on the website. Even
- it's just as simple as saying go to the website to see how your dollars are going to be at work and
- put it out there. You can do that too. There are a lot of folks who, I was dealing with a group the
- other day and half of them didn't have email addresses. Some of our older customers.
- Which is okay. They just communicate differently, but yeah. Our job is to communicate is reach the customer
- where we can. Thanks for the update, James. Any other old business? Okay, new business from the board.
- This might be the time for it. Yeah, we've got a change in our board.
- Yes. So David Hiddle, who had been the city of Bloomington planning and transportation director, has
- taken a new position in North Carolina and we didn't get a chance to wish him well. At his last meeting
- with us two weeks ago, he served with us on our utility service board for the last two plus years and
- been a valuable contributor with his expertise. And so we all certainly wish him well in his new endeavors
- and we'll miss having him with us. Thank you.
- I appreciate that. I'm glad we're able to get that in the record. Thanking David for his service to
- the board and to the city. Thank you. Any new business from staff? Oh, wait. Sorry. I had one more question.
- Okay. I'm sure I'm not going to pronounce it right. This like cyclosporosis. Is that something that
- is measured in our wastewater when we're doing other labs? Okay.
- likely a large produce supplier, given the number of widespread cases, but we do not currently track
- it in our wastewater. It is a reportable illness in Indiana, but it is optional reporting at the federal
- level. Okay, thank you. Should have just looked your way. Appreciate that, Graham. Good question, because
- a lot of folks are interested right now. I'm glad we still monitor our wastewater for all kinds of
- different infections, and that's been a great help to the general public health of the community with
- the practitioners and hospitals and others that are able to keep an eye on what to expect to see. Okay,
- let's see. Did I guess for new business from staff? You good? All right. Subcommittee reports. Yes,
- the Finance Committee met.
- Finance Committee met just before this meeting, and there were two items on the agenda. The first was
- an initial presentation of the 2027 budget, which will, I believe, go before City Council sometime in
- August. Before then, we'll have other meetings to update the proposal. This was just an initial one.
- I'll just give a couple of highlights on the revenue side. The biggest change will be, as was just reported
- a while back, the new water rates. We finally did get approval from the Indiana State Regulatory Commission,
- and everyone will see a slight increase in their monthly water bill.
- On the expense side, there are several new expenses that will be taken into account. The first has to
- do with increases in the cost of gas and power and fuel, and I just can't help making my own
- comment again about that, that I think we all know that the increase in fuel costs of the gas pump are
- due to the never-ending war with Iran. Despite the increases, I just looked before the meeting today
- at the profits of oil companies for the second quarter of 2026.
- And the record-breaking and blockbuster are the adjectives to describe it. So if you have any complaints
- about fuel costs, take it up with your politicians and with your oil companies. The other increase is
- due to a lot of the water main replacements that need to be done.
- I think you're all aware that water mains don't last forever. And if you leave them unattended,
- it ain't good. So we'll be doing a lot of those in 2027. So there'll be an increase in either hirings
- or overtime pay. The second item on the agenda was the quarter one and quarter two results for 2026.
- I think it was good news in the sense that the revenues were slightly increased by about 1% for each
- quarter. The expenses were under what we assumed they would be by 25% in quarter one and 16% in quarter
- two, but it's likely that those expenses will catch up
- in the second and third quarter and the third and fourth quarters. And I think that's about all I have
- to say. Thanks, Jim, for the overview of the Finance Committee. We'll look forward to further discussion
- on the 2027 budget as more things are finalized. Okay, staff reports.
- the first we hired a new heavy equipment operator and in TND his name is Ted Prince it comes to us with
- lots of years of experience and we're excited to have him join our team and then the other thing that
- I have other two things congratulations and also sorrow for our TND department Paul Chastain is retiring
- after 50 plus years with the utility he was a
- Engineering field tech he started our CCTV program the trucks monitoring the sewer and stormwater So
- that would be a big loss for us. He's been in that position for since I think he said 85 I believe somewhere
- near 83 85 and then
- The other person, he will retire on the 24th. So before our next board meeting is Kevin Housel. He's
- one of my direct reports, one of my assistant superintendents. He's been here for over 40 plus years.
- Been a assistant superintendent for close to 20 years. So being on call every six weeks for 20 years.
- I really appreciate everything he's done for us and for the utility and the community. So we had a little
- party for them last Friday.
- I just want to thank both of those gentlemen. They didn't want to come here, but. But that's that's
- all we have for the staff report. I see your do have a advertisement for a new AD, right? Assistant
- Superintendent. Yeah. Yeah. For Kevin's position. Correct. Right. Yeah. Great. Thank you. Any petitions or
- Communications from the public. I don't see any. All right, then we can stand adjourned.