we got everybody we'll call the utility service board regular meeting or September 8th to order and
our first order of business is petitions and communications any any input from the public petitions
communications well I'll just remind everyone that CBU's mission is to enhance the quality of life in our
community by providing safe, sustainable, and high-quality drinking water, wastewater, and stormwater
services in a cost-effective manner, promoting public health, economic vitality, and environmental
stewardship. And our vision is that the City of Bloomington Utilities will be the leading municipal
water utility organization in Indiana. Okay, the first item on our agenda then next is
the approval of minutes for the previous meeting of August 24th. We're gonna have a chance to take a
look at the minutes. Are we good with those? Moved and seconded to approve the minutes of last meeting.
Any other discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right, meeting minutes are approved, thank you.
Next is approval of claims and we'll start with standard invoices in the amount of $1,349,577.70. A
chance for everybody to take a look at claims. A chance to review those. Any questions on claims?
been moved and seconded to approve standard invoices all in favor say aye opposed all right motion carries
and then utility bills are next for August 27th of nine thousand five hundred sixty seven dollars and
eighty one cents that's a short one
All right, moved and seconded, approve the August 27th utility bills. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed?
All right, utility bills for the 27th are approved. Next is utility bills for September the 3rd in the
amount of $184,207.73. Any questions on those bills?
Number third. Second. Great, moving to second for the utility bills. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed?
All right, next then with that motion carried then the next is wire transfers in the amount of $633,206.26.
Questions on the wire transfers? I move that we approve the wire transfers.
seconded to approve the wire transfers all in favor say aye opposed all right the wire transfers are
approved and then next is customer refunds and the amount of one thousand three hundred twenty four
dollars and thirteen cents pretty routine there any questions on those
Okay. Are there two different things here, or are they all part of the same? I think it's all part of
the same. It's just the... Because they both say 9-11. I think just the way the page cut it, it cut
them in half. I see, yeah. The total's the same. Yes. Approve customer refunds. Second. It's been moving
in a second. Approve customer refunds.
All in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right. Refunds are approved. Next is the consent agenda. Agenda.
Good evening. I'm Catherine Sager, utilities director, and I'm presenting tonight's consent agenda,
totaling $51,039.62.
The first contract is with Evoqua Water Technologies LLC for $20,420 for a travel water screen at Monroe
Water Treatment Plant. Next is with Aquatic Informatics Inc. for $9,269.62 for WIM software license
and support at all CBU plants.
Next is with Marshall Security LLC for $10,000 for encampment cleanup at Winston Thomas. Next is with
Affordable Fencing for $11,350 to replace damaged fence and gate at Monroe Water Treatment Plant. Is
there any member who wishes to consider one or more of these items individually? Yes. I would like to
discuss the cleanup of the encampment with Marshall Security.
I had a question about that. And then also, just additional explanation about A, I'd just like to know
more about it. I had A and C on my list, please. Excellent. OK. So let's see. Let's see. Is there any
others that people would like to consider individually?
Anything else? So I guess then we'll approve B and C. B and D. B and D, excuse me. Okay. So with the
exceptions of A and C, if there is no opposition to B and D, these items will be approved as recommended
by staff. Hearing no opposition,
items B and D on the consent agenda are approved. I'll start with A. It's first. Thank you, Kat. So
with the travel water screen, can you tell us more about what that exactly does and where does it go?
How does it travel? Yeah, so that's a great question. So what this is is a contract with divers to travel.
to the bar screen, so they will be underwater to do repairs and inspections on our bar screen at the
intake tower. So the screen is not moving? No. So people are traveling to the screen? I had the same
question earlier. Okay, different thing in my mind. That's why I wanted to talk about it. Okay. Hector
could actually give much better explanation. Oh, thank you, Hector.
these operations, so that is to, we have a travel, we have a screen that actually rotate, we call it
the bar screen also. They go like three different levels based on the intake, is that that, or this
is different? No, those are different. Okay. This is just to remove every debris,
material that is floating in the surface of the water so it won't damage any pump or anything. So we
have screens that they just rotated and one of them in the chain link, one of them is kind of jumping
the sprocket. The only way that we are able to do it is sending divers down there. Evoco was the company
that we used to install
Evoco is the manufacturer of the travel screen, so they are going to send their divers to inspect and
see what is wrong.
time to ask about since we're talking about our water I'm going to so Kat I feel like you just took
a deep breath so you know where I'm headed okay it's that time of year when it's hot and it hasn't rained
for a long time and so like are we seeing increase in algae growth and the other things that can affect
the aesthetic taste of our water I do plan on having a moment during new business to address some of
those seasonal concerns
can do, huh? No. OK. I just wanted to check. It will be fun, you know, getting the soup. And the tanks.
That would be great for a Christmas party. Send Frank out there with the cameras. I want to see it.
Actually, I think that would be kind of cool. Thank you. Let's see what suits the Kleindorfers,
don't they? Your question first on C.
Oh, it's me? Okay. Do you have to approve this one first? Yes. Moved and seconded to approve evoke a
water technologies contract for $20,420. All in favor say aye.
Opposed? All right, motion carries. Now, the last one. Tell me what's happening at Winston Thomas.
Oh yeah, so it says encampment cleanup at Winston Thomas. So there has historically been encampments
that show up along Clear Creek. We share a property border with the city, specifically the Parks Department.
along the, what is the name of the trail there? There's a trail. I'm blanking on the name of the trail.
The rail trail there, yes. And so we were notified that there was an encampment on our side of the property
that has been, so the city will do the eviction notice and work with providers to get people out of
the encampment
But because it's on our property, we need to do the cleanup of that afterwards. And that's what this
is for. Michael? How close is the encampment area to the new building site? Far, but it's not next door.
Other side of the creek. Yeah. It's on the creek north of where the building would be built. Yeah.
Yeah. Did Marshall take care of things like the bio waste and the sharps and things like that? They
haven't done it yet. We have to. Because sometimes that requires a separate contract to do that level
of cleanup because it's bio remediation at that point. That was the system you called out in the agreement.
It's not? Yeah.
The same company, though, that monitors our parks and then they do other right for for other encampments
as well. Right. That's what I was going to say. They've done cleanups for other encampments for the
city as well. I know that we clean this site in twenty twenty four. Internally, I don't think it was
the exact same site, but we had another site that was that was up north a little further north of this
one. I feel I think.
Well, it was still on our property in the same parcel. I believe it might have even been south of where
this one was identified. I was thinking one of it's up by Patterson that we had to clean up as well.
Oh, that was another one as well that we assisted with. So we can assist with like brush removal, things
like that, as long as I don't want our staff members to ever have to exit equipment. And that's why we're
doing this through a contract with Marshall, it's just not in the job descriptions of our crews to be
out cleaning up these encampments. As you mentioned, Kat, you mentioned that the city is taking care
of the eviction. Has that taken place already or are they? I believe so, yes. That is taking place,
so now we're left to clean it up. Okay, I just wanted it on the record as far as a cost that,
this continuing issue with the city is costing our, not only, it's costing our rate payers to clean
this up. So thank you. And I do appreciate us not utilizing staff for this. It is, having seen some
of these things get cleaned up, it is, we need the trained professionals in this area to clean it up,
and I don't, I would not wanna see our staff put it at any risk, so thank you.
then in spending $10,000 to clean up the site again, then what are we gonna do so it doesn't become
another encampment? And just to refresh my knowledge, so if we're thinking about the property and then
it's the creek and on the west side of the creek is the trail, correct? Okay, so what's our ownership
Is the entire creek as part of our property? Does it lead up to the creek and then the creek and the
trail is the city's property? Where is that line? Let me pull it up real quick. Thank you. We do have
most of the creek as I think in our property. I don't want to misspeak.
So, yes, it looks like the creek is almost entirely in our property. From, you know, the north end of
the Winston-Thomas property to the south end, yeah. I'm just thinking, like, I don't know how big of
a fence would make a difference. I don't know. I mean, I know that'd be another expense, too, but I
feel like just mitigating this size, cleaning it up,
and then it's just gonna happen again. I think there's less likely to be another encampment once there's
more activity in that area, like once the building is built. It's the activity that will decrease the
likelihood of additional encampments. I don't know if fences would be particularly effective. Right.
Did you say this is the second time we've had to clean this up, or did I not? This is the second encampment
that I'm aware of that we've had to clean up at this site.
and that one was also, was that one also about $10,000? That one we had some, that one we were still
working, it was the beginning of the administration, we were working with the city to try to partner
to clean up, but now we have more of a kind of a protocol. Okay, thank you. That involves contracting
outside. Any other questions about the, oh yeah.
So, like, can... not to, like, do light pollution for... because I know we have, like, neighbors that
live in that area, but are there any lights that we can put up or something that maybe would deter folks
from being in there even when we have construction going on? Will that part of the land be, you know,
cleared of... I don't know how dense it is, like, with trees and shrubs and things,
So one of the plans for our service center, so if we're primarily concerned with the service center
area, one of the aspects of that is that we would want to clear the invasives in that area in the riparian
zone as good stewards of the creek, as being environmental leaders,
But an added benefit is that there would be less cover that is more prone to having encampments. Yes.
Okay. That site runs, I don't know how long that would be, even though we're only building on what half
of the property. So is that something we would clear the length of our property or consider? It's something
worth considering.
Currently, we were only looking at the site plan for the Winston-Alma School Center. Thank you.
All right. Any other discussion on that contract? We're ready then to vote. I move that we approve the
contract with Marshall Security. Second. Moved and seconded to approve the contract with Marshall Security.
All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed?
All right. Motion carries. Next is number six on our agenda to request approval of the service agreement
with Commonwealth Engineers Incorporated. Good evening, Phil Peden engineering. So this contract is
to do some work out at Griffey and with the dam. We do a
or we have it performed a biannual inspection of the dam. It's required for any high hazard dam through
the DNR. So we do that each year. That engineer provides us with a set of recommendations as part of
that report. Some of those are maintenance and we send crews out, the green team with environmental
to clear woody vegetation from the dam or the concrete spillway.
But there were some other aspects of this report that actually required some professional help, primarily
the outlet control and the design of the primary outlet. And so the engineer recommended that we have
that reviewed and make sure that it passes what they call the probable maximum flood. And so that's
one of those storms that's above the 100 year.
wanting to verify that the capacity is there within that primary spillway of the Griffey Dam. So that's
the major component of this contract, but some of the other components are going through the emergency
action plan, doing a tabletop exercise to make sure we walk through that in case there's emergency,
what do we do, and kind of running us through that
just a tabletop exercise, so we're doing it, it's a mock emergency, basically, to see if we can perform
what's in the EAP. Be happy to answer any questions, but that's what this contract's for. So they would
do the assessment of the emergency spillway, is that what you're saying? And then provide, we've got
an emergency action plan for that already, right?
Right, so they're gonna update it? They're gonna update that and they'll walk us through a tabletop
exercise where we perform that in a mock scenario and then make sure the staff understands how to operate.
Yes, thank you. The tabletop scenario then would be the activation of the emergency spillway or the
failure of the dam.
Well, actually the emergency action plan lays out multiple scenarios. So okay, this level of incident
is just where it overtops the primary spillway. And then when there's a breach of the dam, you know,
some other level where it's going to inundate the entire area below the floodplain. So they're gonna
update that inundation map which shows what happens if there's a breach. And my understanding is we'll
go through each one of those
of emergencies that could occur. We've done that before. Yes. We do it for lemon. No. Because that's
the conservancy district correct, but we still. We still own it. Yes, they maintain that and they're
the ones that they they are the ones that acquire the biannual inspection reports for that and then
perform the
emergency action plan exercises for that. That is done for lemon. I assume so. They have that responsibility.
Is there a requirement for us through state or Corps of Engineers or something to do this or? Well,
it ends up in that when you submit your biannual report
then they follow up and say, OK, we've read your report. Thank you for submitting it. You must do all
these recommendations to be in compliance. So whatever you put in your report, they basically accept
that, and then it's a requirement. Who gets the report? It's submitted to DNR. DNR. OK. This might be
an offshoot of Kirk's question. So with Griffey, though, Parks
We own it, but parks may, no. What's parks deal with Griffey? Parks, okay, so like, so we have no agreement
with parks for it? I mean, they have like the boathouse and access. We have an out of date MOU that
needs to be renewed with parks. Okay. I know, well that was what I was trying to get at because if the
conservancy
you know, does this part for Lake Lemon, then, you know, but okay. But Seth said that's for another
day. Okay. Okay. Other questions on this service agreement?
seconded. Any other discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right. Motion carried. Next
is number seven on the agenda requesting approval of a service agreement with CDS engineers. Hi there.
Kevin White, Capital Projects Coordinator.
Yes, this is for a professional engineering services including design bidding construction phase for
upgrades to an existing 10 inch sanitary sewer This is the old fell iron location. So there's a new
development that's Proposed to be going in there. They will be updating their sewer through that site
and this contract will allow
a CDS to start design to extend that sewer upgrade further south to Seventh Street. There's been some
ongoing overflows on Fairview and this should help eliminate that while also providing additional capacity
in the future. Contract amount is for $143,700 and it's roughly 1,200 feet of 10 inch pipe that will
need to be upsized to
I believe 15 inches is what they're calling out. Happy to answer any questions. It is for design, yes.
Where does that development areas stop in? Their site is just southwest of the beeline at 10th St and
it will go about a half a block and then into Rogers and that's where we will pick up.
And future design, it may go further down, straight down Rogers. That's not how it currently goes. It
currently goes down and jogs over east one block and then comes down to seventh. I'm blanking on the
name of that road. I forgot to look that one up today. But the design, you know, they may follow that
same route. They may say that it's more feasible to go straight down Rogers with the larger pipe. It's
still yet to be determined.
Okay, any questions for Kevin? All right. I move that we approve the contract with CDS Engineers. Second.
It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right, motion carries.
Thanks Kevin. Thank you. Next is requesting approval for an on-call service agreement with Bledsoe,
Rigert, Cooper and James Incorporated.
I think Brian's name's on there, but I said he could be excused since I did this one the last time.
This is, again, Philippine Engineering, but this is the same as what we had a couple weeks ago where
we used Eric Deckard. We just want multiple options. What you'll find on the survey world is that you
get to doing some research on a piece of property and you realize that Eric Deckard did a survey next door
He's got information about that property, those property corners, he can help with this property. If
you find BRCJ did a survey over here, that might be helpful. And in them performing the survey for us
at a lower cost also gives us flexibility on availability. So those are the reasons why we've went with
several different options. And again, another reputable survey company here locally.
Any questions? I know it was brought up during the Winston Thomas discussion. So would BRCJ, about the
100 to 500 year floodplain, is that something that would be coming as its own contract or an extension,
and that would not be part of on-call services? Absolutely. And they're sub-consultant under Champlain's
contract already.
and James. It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right motion carries
thank you Phil. Next is requesting approval of the service agreement with Barnes and Thornburg. So as part of
the most recent water rate case, we did get approved to do some bonding for the water utility. So we
chose to engage Barnes and Thordberg to be our bond counsel for that bond issue. Questions then? Matt,
how much does this cover for us with Barnes? Well, bond counsel can get complicated.
Do we expect that, you know, this gives us so many hours worth of their services, or will we need another?
Yeah, there's not to exceed on it. So if it goes above that, then we'll have to come back, but I don't,
there's nothing that's come up in any meeting I've had about the bond that would suggest there's gonna
be any weird issues going out with it. Okay, I don't know if that answers your question or not. No,
that's good. Just to clarify this,
water that includes the sewer bonds. No, this is only water. Thank you. Okay. And we've used them before,
right? Yeah. I know that we approve the contract for a professional service agreement with Barnes and
Thornburg. It's been duly moved and seconded. Any other discussion?
All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right, motion carries. Next is requesting approval of resolution
2026-15 to designate surplus property for auction or worthless surplus. Yes, this is our monthly cleanup.
We have a few items. Looks like there's some lab equipment, then a trailer, and then also a dozer that
we would like to try to auction off.
discussion or questions? Ready to roll. I move that we approve resolution 2026-16. Moved and seconded.
Any other questions, discussion? All in favor say aye. Opposed? All right. Surplus property it is. Is
there any old business from the board? Old business from the board? Old business from staff?
Okay, new business from the board. I'll say one thing real quick. So I had a water main break in my
neighborhood Friday afternoon. The crews were out there working hard in the hundred degree heat getting
it taken care of. I was
out for the evening, and when I got home, I noticed that my address was not listed as one that was under
a boil order, so I called in to ask the on-call center, and they were able to give me all the information
to know that my water was safe, and had any questions, I could call right back, so I just wanted to
thank everyone who was on that job Friday night, and I know that happens every day across our community,
so thank you again to our folks out there working. Well, okay, I know they're out there
working in the heat every day, and people are calling the center every day about something. So how about
that? That's fair. That's right. That's a good observation. Thank you. Let's see, any other new business
from staff? Yes. So I just wanted to let the board know that we have been receiving more customer reports
about some discolored water.
And so we encountered this last year, if you may remember, around the same time of year. And so the
change in this water, it's related to the seasonal conditions at Monroe Reservoir and the combination
of that and the adjustments that we're making at the water treatment plant to maintain effective treatment
while also managing disinfection byproducts or DBPs.
As these reservoir conditions change, CBU can draw water from different depths of the lake.
Like we discussed, we have the different levels of the gates. The current conditions of the lake have
required us to draw from a lower gate where you're gonna have naturally occurring manganese be a little
more prevalent. That's what is resulting in that water discoloration.
And so we have had crews flushing over the holiday weekend and today. So today, just today, we've flushed
over 35 hydrants in an effort to mitigate the impact that this is having to our customers. We've also
taken samples throughout the distribution system.
And all of those samples taken today were within all applicable EPA health advisory levels. We've also
just this evening put out a press release. We were waiting on those samples to come back to make sure
that we could make that statement. And so, yeah, you'll probably see that press release in social media
or wherever you get your news. I'd be happy to take any questions if you have any.
I decided to bring this to Cat's attention over the weekend and encouraged her to bring it up. The water
is safe to drink, it's a little discolored right now in some places a little bit more than others. The
one thing I do wanna say, at least in my area, is thankfully we haven't had the dirt taste in the water
this time of year, so knock on wood.
That's been good, but I do appreciate you getting the press release out. There's been a lot of, I should
say a lot, I've seen several things on social media of people taking pictures of their water and making
comments, so I thought it was very important for her to address this, and we need to get a little bit
more in front of it, so thank you. Absolutely. As soon as we can get information out, when we start
to see social media starting to bubble,
so to speak, that we need to get word out as fast as we can if there's a problem. Because I'll tell
you what, the rumors just go crazy. And people, you know, they start all the, well, here we are living
in Flint, Michigan stuff, and that's just wrong. But it's on us to get the word out that you're good.
Even though things may look a little different,
quality that are, it is safe to drink. And if we, as long as they realize they can trust us to do that
as fast as we can and tamp those things down, sometimes maybe it's even better to do it before we get
the latest test. We can say, here we are, we're, you know, give them as much as we can, as soon as we
can, and then keep going.
Absolutely, and you know it is a fine line between putting out kind of a more vague press release versus
one that can truly assure our customers that the levels that we have in our samples are below that EPA
health advisory level. I think statements like that, I feel confident in saying after we've had our
data. So sometimes it may take a little more time than how rapid social media kind of is. We're in a
very rapid news landscape.
And so I try not to let that very rapid news landscape dictate how quickly we respond to make sure that
we are responding correctly. It's not a bad idea for us to remind folks about our water supply. There's
probably a significant number of our customers who don't even know that we get our water from the lake.
And for some people that
that are familiar with bad lakes, that's not always a good thing. Then they're more suspicious. Well
water obviously has a different makeup than lake water. But on the positive side, our lake water is
unusually good. And when we compare it with other places, like the amount of, what is it, PFAS, is that level?
where there is more of that leaching into an aquifer, we don't have that problem because of the way
the watershed is with the lake. But we have different challenges. But the trick for us is to figure
out how to mitigate those challenges and we're doing that as pretty good as best we can. But it's different
as the year
goes around, and that's hard to explain to people. But it's not bad for us to remind folks now and then
that we're in pretty good shape. Absolutely, and that our water source tends to have seasonal changes.
Yeah. Unlike groundwater. Wouldn't you say we've made strides on that in the past couple of years, adjusting,
learning that the lake makeup changes? Absolutely.
We haven't always done the different levels of intake, right? No, actually exploring using these different
gates is a relatively newer tool in our toolbox, one that we had not been using before. This allows
us to manage the DBPs a lot better than we had had the ability to before.
issue that's happening now is because you're taking water from a lower level, and if it was being taken
from a higher level, then you would have the algae issue. Correct. So it's a trade off. Yes. It is a
trade off. Absolutely. So this is the first summer that you've taken it from that, no? No. Last summer
as well. Correct. When you received the calls, because I didn't notice that,
but I maybe now think I did notice it at school, I wonder. And so are you able to kind of like, you
have these pockets of areas that people are calling from or is it just sporadic all over the community?
We've been mapping all of the reports that we've been receiving to try to identify if there are kind
of like hot spots for it and where we can target our flushing. Have there been a pattern to it or is
it just sporadic? I think,
if I'm remembering the report from this morning correctly, is that we've mostly been seeing it on the
southeast side. I mean, this looks great. It tastes great, too. Does that distribution also happen with
the algae? If it was algae-flavored water, would we still be seeing a distribution like hot spots in
certain places?
There when it comes to the taste and odor compounds varying sensitivities to them. Yeah. Well, thanks
Kat for that report. Any other new business from staff or board? Take a minute to congratulate our staff
on I didn't recognize them as a silver tier.
with their Clint community program, recognized by the state. I've talked about this a couple times.
When I sat in on a couple meetings about a year ago, there was no other community higher than Silver,
so I don't know if that's changed, but I know we're near the top, if not at the top, so a lot
of congratulations, and I know there's a lot of talk about this current drinking water, but we are the premier
utility in the state. So thanks to the staff and congratulations. Great. Thanks for bringing it up.
Good job. Good point. All right. Anything else? We did have a subcommittee that met this evening at
this afternoon at four o'clock the property and planning subcommittee and we discussed the possibility
of continuing our design work for a new utilities service center.
at the Winston Thomas site. We discussed that there is about $41 million in bonding authority available.
That might not be enough to take care of the entire project. We reviewed the conceptual designs that
have been completed over the last couple of years, and we agreed that staff would continue to work with
contractors to get an update on what we expect the current cost would be if we decide to move forward
and come back to us for another property and planning subcommittee meeting on October the 5th. Anything
else that I missed there for those attending? Okay, there's subcommittees now.
And there's staff reports. Yeah. We have some folks we'd like to welcome to the utility. First we'd
like to welcome Mike Axum, Kyle Wilson, and Riley Perdue in TND who have all joined us as utility
specialists. We'd also like to welcome Graham McKean. As our hazardous material coordinator. Some of
you might know from his former role on the board.
Any other petitions or communications from the public? All right. Seeing none, we will be adjourned
till our next meeting. Thank you.