AWWA-MN Water Utility Council

Meeting Minutes - DRAFT

Thursday, March 12, 2009

 

Location:      City Hall, 7100 West 147th St., Apple Valley, Minnesota 55124

 

A.  Roll Call (10:00 am)

In-person attendance:            Bernie  Bullert, Bob Cockriel, Randy Ellingboe, Carol Blommel Johnson, Craig Johnson, Bruce Olsen (MDH - Guest), Laurel Reeves, Bill Schluenz, and Dr. Li Zhang (CDM - Commercial, Consulting, Guest interested in membership).   

 

Via phone attendance:           Doug Lubben, Dennis Martenson, Cliff McClain, Pete Moulton, and Pat Shea.

 

Not present:      Nicole Blasing, Todd Bredesen, Dave Brown, Paul Coone, Chris Elvrum, Steve Fronek, Steve Gleason, Dr. Ray Hozalski, Ruth Hubbard, Bill Janssen, Kurt Johnson, Adam Kramer, Grant Meyer, Dick Nagy, Bob Peplin, Karla Peterson, Doug Rovang, Dave Schultz, Bill Spain, Shahin Rezania, Dr. Michael Semmens, Stew Thornley, and Dave Wagner.

 

B.  Housekeeping - none

 

C.  Approval of Previous Meeting Minutes (Thursday, December 11, 2008, Wenck Associates)

     1.  Page 3 of 4, F.2.d., the name “Cyn” should be “Sinn”.

 

D.  Congress, EPA Update – Bernie had not received anything from Bob Peplin

1.  Randy Ellingboe reported that the Federal Funding Distribution Formula has changed and that they are trying to setup a meeting with Senator Amy Kobuchar to discuss.  (NOTE: Later in the meeting Craig Johnson indicated that there had been a call back from Senator Klobuchar’s office so he expected there would be a meeting in the near future.)  Basically what it appears will happen is the states that have been doing a good job will be penalized by having some of their funding going to the states that have not been doing such a good job.

2.  Cliff McClain reported that he understood 30% of the Drinking Water Fund Stimulus Piece (DWF) would go the Clean Water Fund (CWF), i.e. the State Revolving Funds (SRFs) for the respective programs.  This is due to the fact that there are many less projects in the “pipeline” for DWF as compared to CWF.

 

E.  Legislative Report from LMNC Representative

1. Craig Johnson reported on a great deal of issues that are summarized in the following.

2. Federal Stimulus (aka the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act or ARRA) – a good source of information is on the League of Minnesota Cities web site http://www.lmnc.org/.  On their home page there is a “button” for Federal Economic Stimulus.  This page also has a link to a webinar and slides from a webinar that they conducted on February 27, 2009.

3. PFA update – on March 11 SF 1329 included a change to include 20% from both the DWF and CSF SRFs to fund “green projects” per the ARRA.  A 4 to 5 page US EPA guidance document is due today on this issue at the Federal level.  Up to 30% of the DWF may be transferred to the CWF if there are inadequate DWF projects and this appears to be the case in Minnesota.  A portion of the money must be under contract by June 17, 2009 to be eligible for stimulus funds.  Randy Ellingboe concurred with Craig Johnson on this and added that they would like to know if there are any projects that can meet this time table ASAP.  Bernie Bullert asked about the possibility of Design-Build qualifying as a mechanism to get projects in the funding pipeline earlier.  No one seemed to know the answer, i.e. whether such projects would qualify.  Bernie attended the PFA Board Meeting on Friday, March 6 and said it looked like only projects on the DWF existing IUP list would qualify as projects ready by June 17. 

4. Cliff McClain reported that Moorhead was planning to submit approximately $1,000,000 of water main projects for stimulus funding under the “green project” provisions as saving money since they would save water and energy where losses were occurring in the distribution system.

5. Craig Johnson thought water main projects could be funded as “green projects”.  However, he pointed out that it was necessary to obtain a Federal Number for projects.  He also said it was planned to include an additional 5% grant for all projects, up to 25% for “green projects” and up to 10% for CWF projects.  He also pointed out that the required “Buy American” clause included in the ARRA could be waived by petition if it could be demonstrated that certain parts, etc. were not available from American manufacturers.  He understands that this may be most applicable for CWF projects.

6. SF 1329 provides for some permanent changes, e.g. to permit a 30 year funding period as opposed to the current 20 year funding period.  Bernie Bullert pointed out that AWWA has been requesting this change for many years.

7. Craig Johnson reported that the bill to reinstitute the LCW (Minnesota Legislative Commission on Water) will be introduced by Rep. Hanson but the AWWA-WUC will not be pushing this further this year since there are so many other legislative issues of greater importance.  The plan is to just have it introduced and if someone wants to move it further then that can be done but it is primarily to position this issue for movement in the nest year’s legislative session.

8. HF 952 would add three members to the Board of Water and Soil Resources (BWSR).  There would be two city (one metropolitan and one out-state) and one from a township.

9. HF 1086 was heard on March 11 and includes the requirement to post on a web site all projects being funded from the proceeds of the new 0.375% sales tax that was passed in the November 2008 election.  Security for the water industry is being asked to be added as an eligible category to this legislation.

10. SF 74 which became HF 500 has been pulled from the agenda of bills to be considered in the legislature this year.  This bill would have established standards for recycled water use in Minnesota.  Randy Ellingboe reported that SF 74 basically took information for California’s standards for recycling treated wastewater for crop irrigation.  However, this is not germane to Minnesota due to the different alignment of State agencies and therefore this needs to be better coordinated within the State by the various agencies before it is further considered by the legislature, i.e. there is a need for better regulatory coordination for it to be implemented in Minnesota.  It was also pointed out that the plumbers have also expressed some interest and concern relative to this issue before it is implemented further. Bob Cockriel pointed out that the Metropolitan Council had a study performed a year or so again by Craddock Engineering on wastewater reuse from some of their WWTPs. 

11. Pat Shea reported that St. Cloud is almost through with their design of a 750,000 gpd wastewater reuse project using their WWTP effluent for an industry in their area.  He pointed out that the California Title 22 rules are what he believes might have been being considered for legislation in Minnesota.  Cliff McClain reported that the AWWA Standards Committee is interested in preparing a standard for wastewater reuse since many states are now starting to consider such legislation.  Randy Ellingboe reported that the reuse of stormwater was also on the table.

12. HF 1031 includes some $750,000 for the University of Minnesota Water Resources Center to prepare a State Water Plan.  This would direct some of the WRC efforts from their more global focus to a local focus.  It seemed to be the opinion of some that this is not needed and the question came up as to whether the AWWA-MN WUC might have a position on this?  It was pointed out that there is now a communication plan in place that will permit better coordination of efforts between state agencies to prevent unintended consequences from some actions within the State.

13. New 0.375% sales tax revenue distribution will be one-third to water with a minimum of 25% going to the DWF and of that some $8,000,000 will be added to the Source Water Protection Plan of the State, DNR needs, Emerging Contaminants, etc.

14. Craig Johnson reported that an early solution discussed for the “budget fix” was a formula of one-third from new money, one-third from cuts and one-third by new relief (Stimulus money presumably).  He pointed out that this will include a great deal of political maneuvering in the current session before there is a solution arrived at.

 

 

F.  State Related Water Issues

1.      a. Carol Blommel Johnson just accepted this assignment and did not have anything to report.  Craig Johnson reported that there was a proposal from the Governor’s office, as included in his budget message, to move the EQB to the MPCA.  He believes this will be controversial but may in the end occur since as someone who has been there, i.e. EQB, does not see this as particularly detrimental.

2.      a. Although Ruth Hubbard could not attend today’s meeting since she had a funeral, she reported (see Email dated 3-11-09 to Bernie Bullert attached) that the WARN system had picked up an additional number of members at the Rural Water Conference.  Bob Cockriel reported that an additional seven members were added this past Monday bringing the total to approximately 60.  She also reported that the ARRA will permit them to add some additional staff to MRWA.

b. Randy Ellingboe reported a great deal of what he had planned to report on had been covered in Agenda item E.  However, he reported that there was a great deal of coordination occurring among state agencies currently.  He also reported on a new Fact Sheet that had been prepared by the MDH on Source Water Protection (this is included as an attachment to these minutes). A copy of this was given to legislators also.  He also reported that a virtual center was being established for Emerging Contaminants to consider health effects of them.  He also reported that the MPCA and MDH are working together on the fluorocarbon issue but have not found a lot to-date.  He also reported that there was consideration being given to completing another round of raw water sampling similar to what was done some 25 years ago.  Bob Cockriel expressed concern over the significant advances being made in analytical techniques over the past 25 years and whether the date would be comparable.  Randy Ellingboe explained the primary purpose of obtaining additional sampling and analytical data was not to compare with the past but to obtain current data.  Bruce Olsen also thought that it was important to even have current data on iron and manganese in addition to general water chemistry.  He explained that part of what was driving this was concern over what sources of groundwater might be vulnerable to contamination.

c. Although Chris Elvrum could not attend, Laurel Reeves reported that the Metropolitan Area Master Water Supply Plan is out and the plan is that it will be approved by the end of March (26th is the planned date).

d. Laurel Reeves reported above and did not have anything additional.

e. Although Nicole Blasing could not attend the meeting, she emailed Bernie Bullert a copy of the MPCA Guideline for Land Application of By-Product Limes that she mentioned were being prepared at our December 11, 2008 meeting.

f. Dave Schultz was not in attendance so there was not any report from him.

g. See also 2.a. above for information on WARN (Minnesota Water/Wastewater Agency Response Network).  Cliff McClain reported that he was sending a letter to 62 communities in the Red River Basin to try to obtain additional communities as members of WARN.

h. Bernie Bullert reported that he continues to forward emails from Al Lamm to the WUC membership since Al is continuing on the State Plumbing Board and will keep Bernie informed on issues of interest to the WUC.

i. Although Adam Kramer could not attend, he reported in an email to Bernie Bullert on the Gopher One-Call program.  Ticket volume continues to decline due to the economic conditions.  See attachment for his email that includes the complete report.

j. Dr. Michael Semmens is not at the University during the Spring Semester and his back-up, Dr. Ray Hozalski, could not make the meeting so there was not any report.

k. Bruce Olsen, DNR, was present at the meeting to provide an update on cross-connection control activities.  This is primarily a concern with private wells as opposed to municipal, i.e. public water supply wells.  Communities are interested in a model ordinance for monitoring and controlling such situations, i.e. to prevent such occurrences.  He reported that currently they obtain coordinates for each well drilled.  It was suggested that possibly the well coordinates and/or address for a well could be provided to each community by the MDH and/or DNR when the data is received by them.  Bruce was interested whether the committee would be interested in preparing such a model ordinance.  Bernie Bullert said the AWWA-MN WUC would be interested and a subcommittee could be formed to prepare such a document.  Bob Cockriel said he thought that this would be a worthwhile effort.  Bernie Bullert related his experience at the SPRWS where they used the Building Permit system to obtain data on private wells and categorized them as either for process water (add flow to the sanitary sewer system) or irrigation (does not add flow to the sanitary sewer system).  Bernie wondered how wells that were no longer in use were handled by the DNR, e.g. in St. Paul several businesses that had private wells have closed.  Bruce reported that the DNR has three categories of non-used wells, i.e. 1) use or operate the well; 2) abandon the well in which case they are to be sealed; and 3) keep in a maintenance mode, i.e. available for operation and maintain the well in good condition.  The purpose of these three options is to prevent contamination of an aquifer from an abandoned well.

 

G.        Roster

            Bernie Bullert reported that the roster of members was approved by the Minnesota Section Board.  He also requested that any needed changes to the roster be brought to his attention.  He includes a copy of the latest roster with the Agenda for each meeting and that for this meeting is attached.

 

H.        Fly-In

            Bernie Bullert reported that Cliff McClain, Shahin Rezania and Dave Wagner would attend this March 24-25, 2009 in Washington, DC.  Shahin was trying to setup meeting with Representatives and Senator Klobuchar during their visit but they had not had much success to Cliff’s knowledge to date.

 

I.SRF Discussion

            This subject had been discussed under E. and elsewhere so it was not covered further.

 

J.         Section Strategic Plan

            Bernie Bullert requested input from the committee on the document that he had emailed earlier to all of the committee.  He pointed out that item 5. under Goals and Objectives was the responsibility of the WUC.  A suggestion made at the meeting by Bob Cockriel was to add WARN.  Bernie requested all of the members review and provide input ASAP so he can update and provide to the Board so they can consider in April and approve in May.

 

K.        Other - nothing

           

I.          Next Meeting

            Second Thursday in June 2009 (11th) at the Bloomington Public Works Facility at 10:00 am.

 

J.         Adjourn (12:05 AM)

 

Attachments:  Handouts as noted in the minutes include:

1.      Meeting Agenda – 2 pages (as distributed)

2.      Roster – 2 pages (as distributed with Agenda)

3.      Email from Ruth Hubbard (F.2.a.) – 1 page (with email from Adam Kramer)

4.      MDH Fact Sheet – February 2009 – Source Water Protection  (F.2.b.) – 3 pages (with email from Adam Kramer)

5.      Email from Nicole Blasing with  Guideline for Land Application of By-Product Limes (F.2.e.) – 4-page attachment to Email

6.      Email from Adam Kramer (F.2.i.) – 1 page

7.      AWWA-MN Strategic Plan – 3 pages