HomeMy Public PortalAboutTri-Town Groundwater Protection District -- 2015-12-09 Minutes K-4 p
LU
ORLEANS, BREWSTER, EASTHAM GROUNDWATER PROTECTION DISTRICT
BOARD OF MANAGERS MEETING
DECEMBER 9, 2015
Board Present; John Kelly, Chairman, Orleans; Martin McDonald, Eastham; Charlie Sumner, Brewster
Substitute Representative.
Others:Jay Burgess, Chief Operator; Cyndi Bachman, District Secretary; Beverly Carney, Orleans
resident; Charles Harris, Chairman, Eastham Water Management Committee.
i
1. Meeting called to order at 9:05 a.m..
E
2. A motion was made by Martin McDonald to approve the Board of Managers Minutes dated
October 28, 2015.This motion was seconded by Charlie Sumner and unanimously approved
and passed.Vote: 3-0
3. A motion was made by Martin McDonald to approve the Board of Managers Minutes dated
November 9, 2015.This motion was seconded by John Kelly and approved and passed.
Charlie Sumner abstained.Vote: 2-1
4. Citizen's Forum:
• Beverly Carney gave her comment in written form to the Board for their review and is part
of these Minutes.
5. Winter Sale Discussion:
• John Kelly stated he received an email from Jay stating the Yarmouth Plant will be having a
winter sale of a flat rate of 10 cents a gallon for both in-District and out-of-District
pumpings.
• Jay stated the Tri-Town Plant's in-District current rate is 12 cents and out-of-District is
15 cents.The Yarmouth Plant costs 10 cents a gallon to run their plant; this plant
costs 11 cents a gallon to run.Jay stated he spoke to Eduard at the Yarmouth Plant and
they agreed not to steal each others flow. With the flow we are going to get from
Ocean Edge, I wouldn't recommend a sale. Ocean Edge would supply us with enough flow
to keep the media alive.
1
• Martin McDonald stated with the Yarmouth Plant offering a 10 cent scale price, is the
District staying with the 12 and 15 cents a gallon rates? Is that against our agreement
with Yarmouth?
• Jay stated we will not affect Yarmouth at all. No one from Yarmouth is going to come to
this facility and chances are our outer Cape towns are not going to drive all the way to
Yarmouth to save a few cents.
6. A motion was made by John Kelly that there would not be a Winter Sale at Tri-Town this year
other than what was offered to Ocean Edge,and the rates will remain at 12 cents a gallon for
in-District and 15 cents a gallon for out-of-District. This motion was seconded by Martin
McDonald and unanimously approved and passed. Vote: 3-0
7. Boards of Selectmen Votes on extendine the Ooeration at Tri-Town:
• John Kelly stated his Board received a letter from Eastham which stated the Eastham j
Board of Selectmen voted unanimously not to extend the operation of the plant after
December 2016,and to close the facility earlier if possible. Based on that letter, my Board
voted last week not to extend the operation of the plant as well, and to work with
Brewster and Eastham to move forward with the demolition of the facility in a timely
fashion in accordance with the Intermunicipal Agreement. He asked if Brewster voted on
Monday night?
i
• Charlie Sumner stated he called the Brewster Selectmen's office and it wasn't on their
Agenda and they didn't act on that.
• John Kelly stated at this point,two of the towns have voted. We are waiting on Brewster's
decision, and it appears that the IMA will not be extended, and the operation of the plant
will cease no later than December 31, 2016.We did have a meeting last Wednesday with
the Orleans Water Advisory Panel, and the presentation of the transition of Tri-Town has
all discharge ending at the end of December 2016,and accepting septage would end in
September. I did mention to my Board that the District employees have requested
consideration for a three month retention bonus to stay to the end of closure, and I did a
calculation on that which is about$90,000 for the three months. I told my Board that this
Board would vote to make a recommendation to the three Boards of Selectmen and it
would be up to each town whether they want to support it. All three towns need to agree
to support it or it does not happen.
• John Kelly asked Martin McDonald if Eastham's article for the $100,000 funding for the
plant, includes the design and demolition issue.
• Martin McDonald stated he doesn't think so, but that it is for maintenance and safety.
2
. i
• John Kelly stated Orleans and Brewster's Article do. If Eastham does not,the plan would
be to go to Town Meeting in May and if we already have the authorization for demolition,
we would be in the position to start that process, which is an eight month process for
permitting and design, with the idea of going to town meeting in May 2017 with bids in
hand for demolition.
• John Kelly stated Eastham's Board stated to close the plant sooner. What did they have in
mind?
• Martin McDonald stated there was no discussion on that.The motion was on the table
and it was approved not to extend the plant being opened beyond 2016 or closing it
sooner, What would be the rationale to remain open to 2016?
• John Kelly stated Mike Domenica put together a plan which would get us through the
summer season and not inconveniencing the town residents,giving them enough notice
to pump their systems, and then closing the doors in September.
3
• John Kelly asked Martin McDonald if the Eastham Board of Selectmen had any discussion
on the retention pay for the District employees?
• Martin McDonald stated he talked to Sheila Vanderhoef, Eastham Town Administrator, a
little bit about it, but the Board has not discussed it. I think they were waiting for this
Board's recommendation.
• John Kelly stated in terms of discussion of the employees retention pay, is that something
you would recommend to your Boards?
• Martin McDonald stated he feels this should be discussed in Executive Session because we
are talking about salaries.
i
3
• John Kelly stated,we are talking about the plant closing. I don't see our position is
compromised having this discussion in Executive Session. We simply are going to be
making a recommendation to the Boards of Selectmen as to what we think would allow
the plant to continue to operate through September with the exception of any
catastrophic equipment failure. It would at least allow the decommissioning with the
current staff, plus whatever consulting we need to make sure any permit conditions DEP
requires. If the staff is not here, then we would have to bring in a contractor, and Mike
Domenica is checking into that.
• Charlie Summer stated we probably could go into Executive Session with non-union
employees, but 1 am not sure. Whatever we come up with,we will be talking to our
employees and going to our respective Boards for recommendation for Town Meeting.
3
• Martin McDonald stated whatever we conclude would be going to the employees and the
public, but the options and how we get there is a little different.
• John Kelly stated the proposal from the District employees was three months.
• Jay stated that this year is going to be so busy I don't believe you will have to go to your
towns to ask for funding for retention pay. It would be in the District's checking account.
• John Kelly stated the Districts current checking account shows$266,000 and if we were to
shut the doors and the monies stopped coming into the plant, we would have these funds.
The$340,000 decommissioning costs plus another$90,000, split three ways is net of any
funds we have left in the District's checking account.All outstanding bills would have to be
paid as part of the closing costs.
i
• Martin Mc Donald stated we will have three months of closing down the plant with no
income, so I would assume it would eat up a large chunk of that checking account.
i
• John Kelly stated it may cover part of the salaries while they are working, but the vacation
and sick leave buy back probably would not be covered.
• John Kelly stated at the last meeting Jay checked with every employee that if there was a
three month retention pay,they would sign an agreement to stay here.That is the
proposal that is on the table now. If we lose one more employee,we will have to close
the doors.
• Charlie Sumner stated these are all nice employees who have had a tremendous amount
of service to the District. If we have this balance in the Districts checking now,do you
know how the winter months will go in terms of income?
i
Jay stated winter can go anywhere in terms of the weather. if we have a mild winter, it
will come in nice and steadily and we shouldn't lose too much bank account.
• John Kelly asked for last year's checking account balance at the end of last winter.
+ Jay stated the haulers are already getting stacked up with pumpings due to the plant
shutting down. People are going to make sure they get their systems pumped before the
plant closes. He stated September is the busiest month due to the restaurants shutting
down, and we get flooded with grease.September and October are huge months for us.
• Charlie Sumner stated you are saying if we stayed open until the end of October, it would
be a good revenue flow, and the community could pump in advance.
• Jay stated and we could still get out before the Intermunicipal Agreement expires. If we
get the tanks cleaned up and all the electricity shut off we would be ready to hand the
keys over to a deconstruction company.
4
• Charlie Sumner stated when we close on December 31, the plant would be mothballed.
I
• Jay stated we would make ourselves available to the contractors for any questions they
might have,
i
• Charlie Sumner stated he is very supportive of keeping the employees around and it
would be advantageous to us to make this transition as best we can. If we are talking
about$30,000 a year for each town for a smooth transition, and some of the monies will
be absorbed by the District, I personally would stand up and support it at town meeting as
a resident.
• Martin McDonald stated in terms of a retention bonus, I don't know of any towns who
have set a precedent.
I
• Jay stated in a municipal situation, it is highly unusual.On occasion, if a school fails, they
move the teachers around to a different school.
• John Kelly stated we have checked into seeing if there has been a District going out of
business, and there was only one, with the retirement payments being absorbed by the
retirement group.That's why we went for the special legislature for a special act to allow
for the three towns to have an ongoing responsibility for the employees who end up
retiring as the result of the District closing, to continue to making those payments for
benefits for post employment. One of things we would have to do as part of any closure
plan, is taking a look at the Districts bank balances to have an idea when the payments are
due during the year, because some of them are not monthly. We could probably have a
forecast for the Boards in terms of what the total might be for the three towns to
appropriate, and then understanding how the payments would be made right up until the
time of October so that we have an idea of what our cash flow would be. I am not aware
of any kind of a bonus like this. Generally municipalities don't have bonuses for lots of
reasons. But in this case we would have to come up with an agreement for the employees
to sign, which would be a memorandum of understanding that would be approved by this
Board, like an amendment to the Personnel Bylaws which would allow a payment to be
made at the end of October upon completion of the period of time. In my view, for lots of
reasons, that's a fair deal for the towns to consider. Strictly from a business decision, I
think it is a less cost option than trying to have a contractor do it from a human resources
point. It's not a severance pay, because they are all going to be eligible for unemployment
or whatever they decide to do. I think it is the right thing to do under the circumstances
and I would recommend it to my Board.
I
• Charlie Sumner stated he would reserve the money out of the Districts' cash flow. We are
going to have some costs for November and December because we will have employees
here which will be related to the shut down of the plant, and that's what we can go to
town meeting for.
I
I
5
I
I
• John Kelly stated if we could come up with a plan over the next couple of months and
prioritize on how the cash reserves would be used,the employee related costs, and then
go to town meeting for the decommissioning piece, it gets less personal and it might be
easier and it will be a lower amount.
• Martin McDonald stated he has sat at these meetings for the last four or five years and
appreciates what the plant is doing and what the employees are doing. My sense of the
mood of the Eastham Selectmen is they don't see paying a retention bonus. I haven't
polled everyone, so I am talking about a couple of people, so I don't think I am going to be
comfortable in voting for that.The Town Selectmen may vote to approve a retention
bonus, but I am not comfortable in going to the town and recommending it or being
against it. I am here representing the taxpayers and I am not comfortable in voting for it.
• Charlie Sumner stated I am representing the taxpayers and if we are going to be bringing
in contractors, it will cost more and be more disruptive to our citizens. I think it is cheaper
for us to do this and I don't mind standing up in town meeting to support this.
• Jay stated the taxpayers are also the citizens who are pumping their systems.
• Charlie Sumner stated depending on how this vote goes, it's really going to be incumbent
on the employees to make sure we can create as much cash flow in this facility.
• Jay stated this is why it is important to me, because I know Steve can get a municipal job,
and if I lose him, then we should change the tone of this meeting right now to start
shutting down. Steve has stated to me,why would he want to do all that extra work in a
plant that is falling apart to keep it going, when that other job isn't available any longer
after this plant is closed.
i
• John Kelly stated if we close the doors tomorrow and we make arrangements to bring in a
contractor with Jay as the project manager,we would go through a closure, and cash goes
right out the door and we don't have the luxury of building up our bank account. To me
this is an important decision.
• Jay stated he is still being recruited to work at the Yarmouth plant. I told them I am
dedicated to this Board and would stay to the end until the permit expires unless the
Board agreed they don't need my services anymore.We can keep this place alive through
the summer and close the doors in December.
• John Kelly stated he would like this Board to all agree on the retention pay for the District
employees. If Martin McDonald votes no, that puts us in a very difficult position to be
reasonably certain that we are not going to have all three towns in agreement.The
questions then gets to be, do you need to have all of the options in front of you to vote on
what you think is the best option before you make your recommendation.
i
i
I
6
I
i
i
• Martin McDonald stated I am not sure that these are really options. Its town money no
matter what pocket it comes out of.The mood of some of my Board is we have five or six
employees here at the plant, and they are paid a salary.Why do we have to pay them
extra to finish the job?
• Charlie Sumner stated if my Board said to me that my contract expires on December 3151
and we are not going to renew or extend it, but we really need you to stay and finish the
job, that weekend I am going to start looking for a new job and if some town offered me a
job I would be gone.
• John Kelly stated that is a good point.Jay might be retiring, but the rest of them may not
be, so if you told them you need them to stay right to the end and then you can go look
for a job, why would they do that?So in other words,without any additional money the
plant will close,you will be out of a job next December, but we want you to stay to the
end and don't look for a job until the plant closes.Why would anyone do that?
• Martin McDonald stated the plant was due to close last May and we didn't have this same
issue.
• Jay stated we were working in that direction. I always had an exit strategy since you have
been telling me this since 2005.
• John Kelly stated with the votes that have taken place, there is finality now. The question
is when. I hear what Charlie is saying, and aside from what the philosophy may be that this
is your job,you have an obligation to stay until the end, but then that's fine for me as the
Administrator saying we expect you to stay, but from a personal standpoint if I am the
employee and I am looking at no job at the end of December and I am being told that I
have to commit to stay until the end, I'd say,why?This is a unique situation. It's not like
you are going to retire in December and you have your golden parachute when you leave,
and your buyout, and your retirement,you've been planning this.That Is a little different
than the plant is closing the doors and you need to find another job. So paying the
employees to stay until the end, that retention bonus buys them time,three months, to
find another job. In essence, it is a severance pay,even though we are not calling it a i
severance pay. If it is called a severance pay, it gets deducted from their unemployment
that the towns are going to pay an unemployment charge next December. If there is a
$30,000 severance pay,that amount comes right off the unemployment and it is less.
There is a benefit to calling it a severance pay if they stay until the end.
i
I
7 I
i
i
• Jay stated regarding having to hire a private contractor, I have written private contracts
before I worked here. I wrote the contract that got this job for WYC, I wrote the contract
that got this job for Earth Tech; I wrote the contract that got this for Williams and Works
Operations Services. If you go out to a private operations company it's going to cost you
quite a bit more money because they are going to look at the permit and they will need
five operators right off the bat. My name is on the DEP permit.We feel that we have gone
above and beyond and have not pestered the Town Administrators, or the Boards of
Selectmen with any problems over the years, and we managed to handle them ourselves
and feel we can continue until the plant closes. I can't keep employees at the plant and if I
lose one of them, the doors close.
• Charlie Sumner stated he feels comfortable defending this. I think it is in the community's
best interest and I like the idea of using our own resources to close the plant. E
• John Kelly stated we can hold this vote until our January meeting but it doesn't change the
fact that we have to make a recommendation to our Boards. l
• Martin McDonald asked when does this Board have to make that recommendation.
• John Kelly stated Eastham wanted to have the number for your Warrant in January so we
were trying to get the three towns Boards of Selectmen to meet in December.At thin
point, it's really a question for this Board to take up the request of the employees,
consider it,take a vote, and give the Board of Manager's recommendation to each of the
towns Boards of Selectmen. it's up to them to decide if that happens or not. He stated he
would like this Board to vote today and then we could modify as we go through the
financial review and get additional information. My Board may not vote until next month
because we are going to have to finalize the warrant numbers. By voting now,we are
letting the employees know we support their request and providing some solace. If this
Board votes no, and if I'm an employee, I'm out the door to find another job, and then it's
going to put us further behind the eight ball in terms of trying to have an orderly
transition of this facility. We will put this back on the Agenda for next month for further
discussion on the ceasing operation of Tri-Town.
• Martin McDonald stated if we could defer the vote to next month I would be happy to do
that. I am having a hard time making a decision right now. I'm representing the town.
• John Kelly stated the next Tri-Town Board of Managers Meeting will be January 131h. I will
try to see if we can have the figures from AECOM, as well as a list of items for town
meeting to consider,which is$30,000, one-third of the $90,000.
• Jay stated none of this information has reached the newspapers, and the only information
the haulers get is out in the plant's receiving area,which may or may not be the correct
information.
® Martin McDonald asked Jay if it takes two months to close the plant?
8
• Jay stated its going to take about two months for us to clean out all the residuals out of
the tanks and have it ready so that it is sanitized for the construction crews coming in.
We have done it ourselves hiring a vactor truck costing us$8,000 without labor;with labor
it was$90,000. if we are not getting our retention bonus, our guys are not going to want
to jump down in those tanks and shovel sand for hours at$15-$20 an hour.
E
8. Chief Operator Updates—Jav Burgess:
I
• Process-The plant continues to make permit. Nitrates were 27 mg/l;all others were in
the single digits.
• Maintenance -We have one gravity belt thickener rebuilt for summer use and we are
working on the second one because we are anticipating a very busy summer;and we are
working on the Filter Press Feed Pumps and getting them ready for summer as well.
+ Other—We have to replace the program in the Receiving Computer, because after 27
years of service,it died. Diane, our Lab employee,got three quotes from different
companies. We will also have to buy a computer at$300-$400; a new printer about$300; i
as well as a couple of boxes of the paper for invoices.Yarmouth uses the same program,
and Diane went over to their plant to use the program to get familiar with it. The total for
the software is$4,375.00.We will go to Staples to get the best deal on a computer,
printer, and paper.
• Jay stated there are still a few outstanding projects, one of which I puff out to bid last year
with some of that money that the towns approved. The award went to a company who
was a no show and I have to re-bid it.I still have not put that bid out.That was for$16,000
to replace the intermediate pumps that pump into the effluent station so we can
discharge out of the plant.They are running at about 60%capacity right now.They should
be running at about 100%. Once it reaches down to 40%, and we can't tell when that is, it
can't keep up with the process flow through the plant. I can re-bid this or we can cross
our fingers and hope it makes it to the end. It's going to cost about$25,000 because the
second bids that came in were about$25,000.We may be able to get by with what we
have.There is one other item that may or may not be an issue. We had really good results
cleaning the carbon to get the summer out of it and it worked really good, but it is starting
to show breakthrough again. We are going to start washing it again.That is going to be
added to the demolition bill for$70,000.
i
I
9
9. A motion was made by John Kelly to authorize Jay to re-bid the project for the pumps and get
the work done.This motion was seconded by Charlie Sumner and unanimously approved and
passed. Vote:3-0
10. A motion was made by John Kelly to authorize Jay to upgrade the software and hardware to
allow computerized billing to resume at Tri-Town.This motion was seconded by Martin
McDonald and unanimously approved and passed. Vote: 3-0
11. The Board reviewed the Districts' bank balances.
12. A motion was made by Martin McDonald to approve Treasury Warrant No. 7 for payment.
This motion was seconded by Charlie Sumner and unanimously approved and passed.
Vote: 3-0
i
13. Items for future Agendas:
I
• Retention Pay discussion
• 2014 Financial Update
• Further discussion and decommissioning and ceasing operation at Tri-Town.
14. A motion was made by Martin McDonald to adjourn the meeting at 10:20 a.m.. This motion
was seconded by Charlie Sumner and unanimously approved and passed.Vote:3-0
Respectfully submitted,
�+fY1fJ—Yl
Cyni Bachman
District Secretary
10
Bch rn 2rrf`�-
December 9, 2015 Board of Managers/citizen's comment
Last month Eastham's Selectmen acted to cease operations here before the close of 2016, 1
think their public vote at a public meeting was not legal &wonder if this BoMs can make right
the incorrect public perception that tipping at Tri-Town is in any way wrong. I hope you may
join me in requesting a public explanation of Eastham's direct &substantial interest in closing
Tri-Town ahead of past financial discussions & on-going requests to voters & regulators.
Closing facilities prematurely or as soon as possible will not make for a safe & orderly
decommissioning. All funding must be secured upfront. All receiving flow must be legally
processed, discharged & reported. All hazardous contaminants must be mitigated & removed.
Failure to do so will result in undeniable odors. Any lapse in control could result in the loss of
skilled staff, operational revenues for planning, critical sanitary services, &the public's trust.
Since 1988 District voters at all town meetings have unanimously& formally supported Tri's
ability to secure their properties & businesses. Why didn't Eastham seek a higher level of
decision-making authority before acting to have those services taken away or abridged?
Aren't there administrative laws that govern what Selectmen can & cannot do, procedures to
be followed, a system of rules & consequences in the public interest or is Eastham's breach of
duty, as published in the news, allowable?
I
Annual Town Meetings are 6 months away. Our District was created by the construction of
laws. Tri was envisioned to provided septage & grease sanitation services subject to the joint
controls of 8 town partners under&within an IMA contract. It was built with monies tied to
local, state &federal oversight. Dismantling the IMA should be the last action of this Board.
The O-B-EGPD is an enforceable promise that must be kept.
Ca_/ .
I
i
i