In 30 seconds
- 73.5% of the water Helena-West Helena pumped last year never reached a paying customer, according to the rate study Robert Cheek — then a private citizen — presented to the council.
- $15 is the fee a resident said the city charges per paper water bill mailed to anyone paying after the 16th, even after a moratorium recalculated every bill back to July's rates.
- $30,000 a month, or $360,000 a year, is what that resident calculated the city collects from the $15 paper-bill fee across roughly 2,000 customers.
- 5-0, the council adopted the annual millage ordinance (Ordinance 15, 2024) on its third and final reading, one member absent.
- $9,000 of the $10,000 the city already posted with the court will go to the Boys and Girls Club to finish the well-land deed transfer, with $1,000 covering the appraisal.
Recap
Robert Cheek's water-rate critique
Robert Cheek, then a private citizen and now a 2026 Ward 1 council candidate, addressed the council on the proposed water-rate ordinance . Citing the July 2 rate study by Dennis Sternberg of the Arkansas Rural Water Association, he said the proposed rate would raise the cost per thousand gallons from $2.73 to $7.39, a 171% increase, and that 73.5% of the water the system pumped went unbilled before reaching customers . He proposed tying the mayor's, city manager's, and council's own pay to hitting a 15% water-loss target within a year, and asked the council to publish the ordinance text two weeks before any vote and hold implementation to January 1.
Robert Meadows presses on the loan math
Citizen Robert Meadows asked for billing records, revenue reports, and documentation on the city's pending $11 million ANRC loan , then indicated the loan's terms himself as a 20-year term he did not yet have full payment figures for . Administration staff then set out the payment at $84,850 a year on a roughly 4% rate , and put the combined loan payment and operating deficit at a minimum $1.5 million in new revenue needed to break even .
Moratorium recalculation still let late fees through
A council member said the council's moratorium on the 2024 rate ordinance was meant to have residents simply pay the previous month's bill and receive a credit going forward . Administration staff explained every account was in fact recalculated to the July rate, but late fees and the $15 paper-bill fee were still charged based on the old bill amount to anyone who paid after the 16th, calling the fee avoidable only if a customer paid before that date .
A resident's $15 paper-bill fee complaint
A resident testified that the water department charges a 10% late fee plus an extra $15 to mail a paper bill, calling it price gouging, and calculated that fee alone brings in about $30,000 a month, or $360,000 a year, across roughly 2,000 customers . She said her own bill was recalculated from $278 to $159 under the moratorium but she was still charged the $15 fee and a late fee on top of it.
Millage ordinance adopted 5-0
The council placed Ordinance 15 of 2024, the annual levy on real and personal property that funds general city expenses and retired police and fire pensions, on its third and final reading and adopted it by a 5-0 roll call, with one member absent . The presiding officer declared the ordinance passed before moving to the next agenda item .
Boys and Girls Club deed transfer
Of the $10,000 the council had already voted and posted with the Phillips County circuit court for the well-land deed transfer, $1,000 covers the appraisal and expert testimony and $9,000 goes to the Boys and Girls Club, which agreed to accept that amount through its attorney . The transfer still needs the state Health Department to approve the wellhead-protection-area language before the city can take full ownership.
Water department invoices approved
The council approved three water-department invoices as a group, 5-0: $2,700 to Jones Hydro for a check-valve repair on well number 10, an itemized repair for one of the city's three backhoes, and a Quattlebaum Plumbing invoice for roughly 13 hours of labor plus materials . The transcript renders the Quattlebaum total as $44,000, which the itemized labor and materials described suggest is a captioning error for a bill closer to $4,000 .
Water outages and the new well
A resident given the floor after being turned away earlier described his own household's water cutoff and asked for time before service was restored . Staff said a new well's pump and motor had just been installed and the well was expected online within three to ten days, pending electricity, water testing, and health department approval .
Submitted for the record
Read or submitted by a member of the public — the submitter's own document, not part of the city's packet.
The letter Robert Cheek read during public comment
The written text of the comment he delivered from the podium, starting at 0:03:02: the proposed 171% rate increase, the 73.5% water-loss figure from the July 2 rate study, and a proposal to tie the pay of the mayor, city manager, and council members to a 15% water-loss target.
Transcript
Auto-generated from the meeting video's captions and lightly cleaned for readability — wording is kept as spoken, not corrected, except that caption-garbled names of city officials are normalized against the roster. Speaker names follow the attribution work in our governance record; a ° marks a name our reviewers have not yet verified. Every timestamp plays the city's video from that moment. Watch the full meeting ↗
0:59
Unidentified standing there and tell you about it's pretty routine uh this is from the principal Mr Tony roach and it's the yearly homecoming parade they do starting at fourth in Plaza going around uh Plaza to Richmond Hill to Oakland ending at Central High School campus and it's the traditional things that they do uh basically school children and some other people maybe some floats um and it's describing the boundaries in the permit they asked for a two3 to 5:30 when it's they probably won't start until about 4: um and end about 4:30 but they asked for 2:30 to 5:30 uh the police chief has signed off on it as well as Street sanitation director Roosevelt Collins and the fire chief uh Roder Brown that's little to no cost to the city associated with it other than blocking off the streets using some barrels and police escorts is there a motion to approve the
2:03
Unidentified homecoming permit so uh motion by St Columbia second by Mr Miller any discussion Madam clerk call M Davis yes
2:18
City Clerk Sandi Ramsey Mr St Columbia yes Dr Miller yes Mr eely
2:22
Unidentified yes Miss Miller yes five yes permit is
2:26
Unidentified approved for the homecoming parade uh next up on the agenda is Mr Robert cheek and in your packet looks like there's something inserted at page six yes sir Mr athley U Mr CH is here uh
2:47
Unidentified he has a different presentation this was just a part of what was on the uh Facebook stuff we'll let him speak yes sir
3:02
Robert Cheek so Mr Valley and honorable council members thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak today out of respect for your time I'll do my best to keep my comments brief and to the point in my talk today I'd like to address three key issues that I believe are crucial for our community first I'd like to discuss the proposed water increase
3:26
Unidentified yeah his so you mind I to speak up a little okay
3:31
Robert Cheek second I'll address the critical problem of water loss in our system and third I'll talk about the need for accountability as we address these challenges it is my understanding that during today's meeting you'll be reviewing a new ordinance to increase our water rates I'd like to offer some comments and recommendations for you to consider as you deliberate on this important piece of legislation last week I had the opportunity to read the rates study dated July 2nd this study was written by Dennis Sternberg from the Arkansas Rural Water Association I understand that his recommendations will largely inform the ordinance you're considering today let me share with you some key points from this study currently our water rate stands at $273 per thousand gallons Mr Sternberg is proposing to increase this rate to $7.39 per thousand gallons this represents a substantial increase of 171% since this is an increase of more than 50% the study allows for the implementation of this increase over two years in the first year we would Implement half the increase then in the second year we would re implement the remaining half there are many more details in the study and I strongly encourage members of the public to read the full report however to summarize the main reason for this increase is clear it's necessary to ensure that our water department can support its operations without running a deficit I want to state that I personally support a measured increase I believe it is necessary to keep our water system solvent however I also want to emphasize that while addition additional funds are crucial I believe this money alone will not be sufficient to solve the larger issues we face it's not just about having more money it's about how we use that money the funds must be efficiently managed to ensure that the necessary work is completed now let me turn to a shocking statistic from Mr sternberg's report last year our system treated and pumped just over 1.4 billion gallons of water however only 380 million gallons were metered and charged to customers what does this mean it means that 73.5% of our water was lost before it reached paying customers I want to repeat that figure because it's so important 73.5% of our water is lost before it reaches paying customers that's nearly 34 of our water supply simply wasted to put that in perspective highly efficient systems typically lose only 5 to 10% of their water Mr Sternberg notes in his report that an effective water system should lose no more than 15% in a previous meeting mayor Franklin mentioned that his water bill was around 380 following the last increase he also shared that he identified and fixed a leak in his supply line to avoid wasting more water and money this was a responsible action and I applaud him for it however the system you and this Council manage is currently leaking nearly 75% of its water the cost of this lost water is borne by the citizens of Helena West Helena and it's crucial that our leadership address this issue in the private sector particularly in large public companies it's common for 60 to 80% of CEO compensation to be tied to Performance metrics this makes sense When leaders are held accountable for results they're incentivized to produce positive outcomes if CEOs can be held to such standards then surely our city leadership responsible for public funds and critical resources like water can be held to similar standards of accountability passing an ordinance to raise rates is relatively speaking the easy part the hard part is ensuring that the money is used responsibly to rep improve the system this brings me to my urgent request when you pass this ordinance I ask that you codify a promise to our citizens a promise that you will hold yourselves accountable for the results a 15% water loss rate is both measurable and achievable at the end of next year I ask that you measure your progress and report to the public how close you've come to achieving this goal to further ensure accountability I believe your compensation that of the mayor city manager and council members should be tied to these results I propose the following if you miss the Target by 15% you should reduce your salaries by 15% if you miss by 35% reduce them by 35 and if no improvement is made at all reduce them by 60% by doing this you would show the public that you are willing to be held accountable just as we citizens are held accountable through higher rates you would send a powerful message that you are fully invested in fixing this system and that you will share the burden if results aren't delivered before I close I have two more requests that I I'd like to make first regarding transparency as we move forward with these necessary rate hikes transparency is key to maintaining public trust I urge you to post the full language of the proposed ordinance in public forums like the Hell in a world and on Facebook please do this at least two weeks before the vote when people have time to prepare and participate in decisions that affect them trust in the process is strengthened second regarding timing I would ask that you commit to implementing these rate hikes no sooner than January 1st this would give the public time to make necessary repairs fixing leaks and supply lines before the increase takes effect given that the recommended increase is 170% it's only fair to give citizens time to prepare in closing members of the council I urge you to incorporate these accountability measures into the rate ordinance show our community that you're committed not just to raising rates but to actually fixing the underlying problems in our water system thank you for your time and your careful consideration of these important matters I appreciate your transparency and your willingness to engage with the public as we chart a path forward to fix our struggling water system by implementing these measures we can work together citizens and Leadership to create a more efficient accountable and and sustainable water system for Helena West Helena thank
10:34
Councilman Joe St. Columbia (Ward 2) you thank [Music] you Mr Chief yeah uh for the benefit of those who might not know who you are uh Mr Chek owns the Edwardian in he is an implant in our community I was born and rear here in Helena but he chose Helena he chose Helena would you tell the people why you came to Helena sure um so I came to Helena about 10 years ago and I work for the uh Kip
11:07
Robert Cheek school districts um I I bought a house on Perry Street in 2016 um and i' I've worked jobs in the community I used to um bartend down on Cherry Street and then in 2019 um I had the opportunity to purchase the the bed and breakfast um and I would say um you know I I I see in a lot of a lot of the people who are like me who are in my circle that are also implants to this area you know see a lot of promise and potential in the area um mainly in the area of um real estate I think you know we have an an affordable um place that we can live we have affordable housing prices here and um and we have a rich Community a diverse Community with um that has a lot to offer so um so that's that's why I'm invested in the community and and plan to continue to be so you're
12:06
Unidentified originally from Little Rock is that right yes sir that's correct and your
12:10
Unidentified parents still live in Little Rock yeah my family's there this is your home you chose Helm
12:19
Unidentified because it was a good place to move to yeah I agree yeah you're one of many
12:25
Unidentified people that have come here in the last 10 years and made Helena their home and it's important that we provide the services necessary for this community and I'm Glad You Came forward as many others have and uh presented your ideas and thoughts thank you very much for coming yeah thank you CH you're very welcome thank [Music] you next on our agenda is Robert Meadows uh there's an insert found at page 21 Mr Meadows present
13:11
Robert Meadows° yes he good evening everybody uh can I everybody hear me okay yes sir all right uh not really my forte standing up in front of people and speaking uh if uh I trust everybody's read my packet that I submitted for the council uh I'm here as a concerned citizen looking to help come up with the amicable solution um you know we can't in instead of just you know throwing arbitrary numbers around and saying well this rate didn't work uh so let's hike it Hike It Up try this rate and maybe that'll work you know that's just going to leave us in the same boat we're gonna have to come back and revisit this um there's two things I know that we got all can agree on uh the old rate isn't going to work it's not sustainable for our water department this new rate that's currently on pause is not going to work it's not sustainable for our citizens um there's some numbers you know that that I've requested some some documentation uh kind of there they're important to have part of you know to to come up with the solution uh number of paying customers if you've got the billing records and or annual customer report the water department Revenue p&l statements or uh Revenue summary reports your expense reports then there's the whole deal with the 11 million loan is that just just to clarify have we already applied for the $ 11 million loan or is it something we're looking to apply for now I'm not
15:03
Robert Meadows the point person for that that comes from the administration but they've already started the application process but no funds have been received okay
15:10
Unidentified they're in the middle of that process right now is there any documentation that we can get on the loan as far as like the the the terms of the loan like what the what the what the what the payments are going to be the length of the loan the mayor's office
15:24
Unidentified would have control of that documentation I do know I do know this it's a 20-y year loan I know it's a 20-y year loan but I don't know what the payments are okay because I mean and
15:36
Unidentified that that would be important information to have to know what what it's going to take to cover that assuming that we don't qualify for loan forgiveness um that was something else too that I would like to get some clarification on um as far as the qualifications for the loan forgiveness um is based on the median household income uh which is from you know 2022 $3,118 and it a 4,000 gallon usage bill should be equal to one and a half perent of that number well is that water and sewer combined or is it Water and Sewer separate each one needing to be one and a half percent because with that new rate they're each one and a half percent individually and it seems to me you know may maybe there was a mistake made in in reading that verbiage I don't know maybe I'm thinking wrong but it seems to me it would be more reasonable for that to have been one and a half percent of those combined in which case that the rate that was just recently passed is twice as high as what it would take to meet those requirements so is there any is there like a source that information or yes I
17:01
City Attorney Andre Valley° I can I can answer all those questions uh so the most recent question is the the rate the one and a half perc one and a half% each utility is considered separate water is a utility to as a utility and so the rate would have to be 1 and a half% for each utility separately uh the good news that we have on that issue is that the sewer department is not borrowing any money and so the sewer rate is going to be reduced based on not having to meet the mhi so it wouldn't have to be at the one and a half% just water right they told us that they both needed to be mhi each but because you're not borrowing for the sewer department you just borrowing for the water department it has to be at the that mhi okay and so that cuts out a lot of the so that that can come down and we can still qualify for long forgiveness cor correct on the water side then well
17:56
Unidentified on the sewer side water SE we're not borrowing anything right so it comes down saying it could come down and we just still qualifi correct okay and so
18:06
Chief of Staff James Valley then on the loan there a 20-year loan uh I forget the interest rate is like 4% or something like that but the payment is $ 84,85 th000 a year so that you would calculate that divide that over how you want to do your rate but you need $800,000 for it can I like get that you know I can forward you the email Mr C
18:27
Unidentified clay just sent all of us to email with that information in I can forward it to you okay and then so you got two numbers
18:35
Chief of Staff James Valley that that are important 84,000 and the 7x th000 that you're in a deficit so you need basically $1.5 million minimum increase so that you are break even right well and it's important
18:51
Unidentified to note too that break even that's with putting 5% into a separate account for your non routine repairs right your
19:00
Unidentified replacement refurbishment account yes
19:03
Unidentified and so that's going to give you like around $215,000 a year for nonroutine repairs that's breaking even yeah well
19:11
Unidentified well that's that's breaking even but that's breaking even at the current rates and paying people $11 an hour and all of that stuff too correct yeah it's
19:18
Unidentified breaking even as you are so it's breaking even but it's still having a little buffer zone as well for those specific items yes sir yeah yeah for anything over $1,000 yes okay for those items yes and so and then a lot of the questions you're asking is in the rate study itself right right and
19:37
Unidentified I and i' I found that out I actually have a copy of that as well uh but I mean to to have more recent uh numbers would be beneficial but I mean if we're going to base everything off of 2022 and just off of the rate study uh I mean we can we can work with that too uh that's what we're going to use to come up with a solution well basically we're required
20:00
Unidentified to follow the rate study well if following the rate study the the rate study the recommendation was for the first you know for the first thousand gallons to be the 16 20 or what have you yes sir uh actually I got a better documentation in here but uh yeah the recommendation for the rate study was 1620 for the first and 739 for each th000 after that and for the suu to be 927 for the first, and 282 for every thousand gallons beyond that correct which is astronomically
20:41
Unidentified lower than the 988 for every th gallons that's really what's eating everybody's lunch is the sewer rate right at 988 for every additional th you know thousand gallons and and that was set to meet the MH we and so that's what I was getting ready to Pivot to so if if that's not going to be required now for this loan forgiveness is it safe to assume that we're going to make a huge adjustment to that rate the the current recommendation
21:07
Unidentified from the mayor is the sewer is that lower number I I can't remember what it is exactly we're going to go with the recommendation that's in the rate study pull up the rates on that that because I think if we went with what's the recommendation that's in the rate study that everybody be in a lot better shape and it you know the even states in the rate study in the summary that uh rate rate increases are never taken lightly but small increases are accepted a lot more easily than large increases by your customers and that's in the rate study itself so so the May proposal think goes without saying is basically
21:51
Unidentified 1674 plus 582 for the first th000 gallons cuz you on here you charging the increments of 1,000 Gall starting at zero so it's 582 and at that rate you get to $402 at 4,000 gallons we we're looking at the water right now correct yes okay yes 1672 and then
22:16
Unidentified 582 right you scr It Up Show se you started the 988 on SE and the SE the L
22:25
Unidentified the other number doesn't change it's a little delay $82 okay forever so consider let me ask you get above 30
22:39
Unidentified to 50,000 gallons if they want to drop the water rate on because it's going to impact several of your high users well let me let me ask you this on the on the
22:49
Unidentified sewer now that that that's a lot more reasonable than what we've recently been met with but the recommendation in the rate study for the sewer was 92 seven for the first thousand and the sewer was already operating in the black so why why are we still going up on the sewer
23:06
Unidentified well in July the rate was 988 already Okay so we're going back to the
23:12
Unidentified July rate well I'm just saying what's in the recommendation that you know of the race study I'm explaining why we getting there that race stud is based on 2022
23:22
Unidentified okay and the rate was already 988 we were operating we went the rat C recommended that it go down we went down to 1620 and we went down to 927 because the race study and we made the other numbers go up so then when we did this calculation we just left the numbers as they were in July and move the secondary numbers to meet uh the burden that we needed to meet so
23:52
Unidentified mhi with with these proposed rates what would be the annual revenue from the water department the the projected Revenue cuz with the with the recommendation the annual revenue was going to be around 4.3 million yeah I I got a spread on
24:10
Unidentified that I just don't have it open so I don't know it off top of my head but it would generate that 700 and some odd, thousand deficit and the $84,000 paid loan so it's going to generate at least $1.5 million new Revenue to pay the current loan or the one we're trying to apply for the loan that we we've been approved for we applied for it we approved for it but it has not been funded because there's a bunch of other steps you do in the procurement process to get to the that is the engineers got to draw out the designs on that's Pro they have to buid it the award to be and then they do the work and then they get paid as the work is being done and the loan will be funded so to speak as the work being done so we approve for it but we don't have the money got you what when when are we
25:00
Unidentified expected to be able to get that money then it's going to be sometime in 2025
25:06
Unidentified maybe 2026 depending on the engineers and and all the other things that's going on right now the engineers are all tied up on this way and once we get this well done they'll pivot to a new well and to that PPE uh project that we proposed to do replacing the galvanized lines right so we're not going to start replacing the galiz line until lines until the loan is approved or yeah got have Mone well with the rate increase money would be there and we could start doing some is there like a project proposal to see what it is going to take to start replacing the galviz so like how how how much how much of that work could we you know get done reasonably and say you know six months time and what would that cost what would that look like what you have to wait on
26:00
Unidentified the engine to give you a proposal on that but at this point theim engineer report was $1 million to do what we trying to [Music] do
26:12
Unidentified best I mean it's it's hard to make you know decisions with that amount of money without you know all the right info if you're not making decision with that amount of money you don't have
26:28
Unidentified I think this goes to one of the issues that Mr CH raised in order for us to alleviate the 70% water loss we have to replace the lines correct but the
26:39
Unidentified replacing of the lines is a multi-million dollar project it's not something that you're going to fix with a couple hundred, we spent a couple hundred thousand just fixing leaks and so we need the loan in order to address the the lines to replace the lines so these are separate issues um the the the rates are going to put the water department above water and then would help us to pay back the loan assuming it's not forgiven but we need that 11 million to start addressing replacement of the lines and we need at least two more whs at this point well that that
27:08
Unidentified loan is to be able to do everything all at one time and so no the loans do they
27:15
Unidentified to do some things all at one time you have a I say no because the issue that you
27:22
City Attorney Andre Valley expl as if $1 million would fix all our problems that's why I me know about doing it all you'll being work on multiple things but it it that $1 million is really just the beginning of what we need to do to fix things that's why I said no yes you will be able to take a multifaceted approach dealing with the whales and dealing with the lines and Etc but I don't want it to appear that we're alluding the11 million to be end the end of the conversation we we have a long way to go with Forest repairs because we're right now just dealing with water we had gotten to sewer and other whales that we need and Etc and so it's a much bigger issue then one thing we haven't discussed many times we had a meeting with the governor and the one thing that she's concerned about and we have orders from the Department of Health and from the natural resources telling us we got to hire these licensed personnels and they need to meet a certain salary the governor specifically said that our water utility employees salaries are too low now I know there something that people don't like to hear here but that's what the governor her team assessment was when she met with us last year right she met with me she met with the chief of staff she met with John Edwards she met with uh Senator Mur she met with the County Judge she met with the mayor City Treasurer uh and there was several other people in the room it was a room full of people where she made the statements and so I water utility um we have a lot of things need doing and we don't want the public be left with impression that $1 million going to fix everything it's GNA help but it's not g to be the end of the uh conversation maybe I worded that incorrectly I guess what I what I'm driving at is is it possible that the answer isn't getting the 11 million and trying to do one big lump sum like $1 million is going to be more than what we can utilize you know say in a 12- month span is that would that be wrong to assume it's not going to come in 12 it depends
29:27
Unidentified on what we try to uh you know these guys are charging like $400 a linear foot and that that adds up pretty quickly when you start these because what what I'm thinking we could
29:38
Unidentified prioritize the areas that need to be addressed immediately and start on those yeah with the with the rate increase yeah and and maybe not even this rate increase maybe maybe it needs to be a little more maybe you know somewhere but without the without all the numbers you know it's hard to say for sure you know that's why I say we can't just throw arbitrary numbers around right and so but it it's possible we could use cash
30:02
Unidentified flow from the water department from the revenue that we're gaining to start this project without $1 million all at one time I understand so we'll probably be
30:13
Unidentified able to use C to do some of the smallest stuff yes some but the type of problems
30:20
Chief of Staff James Valley that we have U I would call it engineering malpractice is what the problem is we've got line that run in circles so we we we are told that all the people in West Water was turned off for the last two days right correct but
30:36
Unidentified I can take you to a 100 houses that never lost water and that's because we can't physically turn them off the the vales don't work it's it's a valve over here if you turn it off valve over there let the water come through and you know that's people in several places that never lost water and one of those was Doughboy and they had a 60 gallon per minute leak and when we finally figured that out we shut them off and the tank begin to rise more quickly uh but it's a security system they started with two in lines in West Allen and then it came back when the federal government help do fire suppression and they ran six or eight in line right beside them and so you got a line here that's breaking or a line here that's breaking side by side they SPID off each other all kinds of jump really I I can imagine so so is uh so we fix I
31:31
Unidentified think I think you may have answered this already but just to refresh my memory is there a project proposal on getting all of this done that's available I get you what we sent to them that they
31:41
Unidentified approved and we can start there and that may help you better uh in terms of what questions you may have as a result of that because I'm not going to say I got all the answers but I can I can share with you what we have that you would be you know at the same point we are in terms of our understanding what we're trying to do I just I just want us as a group to be able to make an informed decision you know instead of just throwing some numbers out there and saying well let's hope this works no we're not we're not just do all we got some proposal that are 40 and $60 million that are pending that we need to fix system the governor also asked us to look at doing a regional water system because the rate payers are dwin in Phillips County and the more group together more you can spread the cost out for managing that kind kind of thing and so that's one of the things the city council approved uh the engine looking at City attorney is trying to raise his hand so I need to H one of the things I I want to address to to all of you that
32:43
City Attorney Andre Valley that that are speaking about the issue when we're doing these water plans they start with what the engineer proposes to the state and so when you say make an informed decision there will be a plan that's done and the engineer is not just is trying to make an educated guest engineer is trying to say here are the things that we think are priority Council this is what you should do here's my recommendation and this is how we should go forward and so a lot of it is in the engineering plans and what the engineers going to recommend uh for the city council to do and that's why it's not that we're trying to be evasive about your1 million question and how we prioritize but until we see what the engineers plans are and what and when they give with water real water and with the water utility and have something concrete for us to present to you we just know that we have many problems to fix and I we can't tonight tell you what's the priority list as to which one goes first but the more information that the engineer sees the more things that the water util see the more things rur water received then we can make an educated uh plan as to how we go forward because as the chief of staff just told you a minute ago U the CI has also apply for 40 and 60 million uh Financial apparatus so it's one of those things that the problem is much bigger than simply 11 million but we're trying to find the best solution to go forward
34:09
Unidentified correct and that that's the important part is finding the best solution for everybody yes sir U and I I appreciate that info and and you know that's that's great to hear but in all fairness I think it's you know safe to say that everybody feels like that this most recent decision this most recent rate increase was made pretty hastily and without all of the proper information so I I don't feel like it you know it's out of line to you know request that information and to and to look for that but not saying you out of line for
34:46
Unidentified ask anything you're a citizen you can have yeah I
34:49
Unidentified know just my my response to your response that's all yes sir yes sir I'm still and Sir if I could just say
34:57
Unidentified something just just make you feel better like with the federal and I'm not a huge expert but I know with the with Federal loans they're not going to give it to us like one big huge loan they'll typically incrementally uh send that to us as the job is being done so and so feds are very thorough they're g d all the eyes you know cross all the teeth they gonna make sure the work is done before they s they send money so that's one thing you won't have to worry about
35:28
Unidentified got appreciate that was there any other
35:34
Unidentified questions no I don't guess so is you
35:38
Unidentified know the council members y'all have anything for me all right thank you thank you very
35:50
Unidentified much appreciate you guys thank you thank you very much yes sir all right U the next on our agenda we have Sheila Smith I believe Smith is Miss Smith here yes she before she comes let me just quickly point you to page 103 and 104 you have to turn it sideways but I think it's critical that you hear this 103 and 104 yes sir those are usage
36:20
Unidentified reports if I remember right okay is that
36:23
Unidentified what they are yes all right okay so the
36:27
Chief of Staff James Valley first report on 103 if you look at the top left it was printed September the 2nd but it's for hell the municipal water so that and down under your eth month totals it shows you lost perc is at 60. 23% right there's nothing to brag on but it's less than the 73 so it's headed in the right direction and then you go to the next page same type of report um your loss percentage at 3885 U and that's West Helena but you know Hela surviving because his whales are working better West Helena at a lower loss rate but it's not surviving because the whales are not producing water U so we we got lots of room for improvement but those numbers look to be trending in the right direction and that's the only reason those reports well there other reason those reports in there too uh so you can talk about some of the high users and stuff like that but I just wanted you to have that information uh Miss Smith they're calling for you she said she had some questions if y'all can answer okay hello
37:45
Sheila Smith hello hello um first I did want to uh do want to address the water um it's a big concern to mine because I've been in this community for born and raised here I left went to school come back here move back home and it's kind of like the worst I've seen it since I've been here home um with the water and the situation going on in the city so it's a big concern to M because I raised my kids here and this is home my this one my family it is it was and is and a lot have passed on but with the water I know that the water company you know they charge a 10% late fee and on top of that to send out a piece of paper every month they charge you an extra $15 if they send you a piece of paper to your home and that don't understand that uh $15 for a piece of paper to send to my house that's crazy U it's price gouging um and that's a if you you calculate that say 2,000 people don't you send out a bill the the late notice on the 1515 on 2,000 people you got a $30,000 right there so if you got $30,000 a month you're getting in every month for sending out a piece of paper to the citizens and then for the year you're looking at $360,000 uh and I agree with him this money it has to be managed better uh the city can't even pay the phone bill that where's the money out of $360,000 a year you've charging us $15 for one piece of paper why the phone's not on this is a big serious issue on where is what are you all doing with the money I'm just concerned because I live here and I can't even get up and take a bath to go to work yeah pay flush to come I got to run over town to find water and I'm about broke I paid my water bill I paid them $159 plus I still don't have water flush M Lord forbid if I drink it how much was your water bill they sent me for 278 but when they went back down on it it was when they did the adjustment it was $159 but that's a $15 fee on there for sending out a piece of paper plus the 10% I thought the understanding was that we were not going to charge the late notices and all that I thought we agreed on that before we left I came over here and talked to Miss Ford which no one was in the office by Miss Ford I mean am I wrong did we did we not discuss that one like 110 and it was 278 when they sent out the next bill it was going to be like 310 with all the late fees if I had paid after the 15 because it would be $15 just to send out that piece of paper $15 extra for one piece of paper and I went on and I said this is not what it say on the paper it say a 10% late fee she said well we just we can't put it on the paper now cuz we're just sending out all the bills right now trying to get rid of the paper that they do have and I said well it's not a contract cuz it needs to say it people don't know what they're paying and Miss Smith when we had the
41:56
Councilman Don Etherly (Ward 3) last the meeting when we first addressed the uh change in rates what we voted to do was place a moratorium on that ordinance and when we talked about it a couple of weeks later what we suggested uh here at this at this meeting was that citizens just play paid the previous month's bill and so there should be a credit that's sucess going forward that's the way that it should work and that's what we discussed here and that was what our anticipation was so yes ma'am I I got a uh I got a notice also that said you you didn't pay this much and you got all these fees but I didn't pay it because we're in a pause mode nobody can address what your late fees are going to be if you have any at all because nobody knows what your final bill is going to be for that period of time well she didn't get
42:42
Unidentified me a chorice when I was in there it was pay that or well and and and I'm sorry
42:47
Unidentified that you had that experience but but that should not have been the case at the time that you went there that's right
43:00
Unidentified and I say that because we gave we had a specific discussion about what people should do going forward since nobody knew the final bill so I'm sorry that you had that experience but it should have been just pay what you paid last month we can't really because late fees are percentage and if you don't know what the total is you don't know what percentage to assist so that should not have happened well I mean nobody knows
43:25
Chief of Staff James Valley° because it should have been based on the somebody know somebody knows they they did go back to the July rates okay that's what they did so they're paying if hers is more than it was in July it's based on the July rate not the August rate and then the bill when she first got it had the notice of the late fee and the $15 on it and what they did because they got this ENT before they sent out the lake notice those people who had paid before was late because everybody knows the late date was the 16th uh would charg the late fee based on the old bill amount the the the current month's bill and so that's why she's charge the late fee and the $15 now that piece of paper doesn't print itself doesn't make itself do get the numbers don't get the data or any of that that piece of paper is billing extra time that the people in the office are used using to do that that fee is avoidable if the customer pays before that date and that's what we explain when we put it in the uh the the the the ordinance and so U if the council wants to go back and credit people who paid they already reduced rate and they paid it late and you don't take off the $15 that's that's your choice but because she they did the recalculation for for every customer their bill is set at the rate it was in July now it may be more cuz they used more water but it said at the July rate so everybody so the car that car that she's referring to is if it's late you get you go a late a late reminder it tells you you get your it's $5 okay go for that little piece car but not but not the not the regular car bill card the regular bill came out at the end of last month first of this month and then on the 15 16 whenever they sent it out they sent out a new one saying you didn't pay us by this date you owe this much money I got it's the rebuilding yes
45:35
Unidentified sir I I I hear what you're saying Mr I'm
45:38
Councilman Don Etherly (Ward 3) telling you I got a late notice for $97 my bill went from about $80 to $190 I paid the previous month's bill there's no way I accumulate $90 in late fees on my previous calculation it's just not possible so if I have a a late notice for $97 that means there was no adjustment made to my account the time that I paid and I assume you saying $97 total do that that in 15 and 10% that's what it says I owe now $97 so that includes 97 more that's the way I read oh I don't
46:14
Unidentified think that's right you you you think it's it's it's a total of 97 yeah but I
46:20
Unidentified paid I paid it before the 15th so that that may mean it didn't get that data didn't get enter so because you shouldn't have gotten the notice at all if you pay before the 15 I did so that may mean that data didn't get in it but
46:32
Councilwoman Maxine Miller (Ward 1) I check it and I think we should check it for everyone because I've had calls from constituents of mine as well and you know before we left this meeting I thought we were very clear that we were going to not charge all those late fees and fines and all that because the city was in the midst of trying trying to address first of all we were we were dealing with the moratorium and we were going to come back to the table we were going to have people to come in we were going to look at the rates we were going to have a financial meeting about the rates we were going to do all these things and we did not want to put the people in a position to pay all of that because they were confused just like we were trying to manage the information ourselves and I don't think it's fair now I mean and I think that you know it's it's not you know clearly not just uh Miss Smith I mean if attorney ethically said the same thing and I've had people call me with the same issue you know this is not a random act this is something that we're saying and I think we need to address that fairly that's exactly what
47:46
Unidentified I I understood too that's what I we agreed on but the late are not for the current late late that you talking about it's on her bill are the late fees from her previous Bill am I right is is
48:03
Unidentified at the previous billing rate right but
48:06
Unidentified she had a late fee on that bill right so
48:09
Unidentified that's what they charged her yeah for the previous billing rate yes right how
48:13
Unidentified can I get a late fee for something I already paid no no no well so they sent
48:19
Unidentified you a bill for $200 something do right 278 and they reduced that Bill yes and you didn't pay it I paid it after the
48:27
Unidentified 15th right they charged me 10% of the two they still charge me the whole lake fee 10% of what I don't know well I I
48:40
Unidentified I yeah yeah I look it up and show it we we we may not be able to solve the billing questions here in in this meeting but my bill um yes ma' so they should have char me they Fe from last month so well yes ma'am I understand
48:58
Unidentified this and I hear what the city council is saying and I I look you up your your phone number over there the water company yes sir on the account yes sir okay we'll call you okay all right thank you thank you Miss Smith thank you
49:38
Unidentified yeah you g speak you need to come to the to the mic well well hold on a second we
49:44
Councilman Don Etherly (Ward 3) have we have an agenda and we need to stick to our agenda we need stick to agenda your your issue is noted I'm not the may but I'm I'm sure he'll get word that people want to know when the water is being turned off I I these discussions let me just throw this out these discussions are I think they're helpful because I've learned you know the my rule is don't read the comments don't read the comments and so I spent a few days reading the comments and it it has occurred to me that most people don't even understand the water issues and as we have these discussions here around this table we've talked about it all year long but some of the issues have that have been presented remind me that most of our citizens don't understand the water issues I read for example the katv.com online story and the headline was citizens intensify calls for Solutions the solution has been in the work all year long we approve we wave bidding we approve the new wh construction they've been working on that well for months that's the only solution if that well gets under construction uh just two weeks ago the water superintendent stood right here in this meeting and told everybody that the tank was at 32 ft and they were going to have to go through some measures to preserve that tank and I asked a specific question if we lose that tank what happens he said we may not be able to get it back we may be without water but the solution he said then we have to get this new well online but I understand that a lot of our citizens don't understand but and it took me a long time to understand these water issues so rates are related to operation of the water dep Department it's not going to fix our water infrastructure problems $1 million is to start addressing the water infrastructure problems but the water outage that we have right now is based on that well that's being built right now has been under construction for months and the the the honest answer to everybody is this we've been under a gun since January of this year and we talked about it consistently at this table all year long but we're in a Race Against Time because the three remaining whales in West Helena have been failing just like we in not so we have decreased production increased leakage and we're just patching long enough to get that new well online and they say they're days away they've been days away for a long time now but we're hoping that they are days away and they can get it online start pumping water and then we will be able to take a breath for a minute but there is no other solution that well is like a heart patient who needs a transplant we need that new well to go to start pumping water and if it doesn't we're going to be without water and so the water department did what they had to do to at least be able to restore water maybe on a temporary basis but they did what they had to do to try to keep water going until that new well comes online and that's just kind of The Facts of where we are um but that well has been under construction for months now but I understand that there's a lot of there's a gap in information this is whyde It's a Grand Canyon in this community people think we got water already I mean sorry we got money already and it got spent somewhere else we haven't received one dime of that $1 million uh we wanted to put the million dollars from the hospital sale towards the new well construction we haven't received a dime of that money there's been no money to address any of these problems we've been doing the city has been doing the best it can to keep the water lines patched we got two $100,000 loans from the state all of that is gone now to uh patch up the lines and so that's kind of where we are I agree about fiscal management and all those things I have just as many complaints as most people but as it relates to what's happening right now on the ground it's that well that needs to come online so that we can get water pump into to the citizens of West um next item on the agenda is mord mord found at page 118 in your agenda actually it's page 119 M Rams is this your presentation the mill ordance no sir okay the mill ordinance is the ordinance we must pass each year in order to collect property taxes right got to get it passed and get it over to the county clerk right so pretty well standard what yes sir it's
54:41
Unidentified identical the CH years okay number 15 ORD number 15 is
54:48
Councilman Joe St. Columbia (Ward 2)° there a motion on ordinance number 15 I so move reading title only
54:56
Unidentified the rules Mr St Columbia Mr St Columbia moves to uh Place ordinance number 15 on his third and final reading reading the title only is there a
55:07
Unidentified second second by Miss Davis any
55:12
City Clerk Sandi Ramsey° discussion mam clerk call the rooll Please Mr anle yes M Miller yes Miss
55:17
City Clerk Sandi Ramsey° Davis yes Dr Miller yes Mr St Columbia yes ordinance number 15 2024 ordinance Lev and taxes on real and person personal property located within the city of hel West hel based on the 2023 assessment to the freid general expenses of the city of hel West hel Arkansas for the year 2023 to pay penes to retired police officers and firefighters and Pen to widows and minor children of ceased police offic and firefighters and for other purposes is there a motion to adopt so Move Motion by St Columbia to
55:49
Unidentified adopt ordinance number 15 is there a
55:51
Unidentified second second by Miss Davis any
55:54
Unidentified discussion mam CL call roll please M
55:57
City Clerk Sandi Ramsey Davis yes Mr Miller yes Mr ethy yes Dr Miller yes Mr St columia five yes ordinance [Music]
56:13
Councilman Don Etherly (Ward 3) passes not one see1 ordinance passes the next thing is at page 122 instead of 121 this the appraisal for the boys and girls club Mr Val okay as relates to the
56:25
City Attorney Andre Valley Boys and Girls Club we are close to finalizing uh the D transfer the appraisal that you have is is for $9,000 uh as you all previously aware you are voted $110,000 uh the appraisal cost a th000 boys and girls club uh through his attorney Philip Allen and I been talking back and forth they agreed to AC $9,000 with the with you all's uh agreement to pay it but you all already previously approved it and so at this point we at app point just inform you and we'll try to get the Deeds executed this week uh the State Department of Health uh we've been waiting for them to approve the language of the Wellhead prot protection area that has to be approved before the conveyance is done and before we can have the full ownership of it uh but we have to own it before we can operate it and we're trying to get this done this week and so the 10,000 you posted as you see that's a $1,000 invoice for the uh appraisal and his expert testimony trial is included in that and then that's $9,000 left to pay the boys and girls club and so that's for information per purposes only but you've already approved and it's already been placed with the Circuit Court of Phillips County so at this point we're going to move forward to execute the Deeds to complete the well land transfer we need a motion for the uh pay the invoice of $1,000 that what you're
58:02
Unidentified talking about now you can so you can so
58:05
City Attorney Andre Valley° move you've already approved us posting 10,000 with the court the 10,000 is there this is just telling you how it's going to be spent okay but you've already approved $10,000 we paid it to the court I thought we did yes sir but $9,000 the appraisal we've given it for the purpose you know what the appraisal came back and a large measure with that the lack of use of the area the 100 uh feet uh circumference around the um well itself the well head protection
58:44
Unidentified area you don't need to steal anything on this I'm taking that you've already approved it I mean I agree all right um
58:53
City Attorney Andre Valley° sir I I was just moving to the next item
58:56
Chief of Staff James Valley okay on page 93 going backwards what did we miss is it 93 I got 93 on mine I don't have a I have um the appraisal is 121 and I have 97 well I guess I was trying to go in order um what's 93 number F if you go down the letter f um okay 92 is what I see on my agenda page 92 yes it's actually 93 I think I uh we re remove the pages before after we numbered them this a request approve inves yes so we at the underwater Department letter f p page 93 invoice to um Jones Hydro um the last time we came this is below the M spending limit but uh Mr say I'm looking at page 94
59:58
Chief of Staff James Valley Jones Hydro he removed a fail check valve on well number 10 and installed a 8 in check Val modifi the pipeing for installation is $2,700 um and that work was done and been completed then this case eldrid Supply uh to invo for $1,285 for the repair of Volvo what it's a back I'm thinking it was a Volvo no it's a case uh uh back and it it itemizes all the things that they uh did to that but the third item on there is quite expensive it's a that's a hydraulic pump and then the first item it's it's 4,400 and then the first item is the kit to to repair it's 6700 and then just go down uh with total Parts $122,000 label $3600 freight charge $375 subtotal $6,000 some OD dollar sales tax 1300 total $188,200 and this uh machine is ready for us to pick up when we're able to make the payment it's one of three back holes that we have in the city uh two of them are down including this one and we got one that's sitting out in the clear view uh neighborhood that's down and the other one that's in use is leaking fuel the other invoice is quad bomb Plumbing for work between August to 23rd and September to 6 total of 13 hours uh $3,900 plus $100 to make some repairs using materials total $44,000 invoice so those are the water department requests for approval uh payment as funds become available so we have really got three invoices here one Jones Eldridge and quom correct and those are the invoices
1:02:11
Unidentified that you want us to approve yes sir do one at a time or how you want to
1:02:21
Unidentified do I suggest you approve them as a group
1:02:24
Unidentified but you can do them all unless there's some indic indication to not approve I dis approve all as a grou the work has been done
1:02:35
Unidentified and correct I move toay these invoices uh as forms become available yes I second motion by Davis to approve
1:02:48
Unidentified the three presented invoices uh second
1:02:51
City Clerk Sandi Ramsey by Miss Miller is there any discussion madam you call the rooll Please Mr St Columbia yes Dr Miller yes M Davis yes M Miller yes mrly yes five [Music] yes all right and with with that you
1:03:10
Chief of Staff James Valley have basically four items left um that's the water rate update the water rate ordinance water s rate ordinance um and then you have item G consumer complaints to AG that's where consumers of this community have submitted complaints to the Arkansas attorney general we have them listed by number and all of the information that we have on that uh we have until this Friday I believe it is to respond and those are included FYI and listed by number because we're not trying to necessarily name the people who complain uh as it might appear that we're uh not handling that appropriately but it's such that you'll know what the complaint is what their water usage was and our response is going to be to submit the moratorium ordinance uh these uh rate adjustments from 2023 2024 uh the ordinance from 2024 where we increased the rates followed by the moratorium ordinance and basically tell the attorney Jones where we are in this process have you responded to the Attorney General on all of these not yet
1:04:23
Unidentified that's I was just explaining to you how
1:04:24
Unidentified we're going to respond and what is going to include would you give us a copy of your reply when you do it certainly that
1:04:33
Unidentified won't be any problem at
1:04:37
Unidentified all okay is there any so the the last of these items is items b c and d starting at page it says 97 but it's actually 98 I don't know how we got off on the numbers but um it basically shows um the I'mma call it a memorandum from the city treasury that he does each year so it's a 2023 where they adjusted the race based on the CPI and that's on page you stting to page 98 98 yes
1:05:21
Unidentified sir really 9
1:05:27
Chief of Staff James Valley well yes sir that's a kind of a tab cover sheet in front of each one so 99 is the 20 23 CPI adjustment that the city treasury did and then at 101 that's the 2024 adjustment that he did which had your base water rate at $16.74 for the first th000 G $282 for each thousand after that and on sewer $958 C uh for the first th000 gallons $188 for each th000 gallons after that um page 103 and 104 we covered what I wanted to show you uh there's other information that I could explain to you if you had any questions about it um but if you look it shows you how many people in this each group of water users and it's by the month yeah so at on page 103 in August we had 30 people uh in the hell in the water system that use more than 50,000 gallons of water just for example and each one of these groups are exclusive of the others so you add them up as you go across to the huh a
1:06:48
Unidentified residential that's the whole system oh it's not telling you whether they're residential or or commercial okay was
1:06:55
City Attorney Andre Valley° just saying you had 30 people in August in Helena use more than 50,000 gallons of water and in August in West 45 people use more than that amount but as you go across you see most of your customers are under 10,000 10,000 gallons of usage and that's why I was mentioning earlier that you might tweak your rate after that number if you feel like you need to to bring the impact of it down on some of your uh businesses uh let's say between 10 and 100,000 gallons but those that's using over 100,000 gallons are probably in the U have the capacity to pay let's just say it that way CU we got several folks using three and 400,000 gallons every month yeah and they pay two what caused hel high
1:08:01
Unidentified water loss what was the cause of hel losing all that water what col is is going to
1:08:09
City Attorney Andre Valley° be leaks all Le that's that's going to be the best information I can give you is that this usage report basically is a calculation of what you pumped into your your your plant and then what you sold to your customers and subtracting out the difference and giving you a percentage and so the assumption is that you lost that water somehow it's either unmetered let's say like on a fire suppression line in some of your plants or churches or other building if that line runs it's unbe so it wouldn't be sold through the meter or there's a leak or something of that sort anybody got any questions about this these [Music] reports I um the one thing I
1:09:05
Councilwoman Maxine Miller (Ward 1) was very interested in is um when Mr Chek mentioned that if we could and I know we discussed November but he was saying he made the point that if we were to delay it some and give our residents and our businesses and everyone an opportunity to repair lines uh see if they have leaks and so forth and so on that maybe that would be helpful as well because I know you made a point that you went to someone's resident and they legitimately had a tremendous leak going on so they really did use a lot of water you know and they may not have known they had it or you know maybe they did know or like you know I think I talked about once before all of this started is what are what do we do about these renters who are renting from someone but they pay their own pH their own water bill but then I know some someone said well you know it should be incoming upon the you know landlord to get the fixes made and all of that but you know we know that that doesn't always translate that you have people who are renting their landlords don't make the necessary repairs and so they have these huge bills and it's I guess what I'm driving at is I think that there's a lot of considerations to be taken into into consideration and I really thought that the point he made I thought that was just really important oh sorry oh no no no
1:11:05
Councilwoman Maxine Miller (Ward 1) sorry if you know if we get I mean because I had a lady who called me and and so I know that it's not just us you know being aggressive and she admitted that she' been out there you know watering you know apple trees and everything else and she was like well I just didn't know it was going to go up that much I I mean I think there's just a lot for us to take into account and think about right well part of taking
1:11:35
Unidentified that into account and I and I appreciate and understand that was to put this sheet together where you can look at usage and what the impact would be on them and that's I've sent you you know comparisons of what the July rate was August and then the proposed rate is for the various customers especially since we learned that you didn't have to raise the sewer um at the same time as you raising the water to meet that mhi and the only difference Mr bring down the only difference this $582 number and what denn Sternberg recommended for the first year is 76 he recommended $56 right here we're saying 582 because it Le to mhi and on 10,000 gallons it's only $760 more in race that it requires so you need things that wants there the other numbers are in line race recommendation for the first year go with he said 1620 but that wasn't was7 already there and then said 506 so we only propos 58 is 76 per G which is like okay so these numbers are not the
1:13:07
Unidentified numbers that our customers saw when they got their first rais B absolutely not
1:13:15
Unidentified they were much higher okay so these are
1:13:17
Chief of Staff James Valley new right this number was 1620 this one was $758 and this sewer was $988 per thousand gallon so what what you do is you add it up Josh take this up a little so I can show the sewer you would add this 582 and the sewer 282 and you come up with a whatever let's say it's $7 not s let's say $8 we were charge $17.46 in August per 100,000 so now you add this 582 and this 282 7 + 82 tce which is 164 so it's 864 per thousand gallons of Usage Now what we would charge is $17 46 cent in office so you brought it down a whole lot almost over half and you still as I said meet the mhi on the water and you don't have to meet it on the SU so it's much more reasonable in terms of impact on our citizen that there's some tweaks you can do to these numbers that I'm talking about if you want to shift the impact from let's say you got single elderly person who's going to use less than a do you can start lower on the first is but each I got to go up to make up for that right uh there are people who said why don't you just put $10 on the front end on every customer that sounds fair but it's actually regressive because it's based on usage right so why would my usage go up when I'm just using a little where the person $100,000 don't feel that at all you know and so when you deal with the percentage is one of the things and and I meant to tell Mr CH and Mr I thought they both did a good job and we we applaud Mr ch we didn't appla I think we did a good job we should appla I just I want to throw two cents
1:15:40
Councilman Don Etherly (Ward 3) in but you can um this is not I guess this is a preference just a preference and and and we'll get there as a consensus one way or another but I think we have to always remember that we have that consent order that we have to meet and we're down to less than 30 less than 30 days less than 30 days where we have to have a license director on board at whatever he charge whoever we can get at whatever he charges and we have to have those two licensed operators plan operators corre and and U they're going to cost us in addition to what we already have right now and that's not optional we have that consent order and we have have to meet it and so our water department in uh expense our labor expense is going to increase in the next 30 days and the revenue if it stays the same it's not going to it's already underwater it already operates underwater and so we have to keep that in mind and that's why I didn't want to kick this can too far down the road and I'm not suggesting that we take up this issue right now I'm just saying we have to keep that in mind that we have some additional expenses coming and that's just labor expenses numb the Bas not at the level that we're going not the level of the state of requiring yeah the state of requiring a license to have the highest license in each of those positions and we have a order from the Department of Health an order from uh natural resources telling us get this done the from the Department of Health they gave us 90 days from July 25th to have a licensed operator and they prefer that we have licensed for both of the plant managers and that we have that done and we have we need to pay what the market bears and we've been below market for a while
1:17:43
Unidentified not they were not they were filled at some point with people that met the standard at some point they f with people that didn't meet the standard not in
1:17:53
Unidentified 2022 ask you had the Tony scrin he was Tony SC was in 2022 but his salary was less than 70 his salary was less than 70 and his salary is less than what the the standard is right yeah
1:18:11
Unidentified so yeah so the positions are not new we're just going to pay the people more money right well
1:18:20
Unidentified understand it's not just completely new as far right it's just the difference in the what we what we were paying and where are we with
1:18:36
Unidentified candidates where are we with candidates where do we have where are we with applicants I hadn't gotten any any
1:18:42
Chief of Staff James Valley feedback on that so we're GNA probably have to do some aggressive recruiting we've advertised in Ral water magazine the Democrat the world and maybe somewhere else yeah um so that's what those numbers and this calculator is for the purpose of hopefully council members or citizens uh playing with it you just go inad and put in your usage number and you see what you bill will be and I kind of showed that the last meeting but this one option I is the one that uh we're calling the mayor's recommendation as to what we do do uh on that um but you got some some big users like the nursing home and Walmart and and and some of your chemical plants or other facilities that use a lot of water and so you if you like I can get Jackie to get you that information so you kind of know uh I think one of the mistakes that was made in the last rate uh adjustment is that we went to 6,000 gallons in terms of looking at the outlet when we probably should have gone to the 400,000 gallons where you can see the difference in the impact uh on them so we we've done that this time but U that's what that is yeah now uh one of the things that uh Miss Miller and Dr Miller had asked for was a meeting with uh Cole claser and some others and and they expressed uh that they'd be interested but they didn't tell us what their availab availability is other than you know he sent the response uh which I would imagine that the meeting would include generally speaking the same stuff um and one of the things that I had a good conversation with Mr chica about um they recommended you raise your race 58% above that 2022 uh rate but that 58% could be misleading because you got variables you start at one point and if your usage goes up that 58% goes up so somebody comes in and tells you that that bill went up a certain percentage it's it's going to be higher the more water they use or SE or whatever it is yeah and so that's one of the things where I I don't want youall to get caught up in the percentage I don't want to call it the game but when people present the percentages don't get caught up in that as the only measure of how you look at the reasonableness of your rates because the percentage is it's a variable so it's going to expound almost as go up person who used a th000 gallons went up 10% person who used 100,000 gallons went up 700% for example but the same rate and so those percentages could be misleading in that sense yes sir I
1:21:48
Unidentified just the um the base feed um is not changing what it wased is that corre in in
1:22:05
City Attorney Andre Valley° this uh option it is changing as a technical thing in terms of how we're calculating it so that's a good point so um we've been Charing 1674 for the first 1000 Gall instead because the way we calculated this which are 1674 Plus plus the 582 for the first $1,000 and then so chared for each ,000 so really the first 1000 would be 16 plus that number like 22 I I guess I guess the point that that like to make is you know in addition so Dennis reced raising it to $56 um with no no change in the base rate but that base rate covers the first th000 gall and this is different from that in that the base rate doesn't cover any usage and so for the first thousand gallons you're actually paying 582 more than what the Bas R would have been previous to this orance passage and and and that's correct but that's to get the calculation to the mhi so basically the mhi be roughly $400 at 4,000 Gall so you take 4 subtract 1674 divide by three or by four whichever way you want to divide it you get this number that's how we got it so we we can alter that number and that that number is kind of I've heard our mhi has been anywhere from like you said 40 to $31 I mean this is been no no no the $40 I'm talking
1:23:45
Unidentified about okay the 31,000 is not the number that c clay you them use okay they came up with an average of 25,000 but they gave us the number 30 $9.83 so you just throw out what I've said and just use $39 83 at 4,000 gallons then you subtract your first is off of that then you have to charge the other for the remaining gallons to get to that $39 83 that's what I'm saying I have one more question the the
1:24:16
City Attorney Andre Valley° mhi consideration um my understanding was that was that was to qualify for loan forgiveness but what I also read was that communities with higher than 51% low moderate income families would automatically Lo foress so is there another we have toet the percent well all they told us in the the
1:24:45
Chief of Staff James Valley communication we had and we can ask them that more specifically is that we need to be at that $39 83 to qualify for loan forgiveness based on this threeyear average of the mhi that they used to calculate it and um they they are aware that we could be at either 1.25 or 1.5 and that the 398 three represents 1.86 which is actually higher than either one of those numbers but that's the number they said we would need in order to repay that loan at $800,000 a year than documentation something that's the email I forward to you but the council has that email but I I forward it to you so you have then Mr CH I can send it to you to the same same email that they got all righty
1:25:44
Unidentified um anything else to take up on this issue well I think all of the rest of
1:25:50
Unidentified them are all tied together they all the same so if there's no inclination to pass an ordinance you're at the end of your agenda okay well then let me do
1:25:59
Unidentified something let me go back and correct one thing I told Mr Crockett he wasn't on the agenda but then we had an open session here and I so I feel like he should at least get a chance to say what he wanted to say at this point and so um Mr crackett you you may yes however you want to do it
1:26:21
Crockett okay I was just one me in the house about more in one house and and the water cut off so if you just give us some time time water or whatever so water water I know
1:26:55
Unidentified we understand I so I have water so I
1:27:09
Unidentified have yes sir and and thank you Mr car I
1:27:13
Unidentified I was trying to honor the rules but when it went all off the rails I said I need um okay I was just G to say just real quickly um I I if this I don't know if this will work but several several school districts uh I've worked at you know we we had a robo call can we do a robo call and just and is they're really cheap software really cheap you just do a get a database of everybody's phone number you send the robo C oh there's
1:27:42
Unidentified there's going to be a water Bo today they've gone to uh texting type thing
1:27:47
Unidentified okay and there's uh a text alert on the
1:27:50
Unidentified Water Company's web page okay I'm not
1:27:53
Unidentified fully familiar with it but it does do some alerts okay uh I hadn't controlled
1:27:58
Chief of Staff James Valley or managed that but I look into that so we can do better but and and in Fr Mr Crockett Saturday we had a big line to break at Weavers and so we was going to lose the tank and they cut everybody off uh and and so they concentrated on fixing the leak as opposed to telling people we about to lose a tank kind of thing and soon as we fixed Weavers we had one break in front of the Boys and Girls Club and it was another one broke somewhere else that was pretty big and so they was out fixing the leaks uh and then overnight Sunday we didn't recover and so we ended up being without water they shut it down to F the system back up and so they got it up to 66 feet uh before they started turning people on this morning and last check I had was was at 59 ft and we're hoping that we can stay high enough that we won't uh have to take people out of water uh between now when the whale gets constructed I guess this is the part I need to do the whale update so um the the whale you know they' constructed the whale that's basically digging a hole and put some pipe down there and graveling all that so the water come out uh so on yesterday they put the pump down it's 592 feet or 582 feet recall it roughly 600 feet so the pump was put in yesterday today they put the motor on top of that pump and so the motor situated is ready to draw water out of there when we get electricity uh we have the r water has brought a generator to operate that motor uh until we can get uh energy fully in place we've done quite a bit of the stuff out there and our expectation that energy be here Thursday or Friday to bring electricity to that motor uh there's some runoff that they must do to cyle the water uh to make sure it's decent water and they take a sample of that water and it has to go to Little Rock uh to get the ra water testing and get approval from the health department before we can actually put the well online uh to use the water so hopefully within the next three to 10 days uh we'll have that well in use online either with a generator or with power from eny uh but the groundwork and all the major stuff has been done up for getting U electricity uh to it and you can go out there and see it there's a picture that the mayor will post later to showing some of the work that's been done over there okay thank you um any other issues
1:30:40
Unidentified announcements I have I have two there
1:30:43
Unidentified are no others uh no I have
1:30:46
Unidentified one if the truck trucks are operational and if we have the um the materials can we have somebody to start running a mosquito truck around here I
1:31:02
Unidentified don't know we got this but we we'll definitely check on it for you cuz the mosquitoes are carrying people away [Music]
1:31:17
Unidentified aw motion by St Columbia to adjourn a
1:31:22
Unidentified second
1:31:52
Unidentified m e
How this page was made: built from the city's own meeting video (YouTube ↗) and its posted meeting packet (Drive folder ↗). Dollar figures are quoted from the documents; nothing here is paraphrased from memory. Corrections: cheekforhelena@gmail.com.