GRAYS HARBOR COUNTY WATER DISTRICT #2
Newsletter for May/June 2023
We can’t live without water
POST THE EMERGENCY PHONE NUMBERS
THEY ARE AT THE END OF THIS NEWSLETTER
Web Site
There is important information on the web site. Check it often. There is always new content. https://www.centralparkwater.net.
There is general information about the water district, plus quite a bit of detail. The monthly Manager's Reports are posted, along with the meeting agendas and minutes, financial statements are posted, and this newsletter (along with historical newsletters) can be found on the site as well.
You can pay your bill from the web site. There is a "Pay My Bill" button. Xpress Bill Pay seems to be a very popular service. A lot of folks have signed up for it in one way or another. It is obligatory for me to address the occassional comments about the fees. The fees are charged and collected by Xpress Bill Pay, not the water district. In case you are not aware, every time you use your credit card or a service like Xpress Bill Pay, you pay a fee. Private sector companies can include those fees in the pricing of their goods and services. Government agencies typically can not. Of course, if the fee is included in the price, you are paying the fee whether you use a card or not. In the case of Xpress Bill Pay, you only pay the fee if you use the service, and you are aware that the fee is being charged.
The district has a Facebook page. Updates are posted as time allows. The general manager will, from time to time, post discussions on the issues of the day or general water industry philosophy and happenings. Facebook content is repeated on the web site for those who don't do social media.
Do not use the Facebook services for substantive questions or information. Facebook does not get checked regularly. For questions, or to pass information to the district, use email. The best one is ghcwd2@centralparkwater.net. That email gets checked often.
Power Outages
When power outages occur, it impacts the District’s ability to pump water from the wells up to the reservoirs. It is important to minimize water use during power outages.
About Leaks
The property owner is responsible for the condition of the plumbing on their side of the meter. The district offers one hour of free leak detection subject to operational considerations. This is a courtesy and does not relieve the property owner of the liability for all water passing through the meter.
The district is not a licensed contractor so we cannot repair leaks on the customer side of the meter.
Payments
Water bills are payable by:
Check (in-office, mail, night drop)
Cash (in-office, mail, night drop.)
Credit Card over the phone
Online bill pay with your bank.
Online payment through Xpress Bill Pay accessed through the district’s web site.
Xpress Bill Pay offers a variety of services. It is worth checking out even if you are not paying by card or online.
If you send your payment through the mail or use the night drop, be sure and include the bill stub so we know to whose account to credit the payment. If paying cash through the night drop be sure and place your payment and the bill stub in the provided envelope. Or any other envelope. If paying cash be SURE and note how much cash you are including on the bill stub. We have strict cash handling processes which includes confirming that the cash received is the cash the customer intended to include. Payments made into the night drop go into a secure locked box.
If you are struggling to pay your water bill, for whatever reason, the district offers a payment plan for past due accounts. It is best to contact the district early. Don’t be too proud to ask for help. Everybody experiences occasional tough times.
Emergency Notification
Be sure and sign up with the County for emergency notifications.
“Google” Grays Harbor County
Once on the web site click on “Departments”
Click on “Emergency Management”
On the links on the left, in green, click on “Emergency Alerts”
Fill in the blanks
THIS IS IMPORTANT. If you don’t have web access, ask a friend to help getting registered. If your contact information is not available to the County you may miss important emergency information not only from the County, but from the water district as well.
An example is the last year’s water main break between Holbrook and Schrader Lanes. There were simply too many people out of water or with reduced pressure to notify individually. The district utilized the County’s emergency notification system to get information to the community. That system uses a recorded phone message, a text message, and an email to each person for whom they have contact information.
Information on water system emergencies is posted on the web site in the “Notifications” section.
During emergency situations our plan is to have someone on the phones to answer questions as best as we can. We also try and post ongoing updates on Facebook and the web site. That kind of communication is important, but our ability to pass on information is secondary to addressing the problem.
Conditions of Service
There are conditions attached to the provision of water service. If you don’t have a copy, please request one. We can mail it or email it to you. You can pick up a copy at the office and they are posted on the web site.
Special Needs
It is absolutely vital that you inform the District if you have special needs. If you suffer from an immune deficiency or other problem where a lack of water could be life-threatening, we need to know.
Ongoing Maintenance/Repair
The main break between Holbrook Lane and Schrader Lane has been a source of ongoing adventure throughout 2022 and into 2023. The line was finally replaced and put into service in April, but not without some hitches along the way.
Our contractor had almost completed the replacement when it was noticed that the bank was continuing to move. Work had to be halted until the Department of Transportation could stabilize the bank. Fortunately, no damage was done to the district’s new water main.
The old and tired Reynvaan booster station, damaged as a result of the main break, has been replaced. The new booster station, though it had some teething problems at the beginning, is a major improvement over the old one. The old, inadequate and rotting pumphouse has been replaced with a better, and more sanitary, building. The difficult to maintain in-ground pump installation has been replaced with proper above ground centrifugal booster pumps. The old pressure switch/contactor controls have been replaced with Variable Frequency Drive controls.
Both the water main replacement and the Reynvaan Booster Station are eligible for FEMA reimbursement. There is a lot of paperwork involved in that. Most of the paperwork is complete and we should be seeing some checks soon. Those checks will go into reserves to replace the funds that were used for these two projects.
The North Bank Reservoir roof project has been completed.
We are planning very limited capital projects for 2023. The biggest project planned is the updating of the district’s Water System Plan. The update is due to be completed by February of next year. It is a year long project. One of the aspects of the plan is anticipated future projects. A big one is the improvement of pressure on portions of Clemons Road and vicinity. The district does not have the funds to complete that project, but we are including it in the plan because we hope to find granting money for the project.
There is a requirement from the Department of Health to increase pressures on Reynvaan Drive below the reservoir. The funds to complete this project are not available this year. However, we are moving forward on the engineering for this project.
The maintenance platform for the power service entry at the well site is badly rotted. We plan to replace that platform during the current year. Likewise, the main pump house floor has deteriorated to the point of being dangerous. We plan to replace the plywood floor with expanded fiberglass. The chlorine is very hard on the plywood.
There are other projects that are being deferred due to a lock of available funds. Inflation has been hard on the district with many of our costs increasing well above the headline inflation rate.
Fire hydrant maintenance and line flushing go hand in hand. It is important to ensure that the hydrants function as expected when needed. They need periodic testing and maintenance and testing. Flushing is an important part of the testing, and is necessary to keep the water mains free of sediment. When hydrant maintenance is occurring in your area you may experience short periods of reduced pressure.
Projects
These are the projects that currently have our attention:
Utility Repair Indefinite Delivery Contract. Awarded to Brumfield Construction.
Lower Reynvaan Extension: In engineering.
North Bank Access Road Paving: Deferred due to a lack of funding.
Clemons Reservoirs Access Road Paving: Deferred due to a lack of funding.
Clemons Road Pressure Issue: Included in WSP. Hope to find grant funding.
Fairway Terrace Main Replacement: Deferred due to a lack of funding.
Rates
The rate discussion is usually reserved for the November/December newsletter. It is important to start a little early this year because of the inflation pressures and the unusual number of high cost challenges we are facing.
An important point to make is that nobody here at the district likes rate increases. For one thing all of the commissioners and most of the staff live within Central Park. Aside from that, there is special concern for those in the community on fixed (low) incomes. Those folks are always on everyone’s minds when examining the budget and rates.
The flip side is that the district is required, by state law, to recover all expenses and maintain the financial viability of the water system into the indefinite future. That includes not only operation and maintenace, but capital asset management as well. Without adequate reserves to replace equipment when it wears out the system cannot operate into the future. The staff makes every effort to control costs consistent with providing safe and reliable drinking water.
And that we do. We don’t cut corners because that only increases costs down the road. But we examine everything we do with an eye to minimizing costs. The monthly Reconciled Budget Position Report is posted on the district’s web site for all to see.
Inflation is a big question mark this year. Yes, the Consumer Price Index is up. But the items tracked on the CPI are not necessarily the items that most impact water district costs. Actually, the Producer Price Index is a much better indicator of the cost increases faced by the district. While, at this writing, the CPI stands at 8.3%, the PPI is at 11%. We are not yet sure how the specifics impact the district’s overall costs in coming years. As an example, the price of no-lead brass fittings recently dropped by a small amount after several years of double digit increases. But the price of HDPE pipe, of which we use quite a bit in repairing service laterals, doubled. In the past we could plug in a 2.5% allowance for inflation and be very close to the mark. In 2022 the district’s operation and maintenance costs increased 15% overall. For 2023? We, quite frankly, don’t know. When things clarify (or not) discussions will be posted on the districts Facebook page and web site.
An additional factor in determining district costs is the issue of ongoing financial viability, an issue long neglected by public agencies. Which is why there is so much discussion about “crumbling infrastructure”. In order for the district to provide safe and reliable drinking water indefinitely, reserves must be established to replace capital assets when they reach the end of their useful life. There has been a failure to address this issue industry wide. It is not just an issue for the Central Park Water District. Part of the water rate contributes to building up those reserves. A big problem faced by this district, and almost all other water utilities, is that, despite rate increases over the years, there are no reserves available to replace the most expensive asset, water mains.
In order for the district to have the necessary reserves to replace the water mains over the next 50 years, assuming they last that long, many are already over 60 years old, rates would have to be way more expensive than they are now. The only answer is that the district will have to borrow money to replace water mains when the time comes. There is no easy answer. Kicking the can down the road is not a good answer. But it is the only one we have at the moment, bar more than doubling the water rate.
For the present, the district puts away sufficient savings for capital assets, apart from the water mains, so the money is available when those assets need replacing. What are those assets? Buildings, pumps, controls, vehicles, etc. Last year the district replaced the SCADA (short version, pump controls) computers. Payment for those bills came out of savings. Without those savings the computers could not have been replaced and the reliability of the pump controls would have decreased.
It would be wonderful if the district did not have to announce a rate increase in the November/December newsletter. It is highly unlikely that the district will be able to avoid an increase in 2024.
The allocated water is 1,200 cubic feet. That is 9,000 gallons. Relate that to bottled water. 9,000 gallons = about 75,000 bottles of water.
Water Quality Monitoring Report
Included in this newsletter is the required annual water quality report. Some additional information is necessary regarding this report.
One of the things on the web site is the annual Water Quality Monitoring Schedule, issued by the Department of Health and detailing the required sampling for the year. Check it out.
A complete history of the District’s water quality monitoring (as well as some other information) can be found on the Department of Health’s web site at https://fortress.wa.gov/doh/eh/portal/odw/si/Intro.aspx. The district’s state ID number is 29250.
One group of sampling we missed is Disinfection Byproducts (DBP). These are a family of chemicals (HAA5 and TTHM) that can be present as a result of chlorine disinfection. Tests for DBP have always returned non-detect.
The other potential contaminant is Nitrates. These are tested at the well heads and have always tested far below the trigger level. Both the 2020 samples and the 2022 samples are consistent with past sampling.
These were monitoring violations, that we are obligated to report to you, but given the long history, there has been no risk to public health.
There has been a lot of discussion of PFAS’s (poly- and perfluoroalkyls) in the news lately. These are a family of “foreever” chemicals that are found in fire fighting foam and various industrial processes. The district has tested for these substances under the Unregulated Contaminant Rule and none were detected.
More information can be found in the attached Consumer Confidence Report.
Tours
The District is offering a very limited number of system tours. We can only accommodate two people at a time and tours are limited to one per week. A full tour takes about two hours. If you are interested call the office for scheduling. Tour availability is subject to operational and weather considerations. You must be physically able to get into and out of a pickup truck.
Emergencies
There are water district staff available to address water emergency situations 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If you have an emergency, or even think you might have an emergency, do not be bashful about using the emergency contact numbers.
POST THE NUMBERS LISTED BELOW
Water district staff technicians are not in a position to answer billing or other account related questions. Office phones are answered between Noon and 4:00PM Monday through Friday. If you have an urgent need CALL THE EMERGENCY NUMBERS. If in doubt, call. Really, we don’t mind.
When leaving a voice mail, all that is necessary is your name and telephone number. You can pose your question when we return your call. Please speak slowly when leaving your number so we have time to write it down.
Thank You
Thank you for wading through all this information. If you have questions, or there are issues that we have not addressed in this newsletter, please feel free to call the office (360-532-1828) during posted hours, or email the General Manager (reg@centralparkwater.net). You are also always welcome at commissioners' meetings held at 7:00PM on the second Wednesday of each month in the District office. You can learn a lot at commissioners' meetings. The District office is located on East Cross Road just off of Hill Road.
Feel free to call or email if you have questions or concerns. We love to talk with you.
EMERGENCY CONTACT NUMBERS
360-580-2172
360-589-6007
360-591-1649
DO NOT HESITATE TO CALL.
Grays Harbor County Water District #2 is an equal opportunity provider and employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, disability, sex, gender identity, or religion.