Minutes
Regular Meeting of the Board of Directors for Chandler Heights Citrus Irrigation District
26651 S. Valencia, Queen Creek , AZ
January 13, 2009
A public meeting of the Chandler Heights Citrus Irrigation District was convened on Tuesday January 13, 2009 at 26620 South Mandarin. The meeting was called to order at 6:05pm with George Surbeck, Pat O’Malley, Gene Rose and Recording Secretary, Jollieen Williams and Field Operations Manager, Alfonso Garcia in attendance. From the public were district residents, Margaret Benson, Nancy Lopez, Derek Arnson, Ronnie Quintana, Amy Quintana, Patricia Fulks and Dan Kleinman.
President
Recording Secretary Jollieen Williams called the meeting to order. The first order of business was to have each Board Member take the Oath of Office. New to the Board, replacing the seat previously held by Patricia Fulks, was Gene Rose. The next order of business, which has typically been the first order of business at each regular January meeting, was to elect a President of the Board for the new calendar year. Gene Rose nominated Pat O’Malley and George Surbeck seconded the motion. There were no other nominations. A vote was held and Mr. O’Malley was unanimously elected President for 2009. The Recording Secretary then turned the meeting over to the newly elected Board President, Pat O’Malley.
Plans for 2009
Pat O’Malley indicated that there had been concerns expressed about the District having too much staff. He went on to state that he was extremely happy with the current staff and the way the stepped up in the midst of many changes and not only kept the business running efficiently, but helped with accomplishing some great things in the last year. As President of the Board, he is going to impress upon Jollieen Williams and Alfonso Garcia they should begin providing a regular update at monthly board meetings.
George Surbeck expressed a vision to acquire an engineering firm to research the District build out and water resource needs. As we move forward and the District continues to grow and expand, it’s important that we have enough water to support both the needs of residential and commercial customers.
Gene Rose stated the importance of appropriately anticipating the demand and making sure that we have the sufficient storage and delivery capacity. He also thought it was important to remind everyone that the District is being run with just 11 employees.
Jollieen Williams made mention that as the administration continues to change, rumors about bringing back previous staff members, particularly Nancy Lopez, continue to surface. She went on to say that the office staff has expressed concern about the stability of their positions and the growing comments about old employees returning are starting to increase. She mentioned that field employees have expressed serious concerns about their positions as well and wanted the Board to elaborate on its staffing plans for 2009 and perhaps even have a meeting with all staff members to dispel any inaccurate “rumors”. Pat O’Malley advised that he was extremely pleased with the current office and field staff. He said that he had no plans of changing employees or bringing previous employees back in 2009.
George Surbeck agreed with Pat O, indicating that he too was happy with the current group of employees and wouldn’t see a need to replace anyone by bringing old employees back. He went on to say that any staffing plans with regard to a layoff should be brought to Executive Session.
Gene Rose did not add any additional comments on this issue except stating that he was also happy with the current staff.
Designation of Board Member Duties and Responsibilities
Gene Rose prepared a list of duties he would like to assume. (Full report is attached for the record). Pat O’Malley and George Surbeck mentioned a few ongoing issues that they would like to continue to oversee such as Impact Fees and Energy Management, but did not report any definitive responsibilities. The Board will go over this issue in greater detail in a later meeting not yet scheduled.
Micro-Managing by Board Members
The subject of the Board micro-managing the office and field staff was brought up and discussed. Gene Rose stated that Board Members have much more important usage of their time than to manage these two departments. He went on to say Board Members must use their time wisely and concern themselves with the adequacy, improvement and much needed upgrades to the infrastructure of our district. Gene stated that Board Members must leave the management of our office and field to the managers of these two departments. He further stated that the Board Members insistence on micro-managing severely affects the efficiency of these two departments. George Surbeck indicated that he believed that Gene may have been referring to him personally. Gene confirmed. Pat O’Malley stated that he at times thought that George may have been too involved in the day-to-day operations of the office and field staff and said that he believed Board Members needed to use their energies in more beneficial ways. Jollieen Williams interjected that in George’s defense, he was not the only Board Member that in effort to assist and support, had seemingly used micro-managing techniques. Gene recommended that all the board members act only as advisors when either department manager called for their assistance and expressed that as a Board they should support their department manager and reflect that they have confidence in their abilities.
Office Equipment Upgrade
George Surbeck mentioned that as the districts processes and procedures change, they are seeing a need for a copier that can keep up and we are at a point where the current copier can’t keep up and often gets bottlenecked. He mentioned that we were waiting on a proposal from Gil Mares regarding upgrading the current machine to copy, print, fax and scan. The current machine is being leased at a rate of approximately $100 per month. Jollieen expressed that she supports the idea of upgrading the machine to be multi-functional but is not thrilled about the idea of depending on it as an “all-in-one” because when on function is down, the whole machine is down. She would like to see the office maintain a separate fax machine despite any upgrades to the current machine.
Pat O’Malley also mentioned that one of the office PC hard drives died during 2008, but fortunately all the data was backed up. He went on to state that there is a good chance that another hard drive could die this year.
Service Agreements (tabled until a later meeting not yet scheduled)
Engineering Firm (Water Resources)
Clow Fire Hydrants
Pat O’Malley stated that Brekanwood was advised that CHCID wanted Mueller hydrants in the subdivision but Clow hydrants were installed instead. Gene Rose explained that the Clow hydrants are comparable to the Mueller hydrants in terms of cost to repair. He said that spare parts for the Clow hydrants are equally as inexpensive.
Scheduling of Meeting with H Bar H and Brekanwood Residents
Pat O’Malley reported that subdivisions built after 1995 are currently being assessed an extra tax based on ground water by Central Arizona Groundwater Replenishment District (CAGRD). Within CHCID that currently means that only residents of Brekanwood or H Bar H are affected. There is a particular type of CAP water (excess water) that CHCID may be able to get that would avoid the CAGRD tax for these residents.
Pat committed to prepare a meeting notice to be mailed to residents of Brekanwood and H Bar H. A special Board Meeting will be scheduled to explain the details of this plan to residents. Buying excess water from CAP is a financial risk for CHCID and will not be done without a strong show of support from Brekanwood and H Bar H.
Routine Reports
(Pat O’Malley’s full report is attached for the record).
George Surbeck informed that the Rural Water Association of Arizona, previously Arizona Small Utilities Association (ASUA), is planning a conference near Laughlin in February. The conference is expected to focus on meters, education, field and office processes. He elaborated that currently the District is buying the least expensive meters, but they are expensive to rebuild. He thought it would be to the District benefit to send one or two members to this conference. No decision was made at the time.
Minutes from previous Board Meetings
The minutes from December 31 st were read and approved.
The meeting adjourned at 8:15 pm.
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Pat O’Malley
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George Surbeck
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Gene Rose
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Jollieen Williams (Recording Secretary)