[Dan Stoneking]: I'd like to start the meeting, it's 5.30, excuse me, 4.30 on April 19th, 2023. And we started the meeting, I moved to approve the minutes from the last meeting. And the Commissioner Orlando, I think is on, yes?
[Unidentified]: No, not yet? Not yet. It was trying to come in, so. Does he have a copy of it? He's right there. He's coming. Gone. Gone. Can we hear them? Okay. Rick, can you hear us? Yes. Unmute. Unmute. Unmute. Microphone, microphone. Give me a second. Yeah. I'm sorry. Enlarge your browser, full screen, bottom left. Can you hear me? Can you see me from here? He can't hear us. Oh, he can hear us. He can't just speak.
[Dan Stoneking]: He has to unmute himself.
[Unidentified]: It's time to figure out how to do it. There he is.
[Dan Stoneking]: Hello? Hey, Rick, can you hear us now? Yes, I can. Okay, so I just made a motion to approve the minutes for the last meeting. Commissioners, all in favor? Aye. Aye.
[Richard Orlando]: Aye.
[Dan Stoneking]: Okay, so Madam Secretary, record that the minutes for the last meeting have been approved. And with that said, the commitments and abatements to be signed will be hand-delivered. Of course, we've done that already. And so now number three on the agenda, Ron Baker, would you kindly review petition 17, number 1742, petition number 1742 with Linda O'Brien and John Schroeder concerning leaks, et cetera, et cetera, to their property.
[Unidentified]: So this is what they were away. He can unmute when he's ready. Oh, okay.
[Dan Stoneking]: You can ask to speak to him when he's ready. So this person was away, and when they came home, they had a broken bite from that big freeze on February 4th, when the city got 30, 40 calls that day of freeze-ups. That was that summer day that we had. When the bill came, it was just shy of $16,000. At the pictures, you can see, on the first set of pictures, you can see the rip right in the pipe.
[Unidentified]: So a pipe in the basement froze the ceiling, ran, destroyed the basement.
[Dan Stoneking]: The repair was made.
[Unidentified]: $16,000 later, it was fixed on, it works there, March 21st.
[Dan Stoneking]: So he called me when he was having it fixed and I gave him like an estimate of what was gonna be about $16,000 and he was shocked. Mayor Mrakasis, uOttawa, he can't hear you. my recommendation that I would give. If you guys wanna step outside that, that's up to you guys. The same thing, I also talked to the homeowner about filing a insurance claim. Yeah, I would see if there's an insurance claim in and if that water is recoverable, if the price of the water is recoverable. I doubt it, I don't think insurance companies do that. It's funny because, My cousin's house was affected by the same thing while she was away, and the city of Malden abated quite a good chunk of whatever it was. We could consider the mistake. You know, I actually don't know what they are. You know, I'm not quite sure. I don't think we're going to beat $16,000, but I will certainly go outside the $500,000 as well. And I'm curious, O'Brien, you said we'd have a weekend of these Facebooks and other engagements in that situation coming. Usually we have a lot of calls, a lot of freeze ups, a lot of burst meters. Usually when meters burnish, they don't record. So we already replaced a lot of those. We replaced like almost 30 of them. No, what I'm saying is it didn't record. His pipe cracked, which the meter recorded it all. That's the meter itself. And I was personally, there's nothing to. It's just, they got the damage of the house, not, not a bill. So for us, for us as a commission, we could consider the rather than, than a recording of the past because he first asked me to that meter itself. And I'm not sure what that was. I'll be 16,000, you know, but we could, I'll go charge it after the 500. The abatement that you guys usually do is active nature, $500 in sewer charges. The sewer charges 9,500 as a point of reference. I'm just saying, you guys have always said that they use the water, but let's look at the sewer. Yeah, no, I get it. It doesn't really matter. Like what I'm saying is referencing the city of Malden, because I know it's happened twice. My cousin's house and both times they have been a substantial sum. The insurance company covered, you know, the damage to the house, but they didn't even go anywhere near the water, you know, water, whatever. So, Mr. Chairman, I want to hear us. Can you hear us? Yes, I can hear you. Yep. Okay. Okay. Mr. Chairman, since the sewer water did not make its way into the sewer system, it remained in his home. I think that that's focusing more on that. I understand. I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I don't know what other cities and towns do. Us, as Ronnie pointed out, it's always been this- Rick, can you hear us? Yes. This $500 thing. Did you say that you have a few more of them or something? Oh, no. Okay. I don't know. I don't make a recommendation that go beyond the $500. I'm not quite sure what, you know, at least on the sewer side, obviously, because water did not go down the sewer. You want to triple that a couple of thousand dollars off? I don't know. Rick, what would you suggest?
[Richard Orlando]: We're gonna focus on the sewer side. On the sewer side, I would agree in general, it didn't enter the system again.
[Dan Stoneking]: So I think that's... Hold on a second. We're gonna make it louder.
[Richard Orlando]: I mean, given that the water didn't enter the system again for storage purposes, I would, that number is... Hold on one second, Rick.
[Dan Stoneking]: We're trying to make your voice a little bit louder. It's a little bit too... He's coming through that he's coming through the computer. Oh, he's coming through the computer. So he's trying to see if he can boost the volume up instead of through the TV.
[Richard Orlando]: Right now. Go ahead, buddy. Oh, where the water did not enter the system again, as in regards to it being sewerage, I would say that that number is, is questionable as to whether it should be charged to the client to the customer.
[Dan Stoneking]: I'll be honest with you, I would consider. So yeah, I mean, that's something we can entertain, Commissioner. So you feel the same way, obviously, we can entertain that. I mean, how long did this go on for, I've noticed, and so on and so forth? I mean, how long did it go on for? Which means what, a week? It was six weeks. I was in New York caring for my parents.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: And so I was gone. uh, end of January and, uh, didn't return until March 21st and came in and heard the water running. So I think it ran for like six weeks and, um, and, and I'm kicking myself because, you know, now I'm aware and I'm signed up for the, uh, the monitoring. Right. I get, I get, I get my daily emails, but I wasn't aware that I could be proactive that way. Uh, so I'm learning, learning these things, the, uh, the hard way.
[Dan Stoneking]: John, I'm curious that, oh, Mr. Souter, I'm sorry, I'm calling you John again. Did you ask the insurance company regarding any recovery of water usage on your insurance plan?
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: I have submitted it. I haven't gotten a feeling either way because they're still in, I have Liberty Mutual and yeah, they had a lot of claims that they're dealing with regarding flooding. uh, burst pipes and stuff in the Northeast for that. And so, uh, there, there's a defined answer yet. No, I do not have a defined answer yet.
[Dan Stoneking]: It would certainly help us. It would help us in determining what kind of help we can give you. We'd have to have a letter from the insurance company of either denying or paying it.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Sure. Sure. Okay. Um, I, I can certainly make a call tomorrow and, uh, see if I can't get a positive. yes or no on what they can or cannot do there. And I could reply.
[Richard Orlando]: Did they ask for the bill? Did they ask for your water bill? Copy?
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Yes, I did. Well, I sent it to them along with the plumbing repair and some other things, but I haven't gotten, you know, they haven't completed the claim because they just began demolition. I've got a dumpster in the driveway now. They just began demolition today on the basement. and getting everything out that was destroyed from the flood. So yeah, it took them that long, because I opened the claim on the 21st as well. And they're just finally getting out here. So I don't, I, but I can press the point with them tomorrow and get you an answer.
[Dan Stoneking]: I would think the adjuster would have, based on your coverage, would give you an idea of, yes, no problem, we're going to cover it, oh, I'm sorry, no, your policy doesn't cover it. But one way or the other, it would be very helpful for you to get something saying we're denying the homeowner any coverage. Sure, sure.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Who should I reach out to? I'll get you an answer tomorrow.
[Dan Stoneking]: You can reach out to me, Ron Baker. You spoke on the phone, right? You have my information? And if you use WaterSmart, if you use WaterSmart, if you click on the blue tab, you can respond to me. It says contact us. All those emails come directly to me. Commissioners, let us keep in mind that in anything we do, we set a precedent. Now this, this home was left unmonitored for what you say six weeks.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[Dan Stoneking]: And without a smart, you know, or water bug or anything else. Some other, some other home with possibly a larger meter and so on and so forth would have been left alone for the same amount of time and could be looking at a $30,000 bill and so on and so forth. By abating, just on the basis of the water, just because the water didn't go there, we're setting a precedent. So what happens the next time when somebody abandons their home, not abandons, but goes away for three months, five months, and they don't have a monetary system, they don't get the bill in time and said they don't know anything. So this is one of the things we need to test them out before we just say, listen, believe me, my hat's in the right place. put yourself on these things that set the precedent. Somebody else would be putting a claim for $200,000, but it's a commercial building. And say, hey, look, you did it for so-and-so. And nobody was there. So we need to get these answers. And we need some insurance. And then we'll see what we can do. We can split it down the middle, perhaps. But a percentage of these things going forward, maybe 25%, 30%, 40%, let's say. But to abate the whole thing, the president would be astronomical. But this is something we can talk about as soon as you get an answer for us.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, yeah.
[Dan Stoneking]: And I'm so sorry that it happened. And now that you have the water leak. And what I have a couple of properties of mine is a water bug, which is not even a water leak that dials my phone immediately if there's a leak. on the ground, you know what I mean? So there's a little monitor that goes on the, I have it as well around my water heater, the monitor that goes on the ground and as soon as water hits it, an alarm goes off. But these are the things you can talk to your electrician about, you know, they can install things like that, but our sympathy for what happened to your house.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Now, no, I mean, it'll never happen again, because now I'm on the water support system. I didn't realize that was an option for me to be able to sign up for that. And that's my fault, I guess.
[Dan Stoneking]: No, no, hey, listen, life has to be, you're taking care of your mother, you're doing what you're supposed to be doing in life. But unfortunately, these things do happen. In the winter, this was a tough winter. I've been lucky.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: I usually go away for the month of February, and I've never had this kind of an issue with the house, because I put it down, put the thermostat down to like 58, and you know, all these years have never had an issue.
[Dan Stoneking]: So, but this is what you can do. Anytime you leave your home for more than three days, five days a week, two weeks, shut, shut your meter up. You shut it off. You have a main shut off.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. Yeah.
[Dan Stoneking]: I do. If I go in for the weekend, I shut my main off because you don't know what's going to happen. So you have three things you can do. Shut the main, unless you're going off on an hour a day, you know, what the heck. But if you go main for a weekend, you know, you're going to be going away for a week, two weeks, three weeks. You know, and that's what I do in my condo in Florida. That's what I do in my house in Cape Cod. That's what I do in my house in Medford. I mean, not to say that I have these homes, but I've had to learn because I've had things happen to me and I have to learn the hard way. I got a leak in my own home that I couldn't recover. I didn't even put a petition to the commission because it would have been ironic. So I just picked the bill because it would look bad if I didn't. If I do have those three things, I will look into all of them. Okay, yes, thank you. Thank you so much for participating on the Zoom. We're going to table this until we get some answers and then we'll resolve it. Okay, yes, thank you. One second, May 17th is our next meeting, so just so you know.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: Okay. Okay. And what should I do regarding this bill is due on the 5th? of May.
[Dan Stoneking]: I was going to speak about that. My recommendation is it's a large sum of money. It's going to collect a lot of interest fast. Make a recommendation to the commission to waive any interest until the decision is made. Yes, yes, definitely. Yeah, we'll waive the interest on it. So the motion and the decision is made. The motion is to waive the interest until this is resolved. At least it won't accumulate any interest until we make a decision. Commissioner Orlando, how do you vote on that?
[Richard Orlando]: I would, I would agree with that.
[Dan Stoneking]: Okay. Okay. Unanimous approval on the input. Thank you so much.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: And I'll get an answer tomorrow and I will reach out to Ron. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Have a great weekend. Oh, you too.
[Dan Stoneking]: I appreciate your time.
[Unidentified]: It might be in the same class as me actually. It might be in the same class as me actually.
[Dan Stoneking]: I don't know if the public has any input. I don't know who the public is up there. I can't tell. They can. I don't know. It looks like we have two people. If they unmute themselves. If anyone from the public wishes to interject anything, now's the time.
[Unidentified]: Feel free. Okay.
[Dan Stoneking]: So that was done. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But I think, I think also the city in and of itself should, should, you know, those 9-1-1 calls that are made down at city hall at the beginning of the winter, especially the beginning of the winter, you know, let's say in December, maybe once a month, the 9-1-1 should call reminding you that if you go away for a long weekend, because of freezing conditions or what, please shut off your main in your home. I can't hear you. Unless you have steam, heat, then you won't have any water going to your house. You can't do that. You can't do that. Because it calls for water. Let me finish, without interrupting if you don't mind. I know what I'm saying, but also there's more to it. A plumber has to come and feed only, which I've done for my homes, and feed just the water, you know, the heating system, and that's it. And then the shutoff is just beyond that. These are the information, I think the city can give this information to people in the city because it's, it would be a great, great piece of information to give to them. But I think it should be done. That would happen. Yes, of course. But at least you give this. People don't even know that you can do that. So I think the city, on behalf of the love that the city has for the city, residents and so on and so forth, can give this information. And then you don't get it the first time. The next month, you make it a little bit clearer. The next month, you say, listen, call your plumber to explain to you how to do that, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So anyway, but that could be done. That's good information because they put out 15 things a day about the city, things that go on in the city, but that's one of them that can definitely be done. All right. Now, discussion on the second meter from Riverside Yard. So is anybody coming on this thing? Probably around five o'clock. Oh, well, what about the councilor Scott Pelton? He's the one that, well, I understand the thing that I'm But then what I need to find out is, did the council itself, or was it just a discussion that they had? Yeah, yeah, sure, why not? But it makes a difference. If the council itself, on the record, is recommending that we do that, and just, you know, a little verbal information that somebody got. I don't believe that is the case. I think this is just Councilor Scarpelli's. Well, that's what I want to find out. I mean, I don't know. how to do that, I think we tried to tell Kamala, if Rick's not physically here to sign the amendments, sign on his behalf. He can do it as long as Rick, Commissioner Orlando, can Mark Baker sign electronically?
[Richard Orlando]: Yes, I approve that, Ron, on my behalf, if you could sign for me.
[Dan Stoneking]: Thank you, thank you, Commissioner. Will do. Now, is there any way to contact whoever's coming? You said it's coming at five o'clock, but even if the general comes at five o'clock, I mean, I don't mind doing this, you know what I mean? Because I think, well, what they give in the city, I think it's worthy. But here again, precedence, matter. And then if you do for this and somebody else well you know I gave the city this and that so I should get a car wash is going to be next to say well my god we told the city cars to come over here we would do it for nothing for them so we deserve a second you know we're talking thousands and thousands of dollars of revenue loss when you second meters have become commercial. So this is what we have to think about as much as I, of course, I think they should have a second meter for this because look what they do with the city, you know, but it's not costing them anything to do that for the city. You know what I mean? So other than, you know, what, what they waive. We have to find out whether they were allowing the fire department to use a slip. Yeah. Which is, I think, I think that's great. It's a wonderful quid pro quo. There's no change of money, et cetera, et cetera. What I'm saying is there are other commercial things. There are chillers, for example, that go out of these buildings. And when the water doesn't go back into the sewer system, so it just goes into the ground, you know. I remember one of them. But yeah, we've had to nix that because you've got hundreds of these. So alone, you're talking about revenue decline like overnight. So, you know, that's a good example. There's a lot of water. I don't know if it creates mold up there. We had someone that did come before us. He had done his homework. There's three discussions going on at the same time. So what do you want to talk about? So I haven't done anything with this because This is kind of a treasury thing. It's kind of a treasurer issue. Convention housing. They have a lot of accounts.
[Unidentified]: And with them, we give them billing. We don't mail them a hundred bills. We hand them a packet. They give a check.
[Dan Stoneking]: And when they put the check in, it's supposed to balance. Medford Housing did not give the proper figure for the balance. And when they did that, the treasurer sent them back the check with all the bills and said, because it's a hundred different accounts, they can't say, well, let's pay these 90 accounts and give them, you can't leave a difference. It's gotta be down to a penny. So she sent the check back. Because she sent the check back, they accrued interest.
[Unidentified]: They filed 28 abatements for like 20, but they also are asking for past due amounts, meaning that they wanted the interest waived, but there was a past due balance of $2.16.
[Dan Stoneking]: My recommendation is not to waive the pass too, because that's not interest, that's not anything that was built water or sewer. But the interest. So they did pay, once everything was settled, they did pay the money. Right, and they're challenging the interest. These things happen too. I don't know. I would make a motion to waive the interest on this particular case. I'll second that.
[Unidentified]: So I mentioned Orlando.
[Richard Orlando]: Yeah, I, I've got different feelings on it, but I will, I will approve that as well.
[Dan Stoneking]: I mean, I mean, the city sent the check back, you know, these, these sometimes these accounting practices and for housing, it was a private enterprise. Let's say, Hey, you know what I mean? But this is, you're talking about mental housing, et cetera, et cetera. You know, sometimes not that they should be privileged, but I think, you know, There's a lot of work that goes on, etc, etc, for the good of time and time, and so on and so on. Right, right, right. And the city, the city could have taken simply that amount of money and said, no, you need to give us X amount extra rather than just sending a check back through interest. You know, sometimes these decisions have consequences. It won't happen again. If it happens again, we're not going to waive anything because they shouldn't be doing these things over and over again. But for now, I think hopefully my motion will stand. Commissioner? Yes? Commissioner Orlando? Yes. Yes. OK. And of course, they need to pay that $2 or whatever it is. There's no waiving on the interest or anything else.
[Unidentified]: OK. So what else we got going? So that's it. That's it.
[Dan Stoneking]: Well, the Riverside Yacht Club, I mean, Rick, how do you, Commissioner Orlando, how do you feel about the second meter for the yacht club?
[Richard Orlando]: It's because of the water they use for the boats and they just have feeds along the piers and so on that they don't want to pay the storage for. Yeah, washing boats and along the docks.
[Dan Stoneking]: What they do for the city, you know, normally the answer would be absolutely not, you know, but what they do for the city, they provide an incredibly essential benefit by providing a dock for the fire department, where they have their ports. God forbid something happens, they need that boat in there, and they don't charge them a dime for that, which can be expensive, you know, if they were to charge them.
[Richard Orlando]: I saw it there the other day. I know exactly what you're talking about.
[Dan Stoneking]: Yeah, yeah. So, you know, the quid pro quo, because it's city to city, so to speak, you know, it's its benefit to the city. I would have made a motion, yes, but I would like the council to be on board with this. I want the council itself to say, yes, I think, you know, in this particular case, because it benefits the city so much, that a recommendation would be that the Water and Sewer Commission would grant the second meter and not set a precedent for something else. only because of this specific benefit that is being provided to the city.
[Richard Orlando]: Now, we requested that of the council at one of the early meetings, I believe, right?
[Dan Stoneking]: Josh Scarpelli wrote, Councilor Scarpelli wrote that. If you read the letter, it says at the bottom, I've discussed it with my fellow city council members and they would all support the request. So they did have it and they all said that they would support it. So is that sufficient for us? Well, that's a lot of them could go on the file, you know, if that's not true, that that could be bad. You know what I mean? So as long as that goes in the file, because he wrote it and he signed his name to it, you know, as a Councilor. So we'll have to give the council the benefit of the doubt, I suppose, in this case and say, okay, fine.
[Richard Orlando]: Well, I mean, I would, I would agree that's sufficient. I mean, what more would we have requested for us to be at a council meeting and listen to the dialogue?
[Dan Stoneking]: No, not really, no.
[Richard Orlando]: So I think George, I think he took the action, he spoke to his peers, and they agreed to it, and they put it in writing. I mean, the only other thing I would, and if you wanted to go one step farther, would be to have all the Councilors sign a letter as well, in addition to George. That would be maybe the only incremental thing, if you wanted to make it a little bit more certain.
[Dan Stoneking]: I'm going to take that concert Scarpelli's word.
[Richard Orlando]: What he wrote in this letter is that I think the fact that I'm fine with I'm just saying if you wanted to ratchet it up.
[Dan Stoneking]: If we want to go another step further, I don't think personally don't think it's necessary. The fact the fact that this is a legitimate letter that comes from the from a council of the council himself just got the metro city council and signed it that's not something you can put down if you know if he hadn't said that phrase you say well that's your opinion but he included his fellow Councilors in there so i would have to give the council the benefit of the doubt that he didn't give you know he said hey listen yeah yeah you know they approved so and this particular case i don't think each one of them needs to sign it because he signed it on their behalf because he states clearly that he is and they're all recommended so
[Richard Orlando]: Yeah, I'm fine with that. Yeah, I'm fine with that, Dominic. I was just saying if if you're of the mind to do something a bit more specific, but I'm fine and take George at his word. He obviously is. He took the action. He followed up with it. He got back to us, so I'd say that's sufficient.
[Dan Stoneking]: No, that's good. That's good. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner. So the motion is to approve it and to place this on file, okay, Madam Secretary? The letter, specifically, the letter, and it has to be worded that way, the letter from Councilor Scapelli, guaranteeing the approval of the council in this letter, wrote all that down, okay. And I think that'll do it as far as the record is concerned. Because now he's on the right, he can't, if he's finding anything that's good luck to him the next time around, you know?
[Richard Orlando]: Now, Braun, what do you need from the city side to actually enact putting the second meter in and making the change?
[Dan Stoneking]: Do you need anything additional? No, just the vote. Okay, I'll let him do it if you guys vote, vote for it. Okay. If there's two votes. I will accept that as a, as a, you know, accepted. No, I think I think to commission on whether it's fine with what we're going to do, he's just putting together say looks like we want to go any further than that we can do a, b, c, and d. But I think Rick, I think we're, I think that letter, and the which phrase that he You know.
[Richard Orlando]: Oh yeah, I'm there, I'm with you.
[Dan Stoneking]: So I'll make the motion to approve the second meter for the vote club.
[Richard Orlando]: I'll second it.
[Dan Stoneking]: Well, the motion was already made before, but all of the favor. Yes. Okay. Unanimous. Yes. Okay. Approval by the commission. Okay. Excellent. So what else we got? So you have a letter. That's the need to go on file. I have it someplace in my office, but I mean, that needs to go make sure. I'm surprised there's no potential. I haven't seen any abatements for the longest time. Things are good. I mean, just the meters are working, everything's working. How are we on the meter installation? Contract is out for installation right now. I mean, how many new meters have been actually installed physically?
[Unidentified]: 1100. That's this. We got 15,000, right? Yeah. On 15th of the way there. Without the installation company in town yet. This is all in house. And I can only imagine the
[Dan Stoneking]: the record keeping that you've been keeping all this year. You're obviously taking the oldest ones first and trying to make, we're working our way through estimations. There's 3,200 estimations right now.
[Unidentified]: It's quite a lot.
[Dan Stoneking]: And how many, when things are really up to maximum installation, as far as personnel, how many people will be actually doing that? They usually have about four or five guys. But they do like eight, 10 a day. That's 250 a week. About a year and a half, two year project. And that we had the way we wrote the contract. Let me ask you a crazy question though. If they were to put 40 people on it, and because these meters are working so efficient, could they be self-liquidating? If they had 40 or 50 people doing it, and because the efficiency of these new meters wouldn't properly, wouldn't that kind of offset the cost of these 40, 50 people? The faster you do it, the faster the results. The faster you will be recouping the right amount. True. bringing on 40 experienced installers is hard. Scheduling 40 guys, you know. Okay, so Madam Secretary, if we have no further business, Ron, do you have anything else to bring up? I don't think I do. What about, so this budget thing, of course, we can't really talk about rates until we know. How close are they to a budget? I mean, this is April, mid-April. You don't have anything? No, you don't have anything? Because they were gonna put some- early part of June, later part of June. The water is preliminary. I think Tim, that's really, that's one of his focuses. The water and sewage division is going to put in some money for infrastructure and so on and so forth into this budget. I think the man needs to find the money. Because we're not going to be asking, I think we agree that I don't want to be asking the city for anything this particular year, but let's see what the budget is to be transferred from the enterprise fund into the budget until we get a fix. Let's see what this budget is and what percentage the water would have to increase by. just for the heck of it this year. It's going to be a test year. It's going to be definitely a test year this year. We'll see what they do. I hope the city council has an actual meeting so the public is aware if we have to take the rates up based on the budget that we're presented with, that there's a reason why it's going to be. Of course, yeah. They need to let the public know, hey, We have a 100-year-old water system that needs to be completely refurbished and redone, or it's going to collapse at some point in the next four or five years. Well, we don't know that. We don't know that. It's got to be done. Yeah. It's been neglected for many, many years. Many, many years. I understand. That's true. I understand what, you know, Tim and the- I do understand. It's a massive overhaul, and they haven't really looked at it for 20 years or so. Not no shot at Dave Proctor but he really was not that proactive on a long time he was not that proactive on replacing water lines. It drove Stephen's father into a hole. We're that far behind. The problem is, you can't make it up in one or two or three years. You're talking about the next 10 years. So it has to be a plan. Because even the $8.5 billion that's in the enterprise fund, they can disappear overnight. And then what? Then you got nothing. Then the city will lose two ways. It will lose the money there, and it will lose the bonding rating. Which is really good now and it's been saving a ton of money. What we talked about was was we're trying to find out what that. that number is where we don't lose bond rating. So that we can build off that. And then when we build off that, then we can take on top of that and implement it into replacing water lines, whether it's in-house or outside. And one of the meanings, Ronnie, because somebody was saying, well, look, that enterprise fund could disappear overnight. And it could. Just to replace half a mile of sewer lines, it could disappear overnight. But, but, and the objective came from Dave and they said, well, you know, you can't keep on going, and also Dave Fox, you can't keep on going to the other front from because you know you. The only thing we take out of the enterprise fund is $500,000 to $600,000 that the city does not pay its share of the consumption of water and sewer. So they don't want to pay directly, you know, so that's why we've been asking to recover that money on an annual basis. That's what it is. And we've been asking the city to move at least $500,000 to $600,000 a year back into the budget because they're not paying their bill. Now if they stop paying the damn bill issues for my French here, then we won't have to ask for that anymore. But the city promotes a deficit, year after year after year by not paying its bill. And not to me. We've talked about this being part of a utility bill, like an electric bill. Correct. It should get on the other side. But nobody's doing anything about it. And so the commission, how do we get it to go back? I don't know the answer. Jim and Dave and everybody else that is doing this needs to go to the council. We can't do it. We're not involved in any machinations of the budget in any shape or form. The commission has no authority over any of it. But they can, they can say, listen, pay your bill. You know, the councils themselves say, yeah, look, the city of Medford is deliberately, deliberately creating a 500, half a million dollar deficit by not paying its bills. That prompts the, we can't demand that money because we have no power over it, but we can at least ask the city, and then knowing that the city isn't paying, the council always said, yeah, yeah, switch over 500,000, yeah, put it back. But in reality, doesn't it actually do? into the water, it gets into the budget through the budget that were presented. I mean, when Mary puts the numbers together, that $500,000 worth of water used for all those municipalities is in her number, isn't it? Where is it? They don't pay, it's not in there. Because they don't see that bill, that bill is not part of it. That bill is not my left wrist up. The budget would have the telephone. The budget would create the electricity that is consumed. The phone lines are consumed. The top gap. Hold on, I got a question. When municipalities get the water bill, doesn't it go to some department as far as an expense? No. No, I don't think I don't see how it's the only thing used to a used to but they took it out. So the only thing I do is, what do you do was produced as it is a record.
[MCM00001535_SPEAKER_03]: The bills are all coded in.
[Dan Stoneking]: municipal bills are coded M and whatever real estate ID we use. So we're like a 900 series, that's a municipality building, okay? A tax exempt building. So when I code it M9030, that means that Because that M goes at the beginning, it gets built zero water and zero sewer. That's it. It keeps track of the usage and the history. So if I bring up an account in the billing system, I can show you the history. of water usage, but on the side it'll say zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero. Okay, so to put a finer point to it, the city always, not the city itself, but each department of the city, the schools, the fire department. It was part of their budget. It was part of their budget, yes. Year in, year out, they knew that they needed $15,000 worth of the scenario, $30,000, the high school, you know, the school system and so on. And then The previous mayor before, Mayor Matrini-Burke decided, nah, we're not going to pay that. We're not going to pay it. And that was the end of that. They just shelved it. And now, from then on, it created roughly half a million. Well, water rates went up, obviously, as you know. So really, it's the MWRA's bill to us. That bill was never really done. It's basically, we're not accounting for it in a monetary value. We're not accounting for it. So it's been going out to the- We record it when we account for it as usage, but we just don't receive any funds that go back into paying the $26 million. So that doesn't show up. Now, somebody said, well, you know, it's the same pocket, you know, the tax. And I said, no, no, no, it's not the same pocket. Because if you ask the average homeowner and say, listen, would you rather pay that the city paid its bill, which is, you know, and that, and because it's not paying its bill, now it's got to put it on the tax bill, just like everything else that goes on the tax bill, right, that pays bills. And that $500,000 gets lost in a $200 million budget. It's literally pennies, okay? It's a rounding error. But if you put that $500,000 in the water and sewage budget, $25 million, now the average homeowner has got to pay an extra $50, $100, $300. Depends on what they have. What would they rather pay? $0.15 more on their tax bill or hundreds of dollars on their potential? Oh, no, I'll take it on the tax. So it's not the same pocket. It's not the same pocket. And I think that's been ridiculous all these years. Listen to that. And the one thing that I stressed was if The schools may be or I'm just going to use the schools as example. They paid their own bill and they had a budget for it. Maybe they would. fix their leaks. And maybe install low flow urinals or low flow this waterless urinals, just to, but since they're not paying, they may abuse 10, 12 years ago, I forget what it was 10, 12 years ago, Metro high school, one of their two inch lines. was leaking like the, you know, the meter. So I didn't want to pay for anything, but it was being recorded. I said, what is it? They couldn't, they finally found it behind one of the showers. That was a main line that was feeding all of this shit, whatever the heck it was. And it had been leaking now for God knows how long. I mean, and like he says, if there wasn't a budget, nobody cares. So when I got here, they didn't have the high sewage. When I got here they didn't have the high school meter hooked up to a reading device you got the new system.
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[Dan Stoneking]: And when I put when I when I hooked up the reading device. I showed them that there was a problem. Yeah. And what the problem was was. the pool foundation was cracked, and the water was pouring underneath the foundation of the pool. So I asked them, I said, you've got to shut the pool down and figure this out. They shut the pool down, the usage stopped. Again, who was the first person? Millions of gallons. Who would be the first person in government to start maybe reversing this? What party? Who do you start with? The council itself. The mayor or the council? Well, of course, too, but the mayor and the council have to make that decision to pay for the bills right and but since the infrastructure is very important. They need to approach the city, they said that we need to put this in a budget but we're going to be short $500,000 that the city is not paying every single year. That is the recommendation from the water source commission that we take it out of enterprise, it's going to affect everybody's budget, we don't want to deplete the enterprise fund, but if you people, the city doesn't stop paying, again, for its bills. The water was for the vision, excuse me, because you have no choice but to at least ask. You know that they transfer the 500,000 to put it back in a budget because the city is not paying for it. So that's what they have to do they have to present this case to the city. They do not not us because we don't have any. I don't know who the first party. I just read so every budget was would go up the fire would have. they have a water expense. I probably have to give them the estimate of what they need. Whatever they need is consumption. You can put that together. I like the idea that when you spread that over a property tax of $102,000, it's a rounding error. It's a rounding of a penny, whereas it could actually save the homeowners. They're still paying it in one format, but I hear what you're saying. Why would they rather pay $0.25 on the tax side, or $0.50, $0.00, $0.003, depending on the consumption? Then the commercial sector pays way more. You know, so that's what it's in place. So they have to make this case in the city because they're the ones that don't want us to ask the city, you know, to put back the money that they normally should be paying. Where's it coming from? Well, the enterprise fund. That's what it's there for. You know what I mean? To put back into the budget. You know, but they don't want to use it. But if you don't want to use it, then make the case to the city, the city stop its bill. Listen, over the years, we've talked about this with all kind of this way. We don't start off with an automatic deficit of at least a half a million dollars every single year in the water school budget. So half a percent or whatever the heck that goes up with 3%, 6%, 7%, at least a half a percent of that because that half of $500,000 is missing. I just did the math. It's $500,000 is 2% of the total budget for those $26 million. Well, it's going to be versus. This is a percentage of 200. I put 200. It's not 200. It's 0.002, which is a tenth. So why would you run the board? What would the average homeowner pay, or anybody else? They run the board on a backside, of course. All they have to do is pay their bill. That's all. Or each department. And they would be a lot more responsible to the consumer. Well, that's the key right there. responsibility of making sure that this water doesn't maybe the city would shut off some of these irrigation meters right instead of putting more in right right well you know water filtrations on like the splash park or something like that. Water's just being- Each division of the city would be more accountable. Because right now you can have leaks all over the city and who's paying for it? You know, the average homeowner who shouldn't be paying for that. You want to pay your bill, your own consumption, but you don't want to pay for somebody else that's not paying its bill. I didn't get a leak deal because it's all about conservation. This would force conservation. Listen, I think this is a serious thing. I'll have a chat with my cousin, Alicia. Alicia what?
[Unidentified]: I know her. I went to another one of the commission meetings.
[Dan Stoneking]: I follow my cousin. To be honest with you, for that very reason alone is why it should be on there. Absolutely, absolutely. They need to conserve. But not only that, but the water is too precious. Well, I think that's one of the things. When McGlynn did it, it was before my time. I've been here 16 years. 20 years ago, you look at the price of water, it was very small. Things have changed. So it's $500,000 now. It might have been $20,000, $30,000. There was conservation. the rates, how we talk about the rates. We want to reward the people who don't abuse the water. People who abuse it, they're going to pay a little more. This is the same scenario. If we put the owners back on the departments, it will force them to get into some sort of conservation equipment, conservation mentality. Low flow. Low flow. I mean, they should be doing it anyway, to be honest with you. But I'd like to try. I don't understand why A utility is a utility. It pays for every single utility. It's not like the MWRA is giving the city free water or free sewer. They said, well, we're not paying for it. Imagine if the city didn't pay its electric bill. There would be lights on all the time. I mean, you cannot not pay your utility bill. Right, but also if they weren't paying, they would leave the lights on all night, all day. That's true too. That's what I'm saying. I want to force conservation of water. This bill needs to go back on. Think about electricity. They covered this roof with solar, obviously, because we're paying on electric bill, right? They're trying to mitigate the electric bill. Anyway, so thank you all. What do you think of that, Commissioner?
[Unidentified]: Don't you think that it would force them to be more? Unmute yourself. You forgot how to do it. Unmute.
[Richard Orlando]: I would, yeah, I would force them to start to conserve. I think it's just a case of how do they want this bill to show up in the, to the residents? Do they want it to show up in a smaller amount through the, across the tax base, or do they want it to show up on the, the water bill? Ultimately the pocket that it's always coming out of is the citizens. Right. But if we put the bill on the pockets. By which they get taxed, by their pay. So it's,
[Dan Stoneking]: In terms of what they know on the department's wreck. It will force them to kind of pay attention to it year after year and say, oh my God, last year it was 1,000, now this year it's 10,000. What's going on here? It will force them to- Oh, I know, I know. That's how it's always been until it was just overnight. No, forget it. Let's not just pay the bills. Each department, the fire department, the school department, the police department, you name it, the city, everything, they had to meet it. It was in their budget. It was their budget to pay because whatever consumption there was, and they paid attention to it. But like Ronnie said, years ago, it was fairly now. You're talking about a lot of money. Yeah, and the people see it. With the fire department, God forbid, in a big fire, they have to use sewer water.
[Richard Orlando]: And in terms of who, I think a question, and we can just dialogue and speculate and give our opinions until the cows come home, but I think the party that needs to is our DPW head and our water and sewer head. They have a goal to do something on the infrastructure. They should move. I agree. I agree. And not only on this point, but how they want to fund that infrastructure upgrade. They should put a plan together, which would include making the appropriate departments cover their respective areas for water. They should pull together, put it forward to the mayor and the council and let the debate begin. Yeah.
[Dan Stoneking]: All right, well, thank you, Commissioner. Thank you all who participated. Madam Secretary, end of the meeting. It is 5.20, I guess, my friend. Thank you all. Thank you, Ron, for your input. Thank you, Ron.