[0:00] morning good morning how are you mayor morning

[0:04] can we call the meeting to order please okay um let me call the roll dr adams

[0:11] president this battle here mr deal here oh

[0:19] here chair is here um first item any opening remarks dr

[0:25] adams none is battle

[0:33] [Music] next item is um approval of the minutes

[0:38] i assume all the board members have had an opportunity to

[0:42] review the minutes if

[0:46] does anyone have any um objections are there any errors or missions in the

[0:51] minutes as presented i found none i moved for approval that's

[0:57] is there a second motion a second any discussion any discussion

[1:01] dr adams uh none miss battle none mr deal

[1:08] none slope none recall the question regarding approval of the minutes as

[1:15] presented from the january 28th meeting of the utility board dr adams

[1:21] yes this battle yes mr deal yes mr loke

[1:28] yes and mayor votes yes minutes are approved as presented the next item

[1:34] on the agenda is a discussion regarding um

[1:39] the household collection of household garbage

[1:44] east of slappy drive and um i think mr stock and mr rowe are y'all

[1:49] with us this morning yes sir good morning mayor good morning

[1:52] board good morning morning ken hello stacy

[1:58] hello and if we remember i believe we were considering the um proposed

[2:05] purchase of equipment for city staff and there was a

[2:10] request that we determine what the cost would be to transition out

[2:17] of household garbage collection as

[2:21] we know the city collects garbage east of slappy drive

[2:25] and um we have a contractor that collects garbage west of slappy drive so

[2:32] with that mr stock yes sir thank you very much uh

[2:35] jonathan you can just go to the next slide please

[2:41] so so the mayor did an excellent job of leading in for me

[2:44] so i don't have to thank you for the history that is

[2:48] that is exactly what we were uh what we had considered in december

[2:52] and and then requested to make the analysis

[2:56] and so we're coming back today uh with that analysis complete

[3:00] uh and presenting basically two options the first option of

[3:04] course is that the city would continue to provide the residential waste

[3:08] collection to the same benefit as being provided by the

[3:11] contractor and of course you know in order to do that the city would need to

[3:15] replace the aging equipment vehicles and invest in the hardware and

[3:20] software and equipment with the route tracking

[3:23] and documentation capabilities and i guess a third item

[3:27] there would be of course then train staff

[3:30] you know to use that equipment the second option

[3:34] would be contracting out all of the residential solid waste that as

[3:38] uh you know requested to to analyze here in this

[3:42] um item so uh and with that the contractor would then

[3:47] provide all the necessary resources to expand the service to the entire city

[3:51] in either option uh the city will continue to serve

[3:55] all of the commercial customers next slide please jonathan

[4:01] so this slide is the side by side uh analysis of the

[4:05] of the finances uh includes the uh assumptions i just made from the

[4:09] previous slide uh also has that the these assumption includes for

[4:14] both options that would use the quoted contractor rate of

[4:19] 26.48 per account per month and it would

[4:23] include the pass-through of 2.69 per account per month what it does not

[4:29] include is the really big item which is that under the city option the

[4:33] city would have to spend nearly three million dollars

[4:36] in order to buy the necessary equipment again that's why we were asked to

[4:41] consider this uh next slide please jonathan

[4:47] so the other thing we took into account of course is is how would this

[4:51] impact employees because you know we're very concerned about that especially

[4:55] during well at all times especially during these times

[4:58] and in the solid waste division there are currently 36 full-time employees

[5:04] budgeted in the contracting option the city would retain

[5:08] 19 of those positions and obviously doing the math the city would then have

[5:12] to reduce 17 positions however of those 17

[5:17] nine of those are currently vacant which would leave eight

[5:21] and in looking at all of the other current vacancies within public works

[5:25] uh those those eight could be easily reassigned into those other openings in

[5:30] in public works therefore resulting in zero layoffs and

[5:35] terminations in other words this would not

[5:37] impact any current employee all right next slide please

[5:44] so the pros and cons uh the the pros for expanding residential solid waste

[5:50] contract across the entire service area is that

[5:54] would increase and levelize consistent standard of service benefit

[5:57] to all customers both east it would eliminate our confusion of

[6:03] having two separate service areas that comes up occasionally

[6:06] as you can imagine having a dividing line

[6:09] i would reduce the capital cost we mentioned

[6:13] definitely reduce risk and reduction in certain other long-term

[6:18] obligations the cons of not expanding the residential

[6:23] uh solid waste contract across the service area is that we would continue

[6:27] to have a disparity of service benefit for the different areas of the city

[6:31] and of course we would continue to have an ongoing need for large capital

[6:35] expenditures and we would continue to have a high

[6:39] degree of risk due to this activity you know more miles more people more

[6:44] equipment more risk and with that last slide

[6:50] and with that we will entertain any questions

[6:54] okay thank you any questions any questions dr adams

[6:58] none miss battle none mr dill

[7:05] uh yes ken that's an excellent report uh what is the value and how much how many

[7:11] pieces of uh equipment would we be able to to sell

[7:15] use that we're presently using right now we have six grapple trucks

[7:21] um and i believe it's also i'd have to get stacy's on here to help

[7:26] me out but i believe it's also six rear loaders

[7:29] that's correct and again i'd have to defer to stacy if there's any other

[7:34] pieces of equipment i think there's a couple pickups that

[7:36] could probably be shed well that would be another plus

[7:40] the revenue that we would gain from selling that equipment

[7:43] and this this is a in my opinion a great report

[7:47] the thing that concerned me most was the loss of jobs and you've got that covered

[7:52] yes sir thank you very much

[7:56] that's all mr mayor thank you mr slow uh yes got a few questions um

[8:02] and it was it was a good presentation informative

[8:06] um before we were only talking about capital expenditures and replacement of

[8:10] equipment of a million seventy eight thousand

[8:12] but now you're saying that our capital cost would be two million seven

[8:16] seventy so um i think what you're saying is that rather than continuing service

[8:24] as we provide it now that as far as the analysis goes you're

[8:28] looking at duplicating what our contractor does

[8:32] on the west side of town is that correct yes sir that is correct so that that

[8:36] analysis obviously has those six grapples that we originally

[8:40] talked about for that million plus it also includes that of

[8:44] our six rear loaders four of those would need to be replaced in the next 12 to 18

[8:49] months so even though those haven't been

[8:51] brought to you yet they would be you know if we were to continue along

[8:56] those lines and then the last part is is upgrading

[8:59] the equipment so that we would have that same you know

[9:04] level of service to be able to perform that same tracking

[9:07] capability um with the with the bins and stuff and there's a cost of those items

[9:12] as well okay and that i guess leads to my next

[9:15] question i wanted a little clearer definition of disparity of service

[9:19] because right now i live on the east side and

[9:23] um as far as our customers go i think that um

[9:27] that we're getting uh we are getting excellent service i know i do

[9:31] well and we really appreciate that mr lowe

[9:35] what we're what we would really be referring to in this case

[9:38] um is a lot of times when people call in with questions

[9:42] right now about whether or not um you know trash was picked up at a certain

[9:46] time or a certain location you know or whatever right now on the

[9:50] east side we track everything via paper right so but on the on the west side if

[9:56] you called in and said hey you know my trash was supposed to be

[10:00] picked up you know what time you know we can go right to the software

[10:05] and tell you exactly down to the minute when that bin

[10:09] was lifted and and uh that trash deposited into the truck

[10:14] and if you really wanted to push us we could probably provide video

[10:19] well i certainly hope it doesn't come to that oh no but you'll be surprised

[10:23] some questions we get well and uh but that um that certainly does it's

[10:31] it's absolutely evident that from um a

[10:35] business standpoint and from an efficiency standpoint an

[10:38] operational standpoint uh of the utility board um

[10:43] and the solid waste division that it it most certainly would be a benefit

[10:48] i think the last question i've got is um are the containers on the west side

[10:53] different in size from those that we're that we have on the east side

[10:59] i believe that answer is no but i'll defer to stacy

[11:02] no so they're they're both the same they they appear to be a different size just

[11:06] because of the shape but they're about a 95 gallon gotcha

[11:11] okay well i just wanted to make sure that we weren't

[11:16] doing what so many of the uh grocery store products seem to be it seems like

[11:21] rather than go up in price they just reduce the size of

[11:24] what you get so thank you thank you gentlemen for all

[11:28] of that no less cookies here sir

[11:32] well i was thinking more in terms of ice cream oh okay

[11:36] i was thinking about potato chips same size bag

[11:40] a third full i wonder why you're eating ice cream and potato chips

[11:45] hey what else do you do in a pandemic

[11:51] um is that overslow that's it thank you i i just um of course i have

[11:59] some concerns about this really i think it's a big decision

[12:06] but first we need to consider the fact that we would

[12:11] basically be eliminating the solid waste division for

[12:15] household collection i mean that maybe you'd still

[12:18] the city would maintain some commercial accounts but

[12:21] um i think it would be prudent to find out how many other cities

[12:25] um essentially contract out household garbage

[12:29] i i think we talk about it being a business decision

[12:33] and and certainly the city always needs to be as entrepreneurial as possible but

[12:36] the city is not a business we're providing a service to our

[12:39] residents and um i don't think we've adequately

[12:45] vetted this issue but if you all want to vote if the board wants to vote on it

[12:48] today that's fine i mean i was looking over this and i thought the

[12:54] staff hadn't provided us with the pros and and the cons on the other side and i

[13:00] i want to address that briefly one thing we need

[13:04] to remember we've got these numbers but concrete enterprises

[13:09] actually came in to obtain the city's business

[13:12] on the west side of slappy at a lower rate

[13:16] than they did and their contract is for only one year

[13:20] so it's a pretty safe assumption that the cost of collecting garbage on

[13:27] the west side is going to go up after that one year

[13:33] what i have seen during my time in office

[13:37] is when fuel prices spike then on these long-term contracts

[13:43] the um outside contractors they start getting a position where they're can

[13:49] actually be losing money with that service oftentimes becomes um

[13:54] sluggish they want to renegotiate their contracts

[13:57] with having um solid waste even on the just on the east side of

[14:04] slappy what we can do is we can mobilize

[14:09] and and this happened before and uh after i speak misubidan can either

[14:13] um verify or um refute what i'm saying but in the last few months of the

[14:19] previous contract we had neighborhoods that trash was not

[14:23] getting picked up for weeks and we were actually sending

[14:26] city employees to neighborhoods on the west side to

[14:30] collect garbage also with an outside contractor you're

[14:35] limited to the scope of the contract and if

[14:39] they're just picking up household garbage and we have a problem with a

[14:42] dump site well then they don't have an obligation

[14:44] to go to that dump site well the residents aren't going to be

[14:49] satisfied when their commissioner tells them well

[14:53] um sorry mr jones but that's not in concrete enterprises uh scope of

[15:00] work we we also um

[15:05] need to look at the cons and uh even though

[15:08] ms subidan sells that she can re reassign all these employees

[15:14] assuming that that's correct we are still eliminating

[15:18] 40 jobs and and this came up over the years well

[15:24] the people who work for contractors don't have

[15:28] the same benefits that they would have as as city employees and we are

[15:32] impacting these people will be eliminating about

[15:35] 40 jobs even if the individuals can

[15:40] be reassigned um mr dill brought up the disposal of the equipment

[15:45] um that would be some income but i don't think

[15:48] that mr stock just told us two of the uh machines have to be replaced so

[15:54] whatever value they would have would probably be

[15:56] um negligible um i question this about the risk and we can get an

[16:01] answer from mr davis i don't think this would be a delegable

[16:05] duty in other words the city is going to be

[16:09] responsible for um the

[16:13] uh negligence of the contractor if it's not inevitable

[16:17] it's not a delicable duty in which event we'd have to insist that they get uh

[16:22] substantial insurance and of course that cost is going to be

[16:26] um passed on to us i mentioned earlier about

[16:29] the um

[16:34] agreement with concrete enterprises being only for one year

[16:38] well um the cost also of using an outside contractor

[16:43] could go up considerably if uh the minimum wage is increased

[16:48] incrementally like it appears it it will be and um once

[16:53] we get out of the solid collect solid household collection it's going to be

[16:59] almost impossible to to to get back in and um i just think there's so much more

[17:04] we need to we need to look at that hadn't been presented to us and also

[17:08] um in all fairness i i think it would be um

[17:11] prudent to have uh surveys or information from other cities to see how

[17:17] many cities are actually um completely contracting out household

[17:22] um garbage collection but that's that's my thoughts

[17:26] and if the board wants to vote on this item today we

[17:29] i guess we can and and make a recommendation

[17:32] um to the commission or if we want to hear

[17:36] uh and investigate further and and with that um dr adams

[17:46] could i provide a few responses for you okay yes sir thank you

[17:54] um so in terms of the rate we calculated the new rate

[17:59] because we wanted to make sure that there were no surprises

[18:03] the contract that we have while it is for it's not technically it

[18:09] is not for one year it's only for one year if they fail to

[18:13] perform as we did our analysis we did calculate

[18:17] the new rate um i certainly wouldn't want to put

[18:21] this commission or the city commission in a position where we have a oops

[18:26] after one year so we did incorporate the rate increase

[18:29] um in terms of scope you should know that the scope

[18:33] of our contract includes additional pickups like dump sites and you know

[18:39] emergency collections you know dead animals on the road all

[18:43] the things that we currently do are incorporated in the rate in terms of

[18:48] quality part of the reason the new contract has

[18:54] significantly more accountability is because of what we encountered

[18:58] at the end of the last contract which was not a contract that i negotiated

[19:04] um this contract requires a significant amount of additional accountability

[19:09] which is why we have things like video gps we know when every pickup is made

[19:14] how much was picked up even when they do their

[19:17] bulky waste or the the yard trash we have video when that

[19:22] was was picked up and um that is part of

[19:25] their contract being able to provide those

[19:28] dashboards and those key performance indicators is part of this contract

[19:32] if they failed to do that then we wouldn't we would we would penalize them

[19:36] accordingly um you suggested that there were 40 jobs

[19:41] in actuality it would be 17 jobs um that would be not jobs but positions

[19:48] that would be eliminated as opposed to um

[19:52] 40 i'm not sure how many vacancies do you have

[19:56] i believe we have nine so that would that would bring it to 26.

[20:02] no sir because commercial and the the rest of solid waste stays intact

[20:07] the only part would that would go away would be the 17 positions

[20:12] that are essentially assigned to residential east side collection

[20:16] okay in terms of risk it is in their cost and

[20:23] nathan was very clear in our negotiation process

[20:28] that any liability associated with the contractor

[20:32] is the contractor's responsibility um and and the city is um

[20:39] is held harmless um and in terms of additional cost

[20:46] for minimum wage and or fuel that happens on both sides

[20:51] you know if the minimum wage goes up to 15

[20:54] it goes up for us as well and so the cost of fuel goes up it goes up for us

[20:59] as well so you know and in addition to this

[21:04] we have a 38 to 40 additional um overhead burden on every full-time

[21:10] equivalent position um

[21:15] you know and that that encompasses everything from health insurance

[21:18] to pension to all of our other benefits so certainly um we will do more research

[21:26] in terms of the um other cities and our intention this morning is to

[21:32] bring this back as requested by the utility board we

[21:36] would like to take this to the city commission and the second work

[21:39] session in march for the input and we can provide

[21:44] additional um and more detailed analysis

[21:48] um there's a lot of backup to each one of these numbers and and we certainly

[21:52] can provide that as part of our um presentation to the the city commission

[21:58] sharon one quick question if we postpone this

[22:02] our next utility board meeting would that give you all adequate time

[22:06] to check with other cities and see how they're

[22:09] collecting the garbage um yes but what that would mean is we would have to

[22:14] postpone the city commission uh or potentially postpone the city

[22:18] commission until april one of the reasons this is being brought

[22:21] to you now is we need to get direction on our budget

[22:25] um we've already started to put together fiscal 22

[22:30] and we need some direction from the utility board

[22:34] because depending on how we go will depend on how much we budget

[22:38] we'll have to budget differently miss superdan

[22:42] uh um excuse me can we go around the table now um you

[22:48] have the floor doc adams okay thank you uh miss am i correct that

[22:53] i heard that we still have to service the commercial

[22:59] uh part of the city and if if that's the case

[23:04] how many employees would be involved in that aspect of it and would that

[23:11] necessitate new equipment and what would be the cost of replacing

[23:17] that equipment yes we would like to retain commercial

[23:21] we found it to be fairly lucrative for us um you may

[23:26] recall a few meetings ago you approved some equipment

[23:28] for the commercial operation we did calculate that

[23:33] that calculation has happened separately to ensure that our cost of commercial is

[23:39] covered and we um end the process ahead i don't have

[23:44] that number on hand but we certainly can provide

[23:47] that as part of our overall the the number of employees

[23:51] uh is anybody that information number of employees in that uh uh

[23:57] or is that a separate aspect or is that so 19 other solid waste employees

[24:03] are retained and a part of that is our commercial operation stacey do you have

[24:09] that on hand i know we had the breakout when we looked at our back up

[24:12] out of the 19 uh that we would retain eight of those as operators that would

[24:18] perform the duties you know for the front loader trucks and

[24:22] uh the the roll-off business that we have

[24:25] good now is that equipment in good shape or will that have to be replaced

[24:30] um and if so about what's the approximate cost

[24:36] i don't think we're slated to replace a front loader this year but

[24:40] the last cost i have for front loaders is like 275

[24:44] 000. okay thank you

[24:50] is that all right yes that's it mr battle

[24:57] no questions for me mr dill uh yes stacy this one's for you do you

[25:04] can you tell us some other towns about the size or cities about the size of

[25:08] albany that are outsourcing their garbage

[25:11] collection now uh i believe one of robin's but

[25:16] i'd like to check and verify before i before i really answered that because i

[25:22] understand that i was just i think the mayor had a good point to see how it's

[25:26] working in other cities that are comparable to albany

[25:29] um but other than that i'm all for it that's all i have mr mayor

[25:34] thank you mr loeb uh yeah just a comment um that you made you did make some very

[25:40] good points um but but one issue i would um

[25:44] i might take exception to you said that we're a city providing a service

[25:48] um and i don't recall this service being paid for out of albany's general fund

[25:55] um we are as a city operating uh what is a revenue enterprise and that

[26:02] means that all of our services that we sell

[26:05] and provide to our citizens they're paying for and they're paying for a fee

[26:08] and they're our customers and the one thing that uh that i think

[26:12] that we've all been very conscious of and done a good job of

[26:16] is making sure that we do and provide that service to our customers in the

[26:20] best way we can at the most at the most efficient price

[26:24] uh and and what's in the best long-term um good for the city and

[26:32] uh i think that this might be an opportunity

[26:36] for us to take advantage of those things and that's all okay i mean i

[26:44] i just in response to that um ms logan would point out that

[26:50] you acknowledged being within the city service area that

[26:55] um you have no complaints with with um the collection

[27:00] and there's no saying if it ain't broke

[27:03] don't fix it but with that does um the board want to vote on this

[27:07] today what's what what is the will of the board dr

[27:11] adams um i would vote

[27:16] uh well let me put you i think i should excuse myself from the vote um

[27:27] what i'm asking i i have to excuse myself from the vote

[27:35] okay um

[27:44] miss battle are you would you are you ready to go ahead and vote on this today

[27:49] i'm fine with voting okay and mr deal you ready to vote on it or you

[27:56] want more information no i'm ready to vote on it i think it's

[28:00] the right move and i think it's a good like stan said i think it's a good um

[28:05] you know we have a fiduciary responsibility to the tax holders and i

[28:08] think that would be doing a good job to to save

[28:11] money by outsourcing okay and uh mr lowe you ready to vote

[28:16] yeah i'm ready to vote today okay so with that um any

[28:23] we've already had discussion haven't we yeah so with that we

[28:26] will call the question dr adams you're abstaining is that correct

[28:30] no i have to excuse myself from the vote right

[28:34] yes okay second uh miss battle i vote yes mr deal

[28:41] mr mayor is there a motion on the table or do we miss that

[28:44] there is oh i'm sorry okay i thought i'm sorry okay the chair

[28:51] would entertain a motion so moved second okay and and the motion

[28:56] is to approve to the city commission um outsourcing solid waste collection

[29:06] in the area east of slappy drive is that correct that is correct okay

[29:13] emotion is there a second second motion second any discussion miss battle

[29:20] none mr deal none slow none

[29:28] okay with that we'll call the question i'm sorry miss battle

[29:32] yes mr deal yes slow yes care votes no motion passes

[29:41] the uh next item on the agenda is um appointment

[29:48] of a utility board member to the long-term financial planning

[29:51] committee misubidan yes mayor um as you

[29:58] may recall the um one-third of the miad credits

[30:05] was assigned to a job investment fund which we maintain and partner with the

[30:14] economic development commission to use it as a

[30:19] as a way for us to secure economic development projects

[30:26] because it was the genesis of the fund came from the utility the utility board

[30:33] seats two people on the long-term financial planning committee

[30:38] um currently jim diehl serves on that committee for the utility board

[30:45] chad warbington bj fletcher bob lang staff served for the city commission

[30:50] and this morning we need a replacement on

[30:53] the long-term financial planning committee from the utility board that

[30:57] seat was previously held by sam smeed who's no longer a member

[31:05] okay um any questions from the suburban and dr adams

[31:08] none it's battle none excuse none

[31:16] slow none um i i would just ask um the city manager

[31:22] for i i'm sure mr logue has a uh good understanding of this but just

[31:28] for our benefit um i'm getting the information

[31:33] um with the rest of the city commission um ms subanen did you send out that

[31:40] explanation to the members of the utility board um

[31:46] no i can send it out again or if you want i can go over

[31:49] it now um okay can we do both absolutely okay yes ma'am just

[31:56] give me one second to pull up the document

[32:01] um

[32:05] sorry this will take a minute

[32:17] um derrick are you on could you kind of give the history

[32:22] of the um yes ma'am give me a credit

[32:29] yes ma'am it's just speaking in the pure terms of

[32:33] numbers uh when me act uh made that decision to

[32:37] refund those dollars back to the utility there was a joint decision made to

[32:42] divide that up into thirds and so the total refund amount was 76.2

[32:47] million dollars uh and so the utility kept a third the

[32:51] city kept a third and the decision was made to set

[32:55] one-third aside for future purposes and it was later decided to

[33:02] create a job investment fund for that other third

[33:06] and so all three entities kept 25.4 million dollars

[33:11] the utility and the city used their funds for general operating purposes

[33:18] up until fiscal year 15 which was about 19.1 million dollars

[33:23] beginning in fiscal 16 they sort of set that money aside the city and the

[33:28] utility pretty much after we came together that

[33:32] other third that was set aside the utility

[33:35] uh requested a million dollars of that money for elevator repairs and other

[33:38] repairs this city requested two hundred thousand

[33:41] dollars of that money for the game task force

[33:44] and since that time uh there have been some requests from the job investment

[33:48] fund thrust aircraft victoria fields restaurant mars

[33:53] chocolate the flats at 249 coast and clark and the

[33:56] flint and so funds that have been exhausted

[34:00] from the or expanded from the job investment fund

[34:03] amount to about 4.9 million dollars that left a balance of 20.4 million

[34:08] dollars in that fund uh we began to get some repayments of

[34:13] those funds that have been uh issued uh from our pretorian fields

[34:17] from the flint we've also made some interest on those

[34:20] funds over the years and so right now at least as of our

[34:24] financial statements has a december 31st uh there's 22.9 million

[34:29] dollars in that fund which is the oversight that the

[34:34] long-term financial planning committee makes recommendations on so as far as

[34:38] the job investment fund that's that balance

[34:40] uh which i'm sure that's that's the primary uh uh one that you're interested

[34:44] in the utilities also has uh six million dollars left of its

[34:48] balance of that 25.4 it initially had

[34:55] thank you darren vm the general fund allocation of 25.4 million

[35:01] was used for general operating um fiscal 09 to 15 before i got here

[35:07] we retained the remainder for several years and in fiscal 19 we used the

[35:12] remainder to upgrade the city's street lights to led

[35:18] so at this point the responsibility of the long-term financial planning

[35:21] committee is to convene to consider economic

[35:25] development projects there are a set of guidelines

[35:28] that are required for a project to be eligible to get a grant

[35:35] from the long-term financial planning committee

[35:39] and we convened that committee on an as needed basis

[35:44] um the bylaws really need to be updated because it requires you to meet

[35:49] more regularly than that but quite honestly

[35:52] unless there's a project to be determined

[35:56] um so it really sort of functions on a call

[35:59] call meeting basis but the um it would be interesting to see how

[36:05] how you would like that to be framed going

[36:07] forward along with the city commission and what the long time long long-term

[36:11] financial planning committee does is is is evaluate the projects and then

[36:16] make a recommendation to the city commission and the city commission

[36:19] ultimately has the decision of whether or not to grant to to approve

[36:24] a grant from the long from the job investment fund i will also

[36:29] let you know that um on tuesday night the

[36:34] city commission approved uh gap financing for

[36:38] the um south albany grocery store and we are using the job investment fund

[36:44] as a funding source but it doesn't meet the normal criteria

[36:48] it's not a grant um it is a loan program so these funds

[36:53] um will will go down by two hundred thousand dollars

[36:57] um for the purpose of supporting the um supermarket in um

[37:04] south south albany um which as you know has been a a challenge

[37:10] able to um partner with an operator and a building owner to bring

[37:16] bring that back to south albany any questions dr

[37:22] adams yes uh the super dan uh

[37:26] this south auburn project uh is it in what we call the food desert area

[37:33] it is it's in the old harvest that closed

[37:37] on on um on gordon okay thank you miss battle

[37:45] no questions just a deal none slope no questions

[37:53] well um it appears we have roughly 20 million dollars

[37:56] in the job investment fund and this committee oversees those funds

[38:01] um we all would agree we need more projects and industrial prospects so the

[38:05] committee could meet more frequently but the issue

[38:08] here is um the utility board needs to appoint a

[38:13] a member um i would entertain nominations or if anybody wants to

[38:19] volunteer however y'all tell me how y'all want to

[38:23] do it do you want to take nominations or we want to

[38:30] uh i i would uh since uh initially i

[38:38] i think i was involved in that uh project that um and i certainly would

[38:45] like to see those type funds uh be guarded with care so to speak

[38:51] and and not just be used heather skether so um

[38:58] i would like to volunteer and i don't volunteer for many things

[39:02] but i like to volunteer to serve if it's the uh

[39:06] if it's the pleasure of the other uh commissioners okay thank you dr adams

[39:14] miss battle um do you have any interest in serving

[39:19] no but i'd like to nominate someone um well i i think we're going to

[39:25] volunteer

[39:30] if she wants to nominate somebody else i would uh

[39:34] certainly not want to take that pleasure from her you know

[39:42] uh okay miss battle uh stan logan okay and um mr deal

[39:50] yeah i'd like to support dr adams he's very familiar with this

[39:55] okay um mr slow uh as much as i appreciate

[40:02] brenda's support um i think that dr adams would be a good choice as well

[40:08] okay that's perfect all right with that um

[40:11] dr adams has volunteered to serve we'll pass on dr adams first

[40:16] i'm all in favor of dr adam servant um dr adams i will abstain

[40:25] [Laughter] but i have to say yes okay mr lowe

[40:31] yes are you sorry mr deal i'm sorry yeah mr lowe yes chair votes yes

[40:38] it's four oh and oh no 401 i guess thanks for the support

[40:48] and as i said i hope the committee um meet soon

[40:52] if we but we just need some prospects here

[40:55] the next item on the agenda is an update on the walmart solar initiative mr stock

[41:01] yes sir good morning again thank you i can make this one

[41:05] really brief because there really hasn't been any movement

[41:09] um on this but we talked about this in december as you may recall i don't want

[41:14] to go into all of the history everybody remembers

[41:17] so the update is is that in in the middle of january

[41:22] the solar vendor that was working with miag

[41:26] uh on the project due to the what they call the subscription level

[41:30] in other words how many megawatts all the cities were interested

[41:34] ended up coming back lower than they anticipated

[41:37] uh that vendor raised their prices and as a result of that price

[41:42] increase in the in the ppa our purchase power agreement

[41:46] walmart rejected that agreement and so um walmart also rejected a proposed

[41:53] service fee for the cities that was included in that

[41:57] renewable energy customer agreement tariff

[42:00] they didn't like the way it was structured uh so walmart has requested

[42:04] me ag power to provide updates on three

[42:08] items and those items are an updated ppa

[42:11] pricing which means me egg has to go back and

[42:14] find another developer and negotiate and come up with pricing

[42:20] and then the second item is the revised uh requitera for the the city fee

[42:27] and redo of that structure and then the third thing we wanted was some project

[42:32] scenarios which are really you know like we talk about are just

[42:35] options you know if this then that uh so they wanted some of those as well

[42:40] based on that subscription level um and that is actually where i did that

[42:46] was uh the status like i said that happened in mid-january but we did

[42:51] uh talk with me ag on tuesday to verify that that is still the situation and

[42:56] that is still accurate information okay thank you mr stock welcome sir dr

[43:02] adams any questions

[43:06] miss battle any questions for mr stock no

[43:09] mr deal none mr loeb none well i i just want to say

[43:16] um

[43:20] my my objections to this proposal i mean from day one has been

[43:24] the city is really not much more than a straw man and here

[43:27] it's um been confirmed because what was happened is the real

[43:34] purchaser and the supplier couldn't come to um

[43:38] terms on the on the cost and so even if we would have supported it it would not

[43:42] have come to fruition anyway but um with that we

[43:48] proceed other matters dr adams none

[43:54] yes i have a two-part question do we have

[43:58] a anticipated date as to how soon we're going to receive the results of

[44:03] the audit one and two i guess this is for um

[44:09] um city managers super dan and two have there been any thought as to how

[44:15] this the results will be communicated to the

[44:20] public um we got a first pass um

[44:25] at the report and um we had additional questions

[44:32] that i don't think they answered that were in the scope

[44:39] um i want to make sure that they fully answer everything that was

[44:43] in our scope of work so we kind of sent them back

[44:48] to do more in-depth uh analysis and provide us a response to everything

[44:53] we ask for and so um i would say within

[44:58] probably within the next month we would communicate it at a

[45:02] at a utility board meeting um and at a city commission meeting

[45:07] um the other thing i would really love is if we were able to have

[45:12] sort of a high level um what i call a people speak version

[45:18] um that we can we can do for the public and so when we get the final report

[45:24] that's something that we would like to to be able to put out on on all of our

[45:28] media and social media outlets

[45:40] anything else in this battle no that's it

[45:44] okay under other matters mr deal no sir okay mr loeb no my the only thing i had

[45:51] was exactly what brenda brought up i was curious about the uh timing on our

[45:56] um consultants report and analysis of exactly where we are

[46:01] okay i um i was reminded when i drove into the parking lot today

[46:05] missus the lines are all crossed over each other

[46:09] we make any progress on restriping the or do you have to recover the whole lot

[46:14] i

[46:21] what you're seeing is the result of restriping we actually need to repave

[46:25] the lot and so my plan was to um

[46:29] see if we could do that either in the budget

[46:33] or um incorporate it some kind of way with the paving contract if there's a

[46:38] quantity um i would have to kind of see how

[46:43] how we're doing though um but we we are we are cognizant and

[46:48] truthfully now will be a good time if the weather holds to take care of it

[46:52] while we don't have customers coming into the building

[46:55] but we'll circle back and try to get a cost and and see if that's something we

[46:59] can do this year could that be a t splash project no sir

[47:04] no that would be funded by

[47:07] okay thank you all right next other business or items for a future

[47:13] agenda dr adams uh no i just uh have a curiosity

[47:19] question and maybe the superman can help me out with this

[47:23] um i i wonder

[47:28] what is the um downsides of using inmate labor uh and

[47:34] why why do we use inmate labor uh in the city or if

[47:41] not why not if so how does it work to our advantage well actually we had

[47:49] gotten a really good um arrangement

[47:54] going um for litter pickup especially in some of our most

[47:59] challenging areas where you know every three days you have

[48:02] to go out and pick up litter um the challenge we ran into though is

[48:07] they transported the prisoners in vans 15 passenger vans

[48:13] and once covet hit it wasn't possible for us to do that anymore because of

[48:18] social distancing so quite honestly since the beginning of

[48:22] the pandemic we've been really limited in in what we can do in terms of um

[48:27] um inmate labor

[48:32] okay thank you okay under other business items for future

[48:38] agenda miss battle none

[48:43] okay mr deal

[48:51] i'm sorry mr deal done thank you miss lo

[48:57] okay i want to thank everybody for your attendance your participation and your

[49:00] service and this meeting will be adjourned

Albany Utility Board Meeting 2-25-2021

Transcript