» board secretary, chante
mitchell: good morning and
welcome to the regular meeting
of the board of water and power
commissioners. Today is tuesday
january 13th, 2026. This
proceeding is being broadcast on
channel 35. Exact broadcast
times can be found by contacting
channel 35. Board of water and
power commissioners please say
present for roll call.
commissioner katz?
» pres. Nurit katz: present.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: commissioner marks?
» allan t. Marks: present.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: commissioner pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: present.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: commissioner tran?
» benny b. Tran: present.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: four board members.
a quorum is present.
commissioner pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
good morning to those who are
here before us today. I am your
presiding officer for today.
and I have to say, if you're a
football person, I have had more
notes, more -- wire for sound --
I wish I was, to get us through
this first meeting of the year.
because it's a new position for
me sitting here today, and I
have said to the commission
secretary, who you have known
for a longer time than myself,
to, please, call in any plays
from the side to -- she does not
have to jump up to hand me a
note, she can just say,
commissioner look at item number
so and so, and that's the way
we're going to get through this
today. So, I want you to bear
with me in that respect. Again
for those of you that follow
football, we just hope there
won't be too many fumbles, or if
there are, we can recover the
ball. And I say that because I
understand that that bear's
game, former usc quarter back --
somebody tell me his name, kay
leg lab williams, I understand
that was one of the most
recovery from being down so long
and catching up since he's a
trojan and I'm a trojan I'm
going to try to bring that
spirit here today.
[laughter]
so, anyway just bare with me and
have humor as we go through
this. At this point I'm going
to ask -- by the way, you will
see new faces here other and
faces that haven't reached -- so
we'll say retired are no longer
on the board I'm going to ask,
starting with my left, then
follow to my right then after
commissioner katz, after those
who have spoken I'm going to ask
these new commissioners and when
I say new commissioners, let's
just clap -- okay? New
commissioners.
[applause]
I don't know them very well
myself and as you know anything
about robert's rules we can
never any three of us ever be
together at the same time unless
it's on record and all of that,
so it's more torturous than you
know even trying to get to know
your commissioners, and, so,
I'll probably learn more about
them today, certainly, than
previously. So starting to my
left commissioner benny tran,
would you please share with our
audience which is both live and
here, anything you care to say?
» benny b. Tran: thank you
madam commissioner, and madam
intern chair. My name is benny
tran, I have worked in many
different sectors, including the
sustainability sector with the
climate initiative also in
public health and I had the
pleasure of moving to los
angeles. Never having been here
before to start the los angeles
football club and be a major
part of building the stadium of
which we partnered with the
ladwp very early on in the
savings by design program and
also the ev changing program.
and ladwp was most recently,
until this past year, we'll see
if we continue to be that, was
that were our main partners at
los angeles football club it's
been a great journey and great
ride. I was also recently a
board commissioner for parks and
recs, sorry -- recs and parks,
symbologies apologies -- what
you do here supporting mayor
bass and for citizens of los
angeles incredible work a lot of
work very unique very
important and to be one of the
innovative utilities nonetheless
public utility and I look
forward to working with everyone
and also serve the citizens of
this great city of los angeles.
thank you very much.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
commissioner alan marks?
» allan t. Marks: commissioner
pinder, thank you very much.
and also thank you for the kind
welcome, I was confirmed and
joined the commission, this is
my first meeting, but I joined
in the middle of december and
since then it's been like
drinking from a firehose with
all of the information I'm al ax
marks I'm a lawyer have worked
in energy and infrastructure in
the private sector for 35 years
this is my first public role and
I think commissioner pinder and
commissioner katz, your
experience has been vital, and I
will say for both of you thank
you for being so welcoming and
helping with this process. And
commissioner tran, I look
forward to working with you too.
we're new kids on the block.
and I know janisse quiñones, the
ceo, is not here today but she
and the rest of the senior
leadership team at the
department have also been
likewise very helpful in helping
me to understand some of the
complexity of this publicly
owned utility one of the things
I think that's important it's
different about being at a
publicly owned utility we're
accountable to the citizens
accountable to the residents we
are accountable to the people of
the city of los angeles not
private shareholders we have
talented and dedicated workforce
of nearly 12,000 employees at
dwp and for me to have
opportunity to give back to the
community where my grandparents
first came in 1915 and to be
part of the standing of legacy
of current commissioners of
prior commissioners of most
recently president richard katz,
you know, people who have built
this community and built this
institution is really a
privilege and honor. So, I
appreciate mayor bas and the
city council for their trust I
look forward to earping it and I
know we and by we I mine the
commission take the liberty of
speaking on behalf as well as
management and the employees you
know that we at the department
of water and power take very
seriously the goal and I look
forward to furthering the goals
of keeping water and power in
the city of los angeles
reliable, affordable, safe, and
clean. Thank you very much.
» pres. Nurit katz: thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: will you
please?
» pres. Nurit katz: yeah
absolutely I will say a word of
welcome to both of our new
commissioners I think
commissioner pinder and I are
both delighted by your
appointments the wealth of
expertise that you both bringing
to the dais and oversight of the
utility as you heard from
commissioner marks and
commissioner tran they both have
a lot of really important
background and knowledge ranging
from sustainability,
construction, infrastructure
finance all extremely relevant
to ensure that we continue as
commissioner marks said, to
provide reliable and affordable
energy and clean water. But
also as we move towards the
future and the ambitious goals
of the city of los angeles,
moving to 100% clean energy by
2035, and also 70% local water,
and I am really glad to have you
both here to help us continue to
move forward and continue to
improve the work of this
utility, and I certainly echo
your comments in terms of being
honored to serve in such an
amazing organization. We have
so much talent and expertise in
our staff and, you know,
especially, I know later today
we're going to hear about storm
preparations and actions and I
especially am grateful for all
of our field staff who are out
there, rain or shine, or wind,
or, you know, we don't get much
sleet and snow here in los
angeles, but really out there in
difficult conditions. So, thank
you commissioner pinder, and
welcome commissioners marks and
tran.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
I think we're ready at this
point for general public
comment.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: thank you
commissioner pinder to the
people providing public comment
when it's your turn to speak
please state which of the agenda
items you would like to speak
to. You will have two minutes
per item up to five minutes
total if you are speaking on a
specific item stay on topic
otherwise your time will be
forfeited. If you are only
speaking for general public
comment you will have two
minutes during general public
comment members of the public
may speak to any of the items
and anything else within ladwp's
subject matter jurisdiction. A
timer will sound when your time
allotment has expired. The
first speaker will be aleta
banda, followed by jeer
gerardo.
» speaker: good morning I know
I only have two minutes and I
want to be fast, kind of nervous
the reason I'm here today is
because I have a problem with my
bill it's been for the past
three years I have been trying
to get in touch with whoever can
help me with this but every time
I try I sends all the paper
requests but never get an answer
back so they transfer me from
one person to another and I
really need on get an answer on
this that's the many reason I'm
here today. And, well, this's
basically why I'm here today. I
really need help on this. And
it's been more than three years.
and they said that because I
accept the charges, but the only
reason I accept the charges is
because I used to have a
business so they went over and
cut the water at my business and
it's something that they
transfer from somebody else. So
how do I -- I wasn't able to say
no, because if I say no, I won't
be able to keep my business
running. So that's the only
reason I accept the charges, but
until today, they are just still
avoiding me. And I think that's
not fair at all.
» com. Wilma pinder: would you
state the amount on that bill?
» speaker: of course. I have
the bill with me, and I already
paid half of that.
» com. Wilma pinder: it's okay.
» speaker: I already paid half.
it was this amount. $103,000
447. And I don't think this's
fair at all.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
I seen it when I stepped into
the audience to speak to you. I
thank you for bring thatting
that matter before us.
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: we have
a representative from customer
relations office who can assist
meet with the customer right now
then provide a report to the
board on the situation what we
might be able to help with.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
so much.
» speaker: I appreciate it.
» com. Wilma pinder: they are
going to address that with you
today while you're here.
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: we'll
meet with you madam.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
for bringing that to our
attention. Thank you everyone.
before we go I want to say
something about this agenda
because I have skipped ahead for
item b it was to be election of
officers so that we had
permanent president however I'm
going to move that election
since I'm enjoying this so much
I'm going to move that election
to the end of our agenda so if
there is someone who is waiting
for that particular spot I have
now moved it to the end of the
agenda because we might get into
a 50 fight and save our energy
to the end of the meeting item b
look of officers is now moved to
the end of the agenda. Thank
you. So let us continue.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: the next speaker will
be gerardo ledesma followed by
ernesto macias.
» speaker: good morning
commissioners I'm going to talk
about item 17 my name is
gerardo, owner of tree service
kings thank you for the
opportunity to continue to serve
the city of la. Tree service
kings was born and raised here
in los angeles in 2006 we
started by servicing homeowners
and commercial properties. Then
our utility company. This is
our backyard. We are constantly
meeting and exceeding our
expectation -- our performance
expectations, services in both
areas of the metro and valley we
can respond quickly and be more
efficient we take pride in
reduces outages caused by
vegetation this is not just a
contract to us this is our city,
employees, and our families.
and our crews show up every day
in difficult conditions, heat,
wind, rain, or in emergencies
because we end how critical this
work is to the safety and to the
stability of our city. Over
these five years, we have earned
the trust of ladwp's field team
and leadership through constant
performance, safety, and being
the ability. Respectfully asked
to consider awarding tree
service kings full base so we
can continue doing what we have
been doing successfully for five
years protecting the city
prevent says outages and serving
los angeles with pride. Thank
you.
» com. Wilma pinder: so was
this a situation -- sir, was
this a situation where you
simply did not get the bid?
» speaker: the bid is divided
into two. We're the lowest
bidder as a whole, for the whole
bid, but the bid got divided
into two and in one area where
you're a bit higher than our
competitors.
» com. Wilma pinder: well it's
a competitive situation every
time every dollar counts I'm
just sharing that. I don't know
anything about that I don't know
other than what you said I
appreciate how you have
presented yourself here no
hostility just saying I'm in the
game I want to stay with it but
those are the rules that we try
to follow because we're man
dated to do that. You have been
heard. Stay in the process,
stay in the bidding. As you
said, since 2006, you have been
in this, you wouldn't be this
far ahead 20 years if you didn't
know your apples and your
dollars and all of that. So, I
wish you good luck with that.
» speaker: thank you very much.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: the next speaker will
be ernesto macias who will be
followed by ryan meyers.
» speaker: good morning
commissioners my name is ernesto
macias here to speak on
agenda item number 17 I'm here
representing tree service kings
a proud local meernt opened
business based in the city of
los angeles. I'm asking the
commission to reconsider
awarding both group 1 and 2
around ifb number 700, solely to
tsk. Tsq isn't just
headquartered here, our
employees are raised here, raise
families here and support this
community every paycheck we
issue stays local every dollar
earned is spent in los angeles.
when you award to tsk, you are
directly investing in the people
who make this city wrun. In
contrast utility tree service is
not local their paperwork shows
chino uts subsidiary of aspen
tree expert company
headquartered in philadelphia,
pa, they are not embedded in
this community and their track
record raises serious concerns
when uts previously held this
contract they struggled to meet
ladwp's expectations. They
turned to tsk for help. They
help keep the system afloat some
of the struggles may not be
public but we respectfully ask
staff and commission to examine
those reviews and operational
reports closely these serious
questions about their current
capacity to take on ladwp most
demanding region which is the
metro reliability and responses
are critical. Tsk has
delivered. We have reduced tree
related outages, trim suggest on
schedule, and our annual ladwp
is able to manage the entire
city with its current staffing
levels because of our
efficiency. During the
palisades fire -- tsk deployed
over 20 crews working seven days
a week all while maintaining a
full system that's not theory
that's commitment and action we
know our protest appeal were
denied we respect that process
but the concerns remain and so
this opportunity to do what's
right for the city awarding both
areas to tsk means that
operational success it's about
trusting the people who have
prove app themselves keeping our
resources in our communities
standing with the workforce
that's showing up where it
matters most. Thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
I would repeat pretty much what
I said to the gentleman who
spoke before you that was the
same company correct?
» speaker: yes, ma'am.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
as far as something being
outside of the city or state the
city of los angeles department
of water and power we do
business with people all over
the united states if it comes to
that so while we are certainly
always looking for what we're
trying to accomplish and the
people who handle the
commissioners we do not handle
the bids we have expert people
who are handling those type of
things but wouldn't want you to
think that bids are simply
looked at regionally or these
are our people we don't think
like that we are thinking
economic range here so your
remarks have been heard as I
said to the other gentleman,
this is the company with 20
years and as you said you
produce and do good things and
I'm sure you will be looked at
in a continuing and competitive
situation with ladwp.
» speaker: thank you madam
commissioner.
» com. Wilma pinder: you're
welcome.
» nurit katz: may I respond as
well, commissioner?
» com. Wilma pinder: please.
another commissioner.
» nurit katz: yes thank you to
both of the tree service kings
speakers really appreciate you
raising these concerns I will
one year with renewal options so
we take seriously concerns and
considerations obviously it's
complex when coming from a
competitor but to the community
if you have concerns with either
company please do raise those
we'll look closely at the
performance of these contracts
and long-term will continue to
consider through this
competitive process the best
positions for the city. It's a
legal process the rfq process so
we do not have the option to
award the contract differently
today. But I will is say to the
tree service king speakers,
thank you for your service so
far. As commissioner pinder
said please continue to bid as
needed and on a personal note,
did I have a backyard tree
trimming recently for utility
lines and was appreciative of
the notice and service that I
received. So, again, thank you
for the service you have given
so far although we're not able
to change the awarding of the
contract today. Again, we
welcome any feedback from the
community on any of our
contractors, and we will
continue to evaluate the
performance of these contracts
over time.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: the next speaker is
ryan meyers who will be followed
by valerie lizeraga.
» speaker: I'm ryan meyers
director of operations of
utility tree service we'll --
I'll be speaking to item 17.
good morning commissioners and
thank you for the opportunity to
partners with ladwp on
vegetation management services
on behalf of utility tree
service. We're honored to
support your mission, keeping
your electric system safe,
reliable, and compliant for the
communities that you serve.
in the prebid conference you
emphasized that you intended to
make two awards one contract
area north and south we just
want to thank you for choosing u
are tilt tree service in the
south it's a smart strategic
decision for ladwp and customers
and we are a local company. We
are a california llc, but we
have over 700 employees here.
our employees live within
drivable distance of ladwp and
we serve every major utility
here in the state from san
diego, socal edison, pg&e, north
sacramento smud so we're well
versed in the industry as far as
value we deliver the lowest life
cycle cost while maintaining
highest standards of safety
quality and regulatory
compliance which is huge for us
our safety performance leading
it. Cir injury incident rate is
consistently 50% better than
competitors in the industry
which as you know this is very
dangerous work here that we do
our teams have isa certified
arborists and utility
specialists with decades of
experience on a l.e.d. Wp system
what differentiates us we
haven't a comprehensive employee
screening we verify drug test
all employees ensure 100%
compliance with federal
standards osha ansi standards
soc two certified it huge this
industry here to safeguard all
distribution transmission data
is a huge thing rapid
mobilization capabilities within
the state as well outside of the
state as you know with the
recent fires and things like
that we have workforce can tap
on -- was that two minutes?
I'll wrap up here committed
transparency collaboration
continues improvement our goal
is to align with ladwp
operational priorities community
values delivering best class
vegetation management every day
we want to thank you for your
trust look forward to partnering
with ladwp answering questions
getting to work we're ready to
deliver the best-in-class
vegetation management solutions
that align with your operational
goals and community. Thank you.
» nurit katz: I invited the
community to provide feedback on
these contractors I did not mean
to the commission so the
commission is not engaged in
selecting these vendors we are
approving the contract but the
selection is by staff so if you
have feedback on the service of
these contractors please share
with ladwp staff that is always
welcome.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
f that's important clarity
because we don't do that thank
you.
» speaker: thank you.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: the next speaker is
valerie lizeraga followed by
fateme murietta.
» speaker: good morning I'm
going to make a general comment.
good morning commissioners my
name is valerie, I'm the
assistant director of organizing
and policy with jobs to
america's western states team
jma is a national non-profit
organization that conducts
rigorous independent research on
manufacturing economy and works
in coalition with communities to
negotiate community benefit
agreements and benefit all
stakeholders including promoting
safe quality jobs in
september 2025 members of our
team partners joined the board
of water and power commissioners
meeting to share about a new
report that was published by jma
after two years of investigation
which documented troubling labor
and environmental conditions at
neptune technology group major
manufacture of smart water
meters based in tallahassee,
alabama and key supplier of
ladwp neptune workers surveyed
reported having witnessed or
experienced at least one serious
injury on the job nearly 70
survey workers reported
experiencing or witnessing
unfair treatment including
favoritism inconsistent
discipline racism and sexism and
that two landfills where neptune
sends its waste have long been
focus of environmental justice
investigations and litigation we
believe that the city of los
angeles and ladwp can and should
continue to be a leader in
uplifting strong workers and
standards and procuring
equipment from companies that
treat workers and surrounding
communities with responsibility
and respect is crucial at the
board meeting in september 2025
the board committed to
investigating these findings and
agendaize this item for further
discussion we're here to ask the
board for an update to follow up
regarding these concerns and ask
you to follow-through with your
commitment to agendaize this
important item for further
discussion. Thank you. I'll
end that we brought two copies
of the report for the two new
commissioners and also want to
say welcome. Thank you. Please
let us know how we should hand
it to you all.
» com. Wilma pinder: someone
will take it now. Thank you.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: the next speaker will
be fateme marietta followed by
martin marufo.
» speaker: good morning my name
is fateme I'm here to give
public comment I'm a senior
organizer with jobs to move
america and I was also here at
the last board meeting in
september 2025 and shared key
findings that valerie just
reviewed with you. And I'm here
again to respectfully ask the
board to follow-through with
your commitment to investigate
these findings and to agendaize
a report back at an upcoming
board meeting. Since we last
spoke to you about the report
neptune has hired a consultant
to meet with workers on the
clock to, "represent neptune in
their facility at tallahassee
and alabama and developing a
training and communication
materials regarding the national
labor relations act according to
the federal disclosure
documents." neptune has
characterized mischaracterized
reports and findings and jm's
activities these actions are
concerning the good
neighborhoods alabama coalition
is made up of 25 organizations
and jma is one of them, aiming
to partner with workers in the
community in the company to
address the issues outlined in
the report our hope is that
workers and community in alabama
who build these water saving
infrastructure products for los
angeles are doing so in safe and
fair working conditions and that
strong environmental standards
are put in place to protect
surrounding communities. The
coalition has asked neptune to
take the report's finding
seriously and to come together
in the pursuit of real solutions
but in a communication to its
workers neptune falsely stated
the report was, quote "coupled
with demand that the company
recognizes a labor union and
requirement that workers pay
union dues." neptune also
falsely allege that good
neighbors alabama approximate
and jobs to move measuring try
to trick workers into signing
authorization cards. All not
true. In our opinion neptune
miscarries reminded us of union
tactics and we want a commitment
to win-win solution to solve
these serious problems and look
forward to seeing this item
agenda at a future board meeting
and hearing back from the board.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
» nurit katz: we did request
that staff investigate this
issue and appreciate you raising
it and will certainly reach out
when there is resolution or
additional information from the
water system. Thank you.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: next speaker martin
marufa followed by bruce
resnick.
» speaker: good morning
commission good morning staff
good morning everybody for the
new members what were you
thinking?
[laughter]
this is a very difficult job
there is a lot here. I'm a
lifelong resident of los angeles
went to public schools did the
whole route worked southern
california edison former
employee of ladwp generation
steam generation for a long time
out on the outside but it's
important for the residents for
the citizens for member adlies
at ibw local 18 because I'm the
business manager also ibw local
18 to have reliable efficient
affordable power scattering
generating station has been
discussed for many years the
repower it's utmost important we
get this handled pushed through
we have environmental concerns I
live in wilmington I'm right
next to harbor generating
station so I understands what
it's like to live next to a
power plant we also have
refineries and we have chemical
plants there but the important
of having reliable power now at
this time is important we cannot
ignore the impact that it will
have we believe that we should
be going to renewable power but
the technology is not there this
is an opportunity at scattergood
to have hydrogen introduced to
our system and this is going to
help us get to that next level
we understand that hydrogen will
be difficult and challenging but
it's not impossible we need to
find a way to fix this it's not
acceptable to just kick this can
down the road we are working
with environmental groups spoken
at the water resources board to
talk about expending some of the
allowances we have to continue
generating and using gas powered
energy but we're at a point
right now where we need on get
this passed and pushed forward.
please, take all the time and
attention you need but this is
of utmost importance to
everybody, member citizens, all
of us. Thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
for your comment.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: final speaker will be
mr. Bruce resnik.
» speaker: good morning. My
name is bruce resnik executive
director of la water keeper
thank you for the opportunity to
speak today different commission
from the last time I testified I
see some new folks here and
welcome. I'm here to support
the groundwater replenishment
project and all modifications
made. Wastewater recycling is
scro
absolutely critical at 70% local
water goal just to be water
secure water resilient city and
expanding the tillman project
from the rim 25mgd to 45mgd is
extremely cost-effective license
the project was already being
developed to get 20mgd of local
water and potentially reduce
expensive energy intensive
pumping of water from hyperion
backpack to the valley when the
full pure water la project comes
on board that being said we're
concerned the commission and
staff take count to make sure
that we're protecting flows in
the la river when we're --
exactly this water we have
actually been working closely
with staff over the last couple
of years protecting critical
flows of la river. We also
look forward to the broader pure
water la project coming online.
I county stand up here and ever
-- you know, without saying
hopefully sooner than the 2056
goal it's such a critical
project and another great
project for workers and labor
and also both these projects
that are groundwater
replenishment and the broader
pure water la are going to be
critical for us to reduce our
import of water from places like
mono lake and of course mwd
colorado river and bay delta and
help restore those critical
ecosystems to help.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
very much. I believe that was
the last public speaker.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: public comment is now
closed at this time.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
the next agenda item item f
reporting and briefing. And,
joe, while we know you well,
since there are various people
in the audience who may have
come just to hear our ceo's
remarks, will you introduce
yourself and give a little
background to our general
manager audience before making
that report?
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: sure.
thank you very much
commissioner. My name is joe
ramallo, I'm chief customer
officer at ladwp. I want to be
welcome everyone today I'm
sitting in for our ceo and chief
engineer janisse quiñones today.
my team oversees and works on
all matters involving customer
service as well as billing,
dealing with key accounts as
well as residential and
commercial customers also
oversee communications and
community affairs team that does
a lot of the work including one
of the reports before you today
concerning our palisades work
over the last year. Also
supervisor our distributed
energy resources team that
involves energy efficiency,
battery storage, in-basin work.
there is an item on your agenda
today regarding significant
expansion toward our distributed
energy resources. And our
claims team, as well. So when
we have an incident in a
community, if a water main
breaks, and it affects a
customer, the claim is filed
that team reviews those claims
and works with our legal
department to find a resolution
for our customers. So very
pleased to be with you today.
we have some operational updates
f you can transition into that?
» com. Wilma pinder: yes
please.
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: we'll
start with anselmo collins water
system followed by dave hanson I
have a few items then zori eya g
who is our chief resiliency and
emergency management officer
will also speak to a couple of
items just before that I want to
say welcome to our new
commissioners pleased to you
have on board on behalf of
janisse, as well, as our entire
executive team we look forward
to working with you and for you.
and are here as a resource to
you. Thank you. With that I'll
turn it over to anselmo.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
» anselmo collins: thank you
joe. Good morning
commissioners, anselmo collins
water system typically this time
of year a provide a water supply
report to the board because
united states this is when we
collect the snow and rain that
we use for the water supply for
the city of la we had a pretty
wet december especially towards
the end of the year beginning of
january. Between the 31st of
december and january 4th, the
city of la got around two and a
half inches of water which is
quite significant, because for
the season, typically the city
of vallejo on average gets
around 15 inches so we got two
and a half just during that
time. Since the beginning of
the water year which starts in
october until january 12th we
have received, the city of la,
12.4 inches of water. The san
fernando valley got a little
over 17 inches of water that's a
pretty significant amount of
water that's allowed us to
capture a bit less than 56,000
acre feet of water. Those
56,000 acre feet of water
translates to enough water to
serve approximately 223,000
homes in los angeles for an
entire year. So, it's a pretty
significant amount of water that
we have received. It's still
early in the season so we're
hoping to get more storms here
but also more storms up north so
we can get more snowpack. So
the department of water
resources which is a state
agency, every year conducts snow
surveys conducted their first
survey recently on december 30th
at the phillips station and they
recorded 24 inches of snow.
when you translate that to the
snow equivalent or water content
that's approximately five inches
of water a pretty good start to
the season as well. Statewide,
the snowpack right now is around
81% of normal, and that is
measured in different locations
on average. For los angeles, as
you know, we received our water
for the la aqueduct from the
eastern part of the sierra never
add as and we have mashed with
snow pillows, approximately 13.5
inches. Now, that number is
going to be verified by doing
our own snow surveys. Our first
snow survey will be on
february 1st. So we'll be able
to verify exactly how much snow
water content we have on the
eastern side of the sierras,
which is what provides water to
the city of los angeles. A
couple of other things I want to
mention, one quite outstanding,
so january 6th, the state of
california actually declared
that there isn't a drought
condition in the state for the
first time in 25 years. So all
parts of the state are not in a
drought. That has not happened
in 25 years. So that's pretty
significant there.
» com. Wilma pinder: in fact, I
was going to say that myself.
so, I'm so glad that you made it
an official announcement. I
mean, I don't know that the
significance of that is so great
I mean we're also concerned
about our little piece of the
pie, but to have the entire pie,
meaning california, drought
free, it's just unbelievable.
» anselmo collins: absolutely
especially considering that just
four years ago we were at the
end of a multi-year drought. So
as you can tell, as water
managers we have got to manage
when there is too much water and
also when there is not enough
water and in this case right now
we're doing well we hope to
continue with that. And that
said also the department of
water resources, they also,
every year, they provide
allocation of water for the
state water project contractors,
metropolitan water district,
which is our wholesaler, is a
state water project contractor,
the state has announced
allocation of 10%. That means
that metropolitan right now,
based on that, can get 10% of
the amount of water that they're
entitled to. Now this number
tends to change, so as the
season progresses and we get
more snowpack and more
precipitation, the state will
update that number. So, the
hope is that by the time we get
to april, when is when we start
the runoff season, that we will
have a greater allocation
percentage, which is good news
for us because we do depend, not
just on the la aqueduct, but
also on the state water project,
and the colorado river, via
metropolitan, to supply water to
the city of los angeles. And
that's the end of my report for
water supply.
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: thanks.
dave hansen senior assistant
general manager for power
system.
» dave hanson: thank you, joe.
good morning commissioners in
december last year we joined
mayor bas council member
nassearrian and several dwp
staff and climate leadership to
celebrate is a large milestone
on our path to climate
leadership to celebrate a large
milestone on our path 100% clean
energy we're proud to share that
dwp is eliminated coal from our
power supply like to thank coal
for its many years of service.
[laughter]
on november 26th, 2025 we
received the last coal fueled
energy from utah's intermountain
power project refer to as ipp
which has been the final source
of coal in our portfolio since
2016 we utilize portfolio since
2016 we now utilize energy from
hydrogen capable generating
units recently constructed at ip
renewed those u noveltys
currently run on natural gas and
are capable of running on fuel
blends of natural gas up to 30%
hydrogen with roadmap eventually
transitioning to 100% green
hydrogen as fuel source in the
near future we expect to add
hydrogen to the fuel mix in 2026
normally power would be
reporting performance during
winter storm outage but ol' viv
griffith will be covering that
today since we're activated for
emergency command this time
towards the end of the year
usually get requests for solar
incentive customer projects to
be energized. We're thankful
for the group to be able to
identify that issue and pivot
and handle before we became
aware of it at the executive
level. Good job miel, john,
gary and the team. Also power
system in the middle of power
reorganization kicked that off
monday engaged with korn ferry
as our consultants for the last
year looking at moving into
functional operating model
instead of siloed built on
classifications the power reorg
bulletin draft org chat going
out today by end of the month
we'll put out the final bulletin
final org chart share with all
the commissioners also palisades
relocated u rock that's our ford
operating base for operations
and coordinating collaboration
all other city departments in
construction now being relocated
from topanga state beach to
marquez elementary school
adjacent to property and we
anticipate that will be open at
the end of this month that's it.
thank you.
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: thank
you dave a couple of items ladwp
was proud to cohost the winter
solstice ceremony on friday
december 19th fortunate to have
commissioners marks and
commissioner katz attend thank
you for going that was together
with fernandeno at that time
staffian band of mission indians
at chatsworth nature preserve, a
real gem in our water system and
community resource this
tradition began in 20215th year
of celebrating cultural heritage
this event honors ancestral
transitions promoting nature
preservation, it highlights our
commitment to protecting
sensitive habitats and engaging
the community and preserving
this unique natural space
together with our partners
from the band of mission
indians. Next monday on
january 19th we will be proudly
participating in the 41st annual
dr. Martin luther king jr.
kingdom day parade in los
angeles the parade is organized
in our city to unite our city in
celebration of freedom equality
community empowerment our human
resources outreach recruitment
services division is
spearheading our participation
in the parade hoping you would
be able to join us for that we
have employees from our own
staff in addition to members of
our national society of black
engineers ladwp chapter will be
participating pleased to have
family and friends together with
our ford lightening ev truck and
ev bucket truck to demonstrate
our commitment to inclusion and
equity and also promote jobs
here at the department looking
forward to that and welcome you
as well. I would like to
introduce zoraya oliver griffin,
our chief environment emergency
management officer to provide
update on the winter storm we
had just prior to christmas and
also on our palisades one-year
after report.
» zoraya oliver-griffin: good
morning commissioners. As we
all lived through the holiday
storm we all know that los
angeles received a record
rainfall on christmas eve in
many areas field by a severe
atmospheric river which added to
the region's rain totals as we
heard from anselmo specifically
on christmas day and early
friday. As a department we
decided to take a proactive
approach and prepared to quickly
and safely manage any forecasted
impacts as a result of the
atmospheric river which was
according to the national
weather service unprecedented
for our area this time of year
despite the additional challenge
of staffing during the christmas
eve and christmas holiday based
on increasing risk reported by
the national weather service
including heavy rainfall along
with high potential for mud
slides, and believe it or not, a
tornado portably touching
ground, which it did, the
department of emergency
operation center activated well
in advance of the storm,
prepared for cross system
operational coordination
realtime situational awareness
monitoring and impact management
proud to report that our
infrastructure both water and
power performed well against the
storm with minimal impacts to
any of our service territory any
power and water system outages
were successfully addressed
relying on existing personnel
and resources within our normal
operations timelines at peak in
the we hours of december 24th
19,000 customers were affected
by power outages primarily as a
result of several inches of
rainfall, fallen palm fronds and
debris that came into contact
with our power lines and
equipment. Also happy to report
that all power outages and power
service was restored well within
48 hours a tremendous thank you
to all field personnel and
responders who worked tirelessly
in challenging conditions of
rain and wind, taking time away
from their loved ones during a
special holiday season to ensure
not only a safe but a very quick
response to restore outages as
quickly as possible. I would
also like to mention that this
doc activation culminated a
very.
[ buzzer ]
2025 for our emergency
response for the department for
a total 53 days of department
wide emergency response ranging
from wildfires atmospheric
rivers and storms civil unrest
and extended water outage and
even tsunami warning so we had a
little bit across the entire
spectrum, waiting for a volcano
to happen
[laughter]
but you know let's keep it at
bay for a while regardless I
want to assure each and every
one of you that the department
as a whole is very well prepared
for any emergency or natural
disaster that we may face in
2026 or moving forward.
next overview of our palisades
report. Last week we passed a
very sobering milestone for our
-- for our city. With the
one-year anniversary of the
start of the tragic wind-driven
palisades fire, nothing --
absolutely nothing can reverse
this tragedy, but I assure you,
we have spent the last year
doing everything that we
possibly can to help the
palisades community to rebuild,
and also help make los angeles
more resilient. Last week we
published our report detailing
all we have done over the past
year to support our palisades
customers and the community, as
well. The report a summary of
all efforts which focuses on how
ladwp led efforts and deployed
resources early and quickly to
support recovery for the
palisades community, the
strengthening of -- and
reliability of our water and
power systems, the things that
we're currently do to protect
our systems against ongoing
climate threats, our advancement
of partnerships to improve
climate resiliency and, finally,
leveraging all funding
opportunity paths to recover --
to recovery and resiliency.
that report is available at
ladwp.com/palisades for any one
of our customers or the public
that would like to refer to it.
» com. Wilma pinder: buffer go
I want to be clear on something.
because if I was just a citizen
at home listening, usually when
we use the word rebuild, many
people think of that as some
financial aid or money that we
make available. When you use
the term rebuild, you are not
referring to dwp helping in a
funeral way with individual
homeowners, were you?
» zoraya oliver-griffin: that
is correct. Referring to
rebuilding of our water and
power infrastructure.
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: but I do
want to add that with respect to
customers and providing that
assistance we did not bill for
any water use for a significant
period of months following
because of the tragedy and the
loss and the inability of
actually accurately measure the
amount of water that was used by
customers whose homes were
destroyed or whose customers
whose homes were not destroyed
so that was a significant help
in addition we have extended
repayment plans for customers,
repayment plans and also we're
not doing collections through
june 30th of this year. We're
doing everything we can to
assist them with financially
even though it doesn't include
direct financial support toward
rebuilding homes.
» com. Wilma pinder: I'm very
glad you restated that because
that's very important point I
remember at the beginning when
dwp made that advisement. So
thank you joe for saying that I
didn't want anyone hearing the
remarks thinking that somehow we
were in a sense providing money
for building. And I know that
dwp has extended itself to the
residents in any way that it can
to anything that we can do that
is a direct role from us to save
them, like you said, being
billion dollar for something,
anything we can clear that is
within our range to handle. So,
thank you for restating that.
and thank you and excuse me for
interrupting you.
» zoraya oliver-griffin: no. I
appreciate you raising the
clarification. You know, I also
would be remiss if I didn't
mention and speak on behalf of
the four executives, dave,
anselmo, joe, and I, that are
very committed and working very
closely with the palisades
community to ensure that, you
know, we meet and support their
needs in a way that is relevant
to them. So, we are very
committed to working with them
so that they help us shape how
we're going to proceed with our
work in the palisades. So, it's
become being a true genuine
partnership. So, a lot of times
they may not like what we have
to say, but the four of us are
very committed to being
transparent and providing the
information when we have it, you
know, to the degree that we're
able to provide it. Okay.
thank you. And that is the end
of my report for today.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
» >>joseph m. Ramallo: thank
you zoraya.
» nurit katz: may I comment on
the report?
» com. Wilma pinder: sure.
» nurit katz: thank you I just
want to take a moment to
acknowledge that this is our
first board meeting and so soon
after the one year anniversary
like many of you and many
angelenos I had friends and
family impacted by the fires in
2025 both the palisades fire
here in the city of los angeles
and also the eighth on fire and
I know many of our employees did
as well some of our employees
lost homes directly or were
otherwise impacted by the fire
and I remember a year ago that
some of those employees were at
work the very next day despite
having lost their homes and
participating in the helping the
city in this time of crisis. I
want to take a moment to
acknowledge really all of our
staff and all our employees who
have been engaged in that time
of crisis and since then your
service is really inspiring and
incredible president katz would
often refer to dwp as first
responders and I want to echo
that and especially when it came
to the 2025 fire. It's amazing
to reflect back on this year and
look at everything that this
department has done from
restoring water at record speed,
water service to continuing to
advocate for fema funding, and
working on the rebuild,
providing a good source of
interaction for the community to
get all their questions answered
at the u rock, and I'm glad to
hear that movement is underway.
so thank you for that. We don't
get to plan on emergencies so I
want to acknowledge zoraya, the
whole team that was involved in
the department eoc on christmas
a holiday that I'm sure many
would have liked to be
celebrating with families so to
be activated in emergency
operations we really protected
your eye on the storm and
ensuring that power and water
were restored quickly. Lastly I
want to note that although the
state is, for the first time in
many years, out of the drought
for the moment, that with
climate change we have really
seen a whiplash so we know we're
going to have these wet years
and very dry years I want to
encourage all angelenos to keep
your eye on water conservation
just because r because we're out
of a drought for the moment
doesn't mean california doesn't
have serious water supply
challenges ahead so please
continue to take advantage of
the now increasing tougher
replacement program the leap
program for low-income families
to have free landscape
replacement and other water
saving measures. It's a big
deal dwp has transitioned away
from coal so thank you for
mentioning that, dave, and we
will continue to push forward
towards clean energy and all the
different ways that we can
address climate change and also
climate resiliency. So thank
you very much for these reports
today.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
I wish I had included this under
my general remarks, but I'm
going to put it in right now
before I move to the ratepayer
if you will allow me.
we have had general counsel here
at all times, you often possibly
don't pay any attention, but we
have someone who is, before we
come to a meeting, things have
been screened in a legal way so
that we do not inadvertently
misstep or make a legal decision
or action that could have
repercussions. So, always, at
the end of our circle, we have
our general counsel for the
department of water and power
board of commissioners with us.
the dwp has its own legal
section, not in this building,
but in another building. In
fact we used to, when I was
here, on the 15th floor, and
they moved us to another floor,
and eventually they moved the
whole legal team out of this
building. But there are lawyers
that are dedicated just to l
ladwp, who are city employees.
and those people are here to
advise on the contracts, they're
to advise the attorneys, I said
attorneys -- commissioners, on
what we're doing. So ben
chapman kind of got away before
many of you who are regulars
here or who tune in regularly,
was acknowledged as fully as he
could have been. But someone
has stapedes -- stepped in,
because the city attorney's
office has capable attorneys
people send to take who are
government employees for granted
where all of the dwp people are
government employees they're
keeping the lights on and water
flowing so we don't want people
in little boxes and little
places and diminish what they do
in their life for all of us so
with that said I don't want to
introduce you myself miss florez
but I would love for you to tell
us not only your name, what you
do and how you assist the
commission. Will you do that
please?
» speaker: certainly. Thank
you for the nice introduction of
our whole office, office of the
city attorney, I am the chief
deputy city attorney and am
filling in, in an interim role
as general counsel for dwp given
how much is going on here, and
the unexpected retirement of the
former general counsel ben
chapman. I'm here, and our
whole office is here to provide
legal support and guidance, you
can call upon us at any time and
we're happy to help out. I am a
23 year veteran of the city
attorney's office. I started my
career in big law, was a trial
lawyer, and then came over to
the city. It's been the best
legal decision I ever made.
it's been a great job. I was
born in la, both parents were
city employees. So, this is my
mission in life to make sure
that the city prospers and
conducts its business legally
and effectively. We want to
make sure the whole office of
the city attorney wants to make
sure that our clients meet their
goals and we're here to help you
do that so, thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: well, I
appreciate you, just on the
spot, because I didn't tell you
I would do that I just sat there
and I looked. And I know --
now, she sounded all nice and
sweet when she said that, now,
that lady is a land slapper, she
will get -- they make you course
correct very quickly. It's not
all smiles. And many times we
retire from you and we go into
closed session and those are the
matters that the charter
mandates that we only talk
offrecord with our attorney. We
list those cases that are in
litigation, you can go and look
them up yourselves, but we do
not discuss them in front of
you. But when we go into closed
session, we have the city
attorney's office there. We are
a check and balance. We comment
on the cases that they have, or
how much -- how much risk do we
have if we go forward with a
matter. So, this is -- I want
you to really get the sense that
this is not just a stagnant
thing here. I noticed, and it
was new to me, dwp people call
everybody by their first name.
so, it's -- it's -- seems
informal seems like everybody
is, you know, brother, sister,
lovey dovey, but people here are
check mates of each other. And
while they try to do it with a
smile, they do hold people to
follow what is correct, and that
goes for not only just the
commissioners, it goes for
people here who have title
underneath them. They have to
keep those people in the right
line, but they still allow a
flow of information. So, I move
to say all of this today because
I happen to have the mic, and
I'm able to say it today. But
it's just donning on me, it's
just donning on me, how involved
this is. And maybe that's even
why we ends up with a shift of
people. It's a lot to ask, even
the people who are getting paid,
and I want to remind you, we're
not getting paid. And there are
people who are -- and we're used
to making big decisions
ourselves. I know my colleagues
here, they still work. I happen
to be retired, but be that as it
may, if we are away from
whatever we're doing, our
family, our work, et cetera, we
all are committed to this. And
the commissioners, we wouldn't
want to work here -- wrong word
-- we wouldn't want to volunteer
here if we did not feel that our
time was appreciated. But the
people keep us in check too.
commissioner pinder, you can't
do that, you can't say that, you
can't do that, so, we follow
those. And I want you to know
it starts with the city
attorney's office that's located
in the city hall east building
and it's here with our council,
as well. So, and I don't know
even if our two new
commissioners who I'll probably
may never say this again, you
better watch your toes because
these people aren't playing.
» nurit katz: and commissioner
pinder I have to say because you
are always so humble with your
own background, commissioner
pinder is speaking from
experience 30 years of service
in the city attorney's office
and 20 of those serving ladwp so
we're lucky to have your
expertises on the commission as
an extra set of legalized
everything that you bring thank
you for that wilma.
» nurit katz: you're very kind
next item another agency that
keeps us on our toes ratepayer
advocate item g on the agenda.
» tim o'connor: thank you
commissioner pinder. Good
morning and welcome commissioner
marks, trance, nice to see you
here in your first meeting after
having been confirmed my name is
tim o I'm the ratepayer advocate
I would like to recognize joined
with me today by another member
of my team joe coko, if you
might stand up a leader in our
office focused on daily analysis
customer program analysis
affordability joe brings a long
line of experience in
examination of these issues on
behalf of ratepayers he'll be
working with me my team upcoming
analysis which you will be
seeing as well as forward basis
in support of analysis on filed
items I would like to direct
your attention as well members
of the public to written
comments that we filed with the
commission on filed items 8, 13,
16, 17, those were as well filed
items 7 and 8 you should have a
copy of our written comment
before you in addition opa
reviewed all items submitted to
the board via the public web
site and met with staff on items
for approval today before you on
5, 6, 7, 9, 15, 18, and 23,
we're not providing written
comments on those but have
evaluated the information
associated with those as well as
all filed items that have been
submitted to the commission
leadership to the board. The --
I would like to say that in
meeting with staff on all of
these items, I would be remiss
if I didn't give a level of
gratitude and appreciation for
the openness of an ongoing
openness of teams from the cfo's
office, from the power system,
from the water system, from the
administrator office, from
customer service that helps us
do our jobs of evaluating these
items that come before you,
providing analysis and comments
areas that we identify, maybe
are needed areas of improvement,
areas for additional analysis
and just additional areas for
consideration.
I will bring forward three items
today that I want to raise to
your attention. The first is
related to opa's broad mission.
we remain committed to
affordability, to transparency,
and to accountability on
community impact from the
department. And in support of
this, opa recently released
several items for public
evaluation in areas which are
relevant to the -- the board
today. One of those is a series
of public-facing materials on
water and power rate design, as
well as consumer utility bill
design to provide explanation to
the general public for how water
and power rates are designed and
how to interpret their utility
bills. We have received a lot
of comments on these. This
material was not present in the
public before, we would
encourage to you review that as
on our publicly facing website,
and we will be planning
additional information for
transparency and community
advising going forward.
the second area that I would
like to raise your attention on
is some upcoming listening
sessions that the office of
public accountability, the
ratepayer advocate, will be
holding in the community to
start to talk to individual
representatives of community
groups to impacted individuals,
to people that receive utility
bills every month to really
start to listen to them about
what it means when people
receive their utility bill, how
do they interpret affordability,
where is the direction of travel
as it relates to community
impact. We have three planned
in the upcoming weeks. One is
on january 28th, another is on
february 5th, and the final one
is on february 11th. These will
have both -- these will have
bilingual access, and the one on
january 28th will be holding at
the boys and girls club of the
san fernando valley on
february 5th we'll be holding at
first ame church, and the one on
february 11th we'll be holding
at the delores mission church.
I have information here both in
spanish and english for anybody
here in the audience, or
information can be found on our
web site that talks about these,
and we would encourage
participation from any members
of the public that would like to
participate.
one item I would like to elevate
from our filed comments is
related to item 17, which you
have heard comments today. And
this is related to the contract
approval for vegetation
management. While opa has no
comments on or concerns about
the approval of these contracts,
we would like to elevate two
items. One is from the
discussion we heard earlier
today, just to make sure that
the board has our points on
this, is that we find it
encouraging that there are two
contracts that are being offered
today. We have seen, in the
past, where there is a single
vendor that is responsible for
managing critical utility
services and infrastructure
services the opportunity to make
sure that there is two vendors
that are able to perform this
critical work is valuable and
has a value to rate payers in
and of itself. Second is we
have requested information about
the green waste disposal
practices associated with these
contracts. While opa doesn't
generally get into the minutia
of contracts, we do look at both
total cost and effectiveness and
city policy that may be espoused
within the approval of
individual contracts. We have
seen and we have requested
information on where the green
waste from these -- from these
contractors will be deposited.
the information we received is
that there is, at present, not a
memo of agreement, or
misdemeanor -- memo of
understanding between the
department and other city
services such as sanitation to
use city facilities for the
disposal of this green waste.
that has required the
development of an improvised
process which we have not
received information on and we
would respectfully recommend
that the board ask this question
either in contract review period
or contemporaneous with the
approval to make sure that the
department's contractors are
fulfilling in the spirit of the
sb1383 law which focuses on
deposition of green waste in
composting facilities. We have
seen many different ads,
facebook posts, and others where
people are getting green waste
bins delivered to their houses
by the dozens and we want to
make sure that the department
and its contractors when you
have such large amount of green
waste is also fulfilling those
obligations I would also like to
call your attention to filed
items 7, 8, and 9, these are in
the report --
» com. Wilma pinder: let's stop
one moment with the green waste
is there anyone that falls under
their department or --
» nurit katz: I want to address
that I will now say as a board
member to the department to
please follow up on that power
system however I would note that
there is complexity around the
disposal of green waste I know
from dealing with other issues
with sanitation and fire
clearance that there are certain
trees palm trees that cannot go
to our compost facilities so
there is a bit of complexity
there and I would encourage the
department to work closely with
la sanitation to ensure that our
waste disposal is meeting city
policy requirements but also not
impeding these areas impacted
facilities that are dealing with
a lot of increased green waste
from residential and other areas
so it will require important
department to department
coordination so please work with
la sanitation and then report
back to us on that.
» speaker: yes.
» com. Wilma pinder: this it's
important green waste mort what
senate bill was that?
» tim o'connor: sb1383 which is
a bill that focuses on climate
change to reduce emissions
associated with the
decomposition of waste which
sets new standards for municipal
government to handle.
» com. Wilma pinder: assuming
it's not too thick would you
make sure we get that language
for ourselves that the
commission gets that particular
language I'm sure the department
is well aware we just have not
received the information in time
that was allotted to provide
analysis before the board today.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
very much for that.
» tim o'connor: final item
elevates items 7, 8, and 9
reports sections that have been
item k that have been
distributed we provided written
comments on an observation
associated with the renewable
portfolio standard and clean
energy resources planning
monthly documents from july to
october we have to call
attention to the board that
while the department is doing
fantastic work to continue to
increase the amount of clean
energy resources, the renewable
energy that's coming to the
system in support of the la 100
power system plan improving and
managing towards safe reliable,
affordable, and clean energy,
there is an item there that
which continues to track as
underperformance and that's in
the transportation
electrification track. We know
the department is doing a lot in
this area. We have yet to see
an e the v or a transportation
electrification integrated
strategy for for the department
we believe that this is an area
where the department really
needs to integrate
transportation electrification
throughout the power system
priorities we understand they
are but recommend that the board
either request a formal strategy
or briefing on the strategies
for meeting those long-term
deadlines on electrification of
transportation. We haven't
really seen a robust
conversation in the public on
this yet.
finally, on item number nine, we
have reported on filed items.
we have reported in the past
that we have evaluated the
elysian reservoir community
parks enhancement fund because
commissioner marks, commissioner
tran, you're new, just a brief
recap, this is roughly a
ten-year old, maybe even longer,
grant process, and we do see a
line of site to concluding this
work, and we reviewed the
report, I believe in the next 2,
to three years, the funding will
be used up by the completion of
projects, so we're encouraged,
of course, by that. If you were
to look back at this funds, you
would see that it's a very long
process. I don't think grants
normally sit out there for a
decade or more, and we would
encourage, of course, the
department to continue to work
to make sure that this grant
enhancement fund is either
concluded or that there is a
review to make sure that the
department gets the money back.
and with that, I'll close my
comments and open up for any
discussion across the dais.
» com. Wilma pinder: any
commissioner have a sponsor a
comment? Or are your hand
stinging from --
[laughter]
» nurit katz: I mean, I would
just thank you, as always, for
your insightful comments and
analysis, and I agree on the
need for digging into further
into the electrification and
vehicle electrification. I know
that the department is working
on a number of important
initiatives there, including ev
hubs that will serve areas where
people do not have private
charging, and so, we'll work
with the department on the
timing, but I do think a report
to the board on that topic would
be warranted at a later date,
and I'll -- we'll discuss that
with the staff. Thank you.
» tim o'connor: thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: all right.
now the parts that I really need
the commission's secretary to
help me get through as we're
moving on to voluminous things
that we have read ourselves as
individually as commissioners we
do this before every meeting
sometime over the several day
period some of us come in extra
early on the board day if we
haven't gotten through
everything to read because when
we vote we're trying to vote
with knowledge and we can't
discuss it with each other
before we can actually come out
here with you, we're not
discussing what we're reading as
a group we would be again this
brown act but what we each have
done in these things sometime we
may have even conferred with
another engineer or something we
can ask questions we're not
bound we're not bound that we
cooperate say hey I'm in the
middle of reading this
particular contract we could ask
right then and there but it's
obviously easier for us to ask
in here so that often you will
hear that we pull something and
we say I want to hear more on
that doesn't mean we have to
hear it right now we might want
to hear it next time but there
is some things that we have read
and we feel that as a group we
can simply vote on those because
we feel we have the knowledge to
do that. So with that in mind,
there are things that I'm going
to ask the commissioners, can we
get a, when I say "block vote"
that means that you have read
it, that you feel that you are
ready to approve that particular
matter, and then there are some
that you may.more information
on, that have to be,
quote "pulled." that's the
point we're at now, you hear us
flipping around through our
papers.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: would you like --
» com. Wilma pinder: miss
secretary please assist me with
the pulled items and the ones
that I'm going to call for our
group f they can block vote? I
know there are a couple of
things that we do have to set
aside, for example, I will be
recusing myself on 013 on that
matter. And at that time, I
would ask commissioner katz
would she stand in when that
voting is taken care of. I
believe one of the commissioners
had an issue or wanted more
information or discussion with
08, and with 06?
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: no, as previously
discussed item 06 will be pulled
or called special per
commissioner tran. Item 07, I
believe was called special by
commissioner tran, and 013, you
will recuse -- is it 08? --
correction 08, as opposed to 07,
and 013, and commissioner tran
has a question on as well as the
recusal of commissioner pinder.
» com. Wilma pinder: okay.
» nurit katz: would you like me
to make a motion then?
» com. Wilma pinder: yes may I
have then a motion as to all
items that have not been
identified as pulled or
retrieved?
» nurit katz: thank you. So
motion approve items 12, 3, 4,
5, 7, 9 through 12, 14 through
23.
» speaker: I seconds.
» com. Wilma pinder: moved and
second. May I have call for
final vote.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: katz?
» nurit katz: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: marks?
» allan t. Marks: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: tran?
» benny b. Tran: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: four ayes motion
adopted.
» com. Wilma pinder: all right
since there is only one matter
that has to have the recusal
it's me I would propose that I
stech out now because then I
want to be back for the other
two.
» nurit katz: thank you. All
right I believe you said
commissioner tran did you have
questions about this item as
well? Did you a presentation or
just you had questions?
» speaker: this is the same one
yeah thank you.
» benny b. Tran: just a quick
question on the report I think
it's critically important that
we did modernize -- are we good?
» nurit katz: let everyone
clear the room for a moment so
we can hear you. Okay. Who is
the right staff member to answer
questions on item 13? Do we
have someone here who can come
forward? Come on up. Thanks.
okay. If we could close the
doors in the back and avoid some
noise? And commissioner tran if
you could repeat your question
please.
» benny b. Tran: thank you.
just a quick question on this
item. Like, as commissioner
marks said, drinking from a
firehose, it's become very
apparent that modernization of
our systems to serve our
customers to increase our
resources to serve, to preserve,
for citizens to keep this
utility running it's critically
important the system is
something that we're just
reaching the standards of other
utilities it also would be
better than those utilities in
the future just a quick question
on this, it's a three year
contract for my own education in
terms of possibly how things
work here how you approach this
contract why only three years
we're looking to in terms of
timeline and implementing
systems and three years after
we're going to renew this
contract or how is that going to
be set up?
» speaker: thank you for the
question let me introduce myself
my name is andrew header an
assistant director of
information are systems with our
information technology service
division my group handles
contract administrations over
these oracle licenses and
subscriptions, but I believe
your question seems to have a
flavor about our automated or
advanced metering
infrastructure, but generally
it's regarding why it's only
three years. So, as our
previous contract expired, we
were doing individual purchases
directly with oracle, which
weren't efficient, take a lot of
internal administrative time to
actually process, so, we were
looking to do something in the
competitive arena. But one of
the option that is the city
charter and admin code allow us
to do is to do what is known as
a "cooperative purchasing
agreement" or in lay man's
terms, they call it
a "piggyback" as we look at the
landscape of other governmental
entities that had engaged in
contract with the oracle
resellers we found that the city
of los angeles, our sister
agency of course, had entered
into a cooperative purchasing
agreement with maricopa county
with mythics as the oracle
reseller. Of course, arizona
had done a competitive process
the city reviewed that
competition so we're basically
piggybacking off of those
competitive processes so this
should be interpreted as a
competitive process in any way
because we're just kind of
borrowing the competition done
by others but the reason it's a
three years is because that's
when the current contract that
maricopa county has expires but
I think it leads to a broader
question you know what's next.
what we're going to do next what
we would like to do during this
three year period is take a look
at partnering with the city of
los angeles, as well as other
proprietary agencies, los
angeles world airports part of
los angeles u.s. Of course being
water and power to see if we can
come together as an entire city
of los angeles family and
negotiate something you know
this is an arena we second
potentially do another
cooperative purchasing agreement
or go out and do a competitive
process on our own but as a city
family kind of joining our needs
together and getting prices that
come from having that volume.
tan tran thank you. Just a
quick question from a city
prosstandpoint if we were to
engage in the new rfp within
three years estimated timeline
for us to go through process bid
out and award?
» speaker: we would called
purchasing side invitation for
bid because it really boils down
to just price it's not heavy
footprint on capability because
resellers at the end of the day
are offering what in effect is a
material to us so it would be
invitation for bid process that
would do that process to take
probably 6 to 9 months part of
the difficulty for us this time
around while beneficial for us
to piggyback off of what the
city has done actually preparing
the arthease facts to go out
with invitation for bid actually
does require a lot of expertise
in the area of nuances of oracle
listening and while we learned a
lot in partnering with the city
and understanding what maricopa
county did we also are going to
need time internally to build
that expertise as how to prepare
you know in your terms your
conditions as well as what
you're looking for so as we work
with mythics over the next three
years we anticipate getting a
lot of that subject matter
knowledge so that if we decide
as an entity and partnering
hopefully this broader city
family we learned what it means
to actually prepare those
purchasing artifacts that in a
way speaks from authority,
speaks from experience so we
know what lessons do we need to
learn. We can certainly
leverage assistance from the
ratepayer advocate other ands to
help us kind of work through,
you know, those aspects, but we
expect to have that subject
matter expertise at that time.
» benny b. Tran: great. Thank
you. That's all I have.
» nurit katz: all right. Thank
you. Could I have a motion to
approve?
» speaker: I so move.
» speaker: second.
» nurit katz: excellent. You
can take the vote please shante?
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: katz?
» nurit katz: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: marks?
» allan t. Marks: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: commissioner tran?
» benny b. Tran: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: three ayes. Motion
adopted.
» nurit katz: thank you.
--
[off-mic indiscernible]
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
so, the next item for our
discussion will be number six
then followed by eight.
commissioner --
» speaker: item six we have
david jacobs who is the
executive director of the
distributed energy solutions to
present.
>
» speaker: good morning
commissioners my name is sam,
I'm the interim manager of der
programs and projects. The I'm
joined today by mr. David jaco
executive director and stephanie
macarito supervisor of the group
that's manage these two
ordinances. Happy to present
first take questions later?
» com. Wilma pinder: whatever
the commission prefers.
» benny b. Tran: happy to just
jump into questions right now.
you can give background
information of the origin of
this project? What kind of
impact it potentially has as a
pilot project? How it could
scale then lastly timelines of
awarding implementation to until
it comes online?
» speaker: yeah. Can I get it
started and others can join to
add some color. So, this is for
the encino reservoir floating
solar project we have worked
closely with our system planning
and identified projects that
could help support their la 100
plan as it pertains to procuring
100% renewable resources by
2035. To that extent we have
been hard at work identifying
where we can deploy local solar
energy storage and ev chargers.
so, that came in a few different
colors. Some of them were
locally installed carport
systems, rooftop systems, and
then the idea came up of a
floating solar project which has
been done in many countries,
including some areas here in
california. I think the sonoma
district. So, we worked with
the power system to come up with
some potential candidates, and
the encino reservoir was our top
candidate because the water is
not drinkable, and to our
understanding, they use this --
they use it for emergency
response. So, we worked very
closely with la five, as well,
right? Last year, as we recall,
they used the super scoopers to
gather water for fire response,
so we're very tightly
coordinated with them, and they
have all given us approval that
this won't affect their
operations. So, that gives you
a high-level overview. And you
mentioned something about the
timeline. If this ordinance
goes through -- and I should
mention, this is just an
ordinance, this is -- we won't
be approving the contract today,
so no dollars will be spent
today, this will only allow us
to issue an rfp in order to
procure the service, and if that
happens we think it will take
anywhere from 4 to 8 months to
fully install once outside labor
is contracted and the project
begins. Last thing I'll mention
is ■we work closely with the
local encino community to get
feedback and to present our
solution.
» benny b. Tran: and then
before awarding, the rfp will
take how long, do you think?
» speaker: so, we have been
working on the rfp materials in
the interim. Once we start
working with supply chain
services, we hope it will be
fully awarded in 6 to 8 months.
» benny b. Tran: great. Thank
you.
» com. Wilma pinder: is date,
originally you had the language
in here carbon neutral mandate
is 2030, and then I heard you
mention 2035. Are these dates
even still realistic?
» speaker: I mean we're working
towards meeting the dates, 2035
--
» com. Wilma pinder: realistic?
[laughter]
» speaker: I think mr. Hanson
can better answer that question.
I think based on what we have
been asked to do as a group that
is to produce local solar in the
amount of over 200 megawatts we
can do it with the two ordinance
that we have before you today we
can do our job to meet those
mandates but as an overall
planning system, I can't answer
that.
» speaker: I have a question.
» com. Wilma pinder: a
question?
» speaker: thank you very much.
I have a question on the rfp
scope. The epc part I
understand, there is reference
to maintenance, and then also to
training dwp personnel in order
for us to maintain both the
floating solar facilities and
then the best. Are you
contemplating longer term
maintenance contract with the
same supplier under epc contract
or where is that cross over
between end of construction
commissioning extended service
or maintenance or warranty
contracts and long-term o&m?
which could be done internally I
assume, right?
» speaker: I'll get started
then maybe stephanie grant may
add color. I believe we're
currently contemplating five
years of maintenance and the
purposes of that is our crews
really don't have the experience
maintaining a system like this,
right? So we want them to not
only mental health it for five
years but also show us how to
maintain it and if they end up
needing to procure the battery
part of this then that will fall
into the scope as well again the
whole intention we have worked
with our local ibw local 18 that
our crews will be able to
maintain the system going
forward after the five years it
will be passed on to them.
anything else?
» speaker: thank you I think
you summarized it the
maintenance of this is nation
specific being that this is on
floating island getting our
staff and making sure that we
focus who are qualified to do
you know training period to do
that as well.
» speaker: is there flexibility
contemplating the rfp as you
know best location and that
interface are you looking for
the potential bidders to provide
creatity or is it going to be
prescriptive?
» speaker: we have the site
mapped out in the presentation
if you would like to see that we
show the differentiateiation
between where the firefighters
access and reservoir for dipping
where the floating solar panels
would be that's fairly coated
and fairly hard coated so
specifically because of the need
for reservoir to remain fully
available for firefighting at
all times are quite a distance
from each other within the
reservoir and fire department is
assured that they don't have
concerns about the location.
» nurit katz: if I remember
correctly about 10% of the
reservoir surface area is tucked
in an inlet that would not be
suitable for super scoopers?
» tim o'connor: may I offer
a comment thank you having met
with the team at the department
received this presentation and
identified one area when you
think about floating solar there
is a lot of benefits that can
occur such as improved
efficiency of panels themselves
because of cooling that's
associated with the underlying
water calling us a pilot is also
important whereas you know the
54 tends future projects
commissioner tran you talked
about scale I would suggest that
there are many different sites
across the region are suitable
for local solar and some of
those will probably be coming
before the board soon and
they're going to have different
cost profiles I would only ask
the team to talk about the cost
profile of this type of project
compared to other types of
projects because of course we
see in very significant projects
the change in tax credits and
tariffs it's changing the
cost profile and would just ask
if the team could talk briefly
about the price per kilowatt or
what you would expect rate
payers would experience in terms
of competitiveness and this type
of energy versus others.
» speaker: high-level I'll turn
it over to the team here so loss
of tax credits impact the
projects whether they're
floating solar or ground mount
or roof mount in any case the
storage is the same so that's
pretty much a wash between
installation type set ups now
specific to this project we run
analysis to estimate the 24
million or so we're pricing out.
» speaker: the 24 million or so
that covers not only solar but
also energy storage and the
small ground mount system that's
nearby. I don't know the exact
there per kilowatt for the
floating solar piece but when we
did the analysis, the team
reported to me that it was
comparable to a carport solar
system which we have all over
the city.
» speaker: and also mention
this is, again, we don't have
any bids yet, this is to get
approval from the city council
to issue a 10-year rfp so that's
where we'll get specifics in
terms of multiple bids with
these components and the labor
priced out specifically. So
it's pretty ballpark at this
point.
» tim o'connor: yes, thank you.
just, in closing, would suggest
that we have an all of the above
strategy in terms of finding
opportunities for new emissions
free generation, load balancing,
things that can reduce the need
for plants like the scattergood
natural gas generating facility
and these types of projects we
see being both in the ratepayer
best interest, but in the
ability of the department to
move forward to accommodate
increased load growth as we
suggest in coming years.
» speaker: if I could add to
mr. O'connor's comment, us being
dwp joint departments of water
and for this is one of those
unique projects where we have
opportunity to leverage
reservoirs especially
non-potable areas so this is the
50 pilot project that's unique
but also when we're looking at
facilities within the city of la
and local how do we impact our
local grid this is an important
project where we can deploy this
much faster than traditional
solar rooftop carport grounds
mount so when looking at cost
comparisons and having almost
identical or less cost compared
to when we can do at other
facilities but in a much faster
deployment I just would like to
say that piece so that's taken
into consideration as well.
» nurit katz: thank you. And I
think given the urgency of our
targets and scope of what we
have ahead of us that speed
matters. So this is an exciting
project. I just want to call
your attention and I'll sends
you an e-mail with a link but
there was a recent peer reviewed
study that modeled floating
solar in terms of potential
environmental impact, which of
course is also very important to
the department, and they did
find significant differential,
in turn, that's related to the
amount of coverage, so I want to
make sure that study is
informative as we're thinking
about balancing all of these
things in planning these
projects, of course fire use of
reservoirs but also important
environmental impact so I'll
senilities the study along and
really looking forward to the
outcome of this pilot.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
for adding that you really stay
up on this and I know the
department appreciates it very
much. Is there any other
questions with this or otherwise
I'll call for a vote on it.
» speaker: I move that we
approve this item.
» nurit katz: second.
» com. Wilma pinder: item six.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: may I call the roll
please? Commissioner katz?
» nurit katz: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: marks?
» allan t. Marks:
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: tran?
» benny b. Tran: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: motion adopted.
» com. Wilma pinder: and I
thank you commissioner tran on
your very first day, that proves
that people are reading these
things before we come out here.
and we appreciate you digging
in. And I particularly
appreciate the ratepayer
advocate who, obviously, has
gone and dug in even further and
able to call for that additional
information being on the record.
thank you very much, both of
you. Now, there is also moving
on then, to number eight. No.
you're still --
» speaker: this will be the
same group responding to number
eight.
» com. Wilma pinder: I thawed
we were rid of them.
[laughter]
same group. Number eight.
yeah, they were too charming and
too good. I thought we had
someone else to beat up on. All
right. Number eight, please.
» benny b. Tran: just same in
terms of questions for now.
this general item, are there
currently projects in mind that
you will be pursuing under this
ordinance, is my first question.
I have a second question.
» speaker: so, we have a lot of
flexibility with this. A few
years back we approved three
mou's with our sister
departments, the department of
gsd, general services
department, and la recreation
and parks those three
departments and with those mou's
really opened the door for us to
install got only on our own
facilities, but their
facilities, and the projects
will be front of the meter, and
they allow us to install energy
storage, solar, and ev chargers
on their properties. So, do we
have anything in mind? Not
particularly. We're still
evaluating how many of the
facilities we'll install the
der's on, and to what scale.
but we think in the ordinance we
requested, I think it was 500
commercial level facilities, and
these mou's unclocked over a
thousand facilities that we can
choose from. So we're really
going to pick the best ones, the
ones that have the most rooftop
area, the ones with the most
adequate roofing, biggest
parking lots, et cetera.
» speaker: and just to add to
what was mentioned, it's over
1500 sites that these mou's
unlock that we can tap into for
cooling centers first responder
to build micro grid systems to
make our city more resilient.
and with those 1500, we actually
have done a preliminary. So, we
have ruled out, you know, there
are so many that we rank as good
site versus maybe a b site that
needs a bit more work before we
can get to t so we don't have
every single ranked out because
that's something that we're
looking to accomplish with this
rfp but we have done preliminary
koreanings.
» speaker: I think I know what
you're getting at. Identifying
those facilities is going to
take a long time the way this
we're writing the rfp is such a
way that there is bank of
vendors who are approved and
when we're thinking is issuing a
handsful of projects at a time
getting the best bid, 50
identifying then issuing it and
sees where project costs are
most efficient so I think that
will shorten the timeline a lot.
» allan t. Marks: may I follow
up with a question on that?
» com. Wilma pinder: sure.
» allan t. Marks: there is
tradeoff between flexibility
doing lots of little ones with
approved bank of vendors and
economies of scale? They can't
do them all at once how are you
addressing that?
» speaker: based on research
issuing 100 facilities is
typically too much for them to
bite off at once we're trying to
find the sweet spot we're
working with vendor to find a
sweet spot we think it will be
anywhere between 5 and 10
facilities at a time they also
need projects to be bankable
that means procure materials
ahead of time in bulk so their
economies of scale go down.
» speaker: we have some really
good lessonings learned from
having done one of these
projects internally ourselves
green meadow which stephanie
here has personally led so we're
incorporating lessons learned
from that project green meadows
in south la it's solar storage
ev chargers and lots of
complexities with that micro
grid I believe and so those
lessons learned feed into and
will be managing issuing
managing this much larger
initiative.
» allan t. Marks: I think this
is a terrific idea I did have
one other related question.
» speaker: also related to cost
we're going to be having a bench
this is going to be up to
possibly four vendors so every
single project that we do for
these kinds of community
resiliency projects will be bid
against these vendors. So it
maintains that cost
competitiveness.
» allan t. Marks: and for the
rfp you mentioned solar pv,
energy storage ev charging and
microgrids, has -- especially
with fleets and ev vehicles that
are city owned, whether it's dwp
or other departments, are you --
when the technology allows for
bidirectional charging, is that
going to be incorporated into
this as well?
» speaker: it's certainly a
possibility, right? We have
issued programs in the past,
commercial energy storage to
grid which unlocked b to g we're
learning a lot from that program
uptake and all complaints that
vendors have, so it's
open-ended. We can the first
year issue this rfp have certain
specifications and next year
when v to g matures more and
costs come down it makes more
sense we change the scope in
order for the energy start ev
chargers to be bidirectional.
really important for us too.
» benny b. Tran: couple more
questions in terms of equity
looking at city of los angeles
we had a lot with this at recs
and parks, what kind of weight
do you give how do you analyze
underserved communities and talk
about economically underserved
in terms of how you roll this
out you mentioned south la we're
glad to hear that do you have
this lens or kind of filter when
you look at how you pick what
projects when and where?
» speaker: we do look at this I
think sb535 that has the map of
the disadvantaged communities
our goal is to deploy the best
possible sites for grid
operators to use for them to
utilize and connect to our der
management system and in such a
way that mostly prioritizes the
distribution system that's going
to be our primary ism thes but
we do have the ability to fit
out for projects within dac's.
» speaker: I would also add
that prime workforce development
component of this is all work
will be conducted under apla
project labor agreement all
local trades for work duration
of the contract all ibw local 11
and associated other trades that
are part of the pla, then our
forces take on, we continue --
we will own these assets for the
duration and then as our folks
take on maintenance and
operations of course it will be
dwp staff and folks. So, it's a
little bit less geographically
focused from the dac or equity
standpoint, it doesn't mean we
won't be doing that we can do na
and we will do that. Given
focus on distribution system
balancing that's probably first
priority locationally, second
priority will absolutely be
equitably spread across the city
location, geographically but the
big play is the building
opportunity for the local labor
trades labor force through local
11.
» com. Wilma pinder: I have a
quick question, and I hope I'm
still at the relevant place you
did have language that said at
the moment ladwp has
insufficient department
personnel available. That is a
line in there, correct? I mean,
were we ever going to have such
personnel? Or is it kind of a
pie in the sky, sort of, thing?
» speaker: no, it absolutely
will buzz because that will be
our commitment to local 18 when
we approve contracts when we
goat to this stage local 18
won't issue compliance for these
contracts when we're ready to
bring to the board if we don't
have a staffing plan basically
loa that we can commit to staff
up to take these over.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
that's very important for
something ongoing I thought am I
reading that right? I thought
at the moment ladwp has
insufficient department
personnel available to
accelerate, blah, de, blah, de,
blah. So there is a plan to
have that personnel available.
» speaker: that's in the works
a group called emerging
technologies group which is
rapidly expanding personnel to
support this commitment will be
done.
» speaker: the contract package
we'll bring to the board in a
year or so.
» com. Wilma pinder: that was
my concern. Any other questions
or discussion on this?
» benny b. Tran: last question
if I didn't read by the way if
you need to pass on the answer
if you can. This funded by the
federal government by doa
correct?
» speaker: might have been left
in there prior to I believe the
trump administration canceled
all dob funding that was awarded
to applicants through grip grant
2023 so those are billions of
dollars that are no longer part
of the play.
» benny b. Tran: so this will
be self-funded program by dwp.
» speaker: that's correct.
» benny b. Tran: thank you.
they all I have.
» com. Wilma pinder: you're not
-- you're not taking any
prisoners federal funding really
bringing up something. All
right.
[laughter]
good. With that full discussion
we thank you for it. Calling
for a vote -- motion to approve.
» speaker: motion.
» speaker: second.
» com. Wilma pinder: roll call
vote.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: katz?
» nurit katz: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: marks?
» allan t. Marks:
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: tran?
» benny b. Tran: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: motion adopted.
» com. Wilma pinder: so we have
concluded.
» speaker: thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
now this is a lengthy part for
the new commissioner -- this is
when management usually makes
their reports. But I want to go
to -- I'm going to skip ahead.
I'm going skip ahead to l, which
is the minutes. Am I correct,
counsel, that we will be able to
approve that? With those
minutes? Although --
» speaker: I see we abstain as
new members, correct?
» speaker: if the new members
were to abstain there wouldn't
be enough votes to adopt the
minutes. So, we believe that
you can approve the minutes on
your understanding --
» nurit katz: two commissioners
as present.
» speaker: they were accurately
reflective of the tape recorded
videotaped meeting.
» speaker: yeah. That makes
sense.
» com. Wilma pinder: yes so I
had already inquired since I
knew you weren't here for that
meeting, but it's the
understanding and I'm just
restating what I thought I
heard, that you were having read
those, and the two of us who
were involved, if we agree, and
we feel it's -- this it's cogent
and correct, that you, in fact,
could vote if you found that
those meeting minutes were
correct. So, I wanted to jump
ahead if in fact we were going
to take a vote on that is there
any unreadiness on this?
» nurit katz: no. Sounds good.
motion to approve the minutes of
the november 18th meeting?
» speaker: second.
» com. Wilma pinder: roll call
vote please.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: katz?
» nurit katz: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: marks?
» allan t. Marks:
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: tran?
» benny b. Tran: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: four ayes motion
adopted.
» com. Wilma pinder: all right
we're at the point in our agenda
that we're now ready for our
management report. And I think
it's just one in this case. Are
they in the audience?
management reports?
» speaker: yes. Let's call up
mr. Mike trewek, don cox to
review storm preparations.
mr. Mike is director of power
transmission distribution also
journey lineman by trade mrs.
don cox is the standpoint
director of power construction
and maintenance electrical
mechanic substation. Take it
away.
» com. Wilma pinder: gentlemen,
before you take it away, since
we are somewhat familiar with
this just go through it fast,
main point.
» speaker: yes, ma'am.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
» speaker: all right
introductions outs of the way,
quick overview of our five
phases, or steps for our storm
preparation. We'll go over
these in the next few slides.
all right.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
» speaker: planning, we start
away ahead of the storm season
entails completing open cable
jobs or underground distribution
system if that's not possible
we'll ensure the substructure
gets inspected and pumped of
water prior to storm season. We
prioritize our system and cable
replacement jobs for system
reliability. Our partners at
pcm are proactive in inspecting
various stations based on
historical data. And monitoring
equipment. Okay. Next slide.
so, as the director of ptd I
schedule and lead the prestorm
team meetings. We assemble the
directors of our partner power
groups includes advanced
technologies of ati, pcm, of
course pso, office of emergency
management our call center and
pr and supply chains. I'll
generally share a snapshot of
national weather service and
pending storm details so we all
know what to expect. I'll ask
the power groups to provide a
duty roster of their personnel
they will be on shift and
available for my electric
trouble teams to be able to
connect with if needed. Also
the rosters are provided to the
office of emergency management
and will be used in case we need
to open the pdoc which is the
power distribution operations
commands should our customer
outages grow to a number that
our field personnel be get
stretched thin. The pdoc often
stream lines communication.
okay. The ptd storm response
includes holding over our
construction screws and having
crews start at midnight. This
complements our already 24/7365
trouble crews. Right? 365 days
we have guys and gals on 24
hours a day, seven days a week.
we even activate some of our
smaller sections, street lining,
and transmission crews to
further complement
restoration efforts.
at times we have even called out
our pole spotter groups, these
are cell your level single-man
crews that will prefield larger
jobs so the crews know what
they're getting into before
arrival. We have even gotten
our special projects engineering
teams out to our electric
trouble dispatch center to
assist in the sdpdispatch proce
and the pcm will activate their
mcc which is maintenance control
center they will put crews on
the five by five crew plan and
what that means they have
personnel in place where needed.
moving on.
our restoration approach is
twofold starts at number one
with public safety then outage
numbers. Our crews will always
make sure the incidentally scene
or area is safe for public and
themselves that could mean
having the area shut off remote
he by our energy control center
or ecc or by having first
responders as pd or fd stand by
the scene while we energize the
area in the field. Pictures
below but see the left one
pulled down due to a tree far
right that one actually a
vehicle incident hit the pole
during the wet slick rainy sene
season. Drawing your attention
to the center picture aren't
ground substructure obviously
flooded ten by ten by 20 feet a
lot of water in there that's why
it takes extra time for the
underground crews to diagnosis
and trouble shoot these
problems. Moving on. There
are many types of outages caused
by winter storms there are
pictures of customer station
with water intrusion on the
left. To our overhead
infrastructure due to do you
understand tree in the center
picture and then ice and snow in
our owens valley service area.
okay these differ from our
summer storms which primarily
consist of overloaded equipment.
all right.
so customer communication. Our
pdoc, city eeoc and electric
trouble sections communicate
with our public relations folks
to get messages out to
customers. This could be how
we're preparing, provide
customers with tips to be ready
in case of power outages, remind
customers about safety around
downed power lines and share
outage maps on forward facing
web site with information.
okay. So, hopefully wrapped
that up quick. Are there any
questions?
» com. Wilma pinder: oh that
was quick.
[laughter]
» dave hanson: commissioners
I'll add there is a lot of
several different divisions that
work together whenever in the
middle of heat storm sponsor
winds and rain storm response
these two are the gentlemen that
lead the charge on this but we
also work with supply operations
which is our generation
facilities energy control
facility which is our ecc up in
the valley that dispatches
transmission subtransmission and
ati decision that has telecom
because on these poles also
resides telecommunications so
those folks are also called upon
to go out there and do
restoration work we have 24/7365
linemen under electric trouble
under mr. Mike, moving forward
we're going to have full trouble
organization with operations
maintenance personnel we're in
negotiations now with local 18
on how we're going to stay that
as quickly as possible while we
do the long-term strategic
staffing plan as well.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
those photos particularly really
bring it home because it reminds
us again how dangerous all of
this is, not only our workers
but the public there are
vehicles I mean it's like a 24/7
thing we greatly appreciate all
the effort. The wind storm we
had recently, weakened soil,
happy with the water over there,
it has weakened the soil and
bringing down trees so we're
going to have falling trees when
the ground dries out. Thank you
for that presentation.
» nurit katz: I noted you were
talking about infiltration of
are underground infrastructure
obviously we're keeping an eye
on the palisades and rebuilding
significant under-grounding
there are you tracking lessons
learned from prior storms and
existing underground
infrastructure how we might
inform the process in the
palisades.
» speaker: absolutely we're
sharing all data with both teams
that are developing the
underground system for
palisades.
» nurit katz: there are impacts
to water as well and other types
of emergencies like in
earthquake we would be all hands
on deck on both sides can you
speak to how the power
distribution operational center
works with other admit eocs or
how that -- and this might be an
anselmo/dave question I would be
interested in input on how we're
making sure the power and water
integrate in these manager
conditions.
» dave hanson: you want to
start pdoc then I'll jump in.
» speaker: sure pdoc, get our
power groups together all groups
provide some like dave said some
portion of service to the
electric and we also have wec
which dave and anselmo can take
over on how we work together
between those.
» dave hanson: essentially the
pdoc power distribution
operations center is a power
command we stands up when we
meet certain conditions recently
last year, year and a half we
hit kpi of 5,000 customers where
we start to look at our outage
management system and ask if we
find ourselves twentiesing
upwards from 5,000 and we find
that number to be true we start
to ask questions if it's
starting to look like it's
getting to where bee need to
coordinate with other groups we
would do virtual activation of
pdoc if we hit 10,000 customers
out we verify this number to be
true activate virtually pdoc
look at activating in-person
from there. Pdoc is located at
lincoln heights was built by
mrs. Walter rodriguez former
director of transmission
distribution so that asset lives
under t and dtod and essentially
I call upon mike to stands up
for power if there starts to be
department wide issue now with
anselmo and zoraya in charge of
emergency operations center for
the entire company.
» anselmo collins: so in water
system if emergency is one that
is specific to one division as
the incident know command system
the division handles if it's
going to take multiple divisions
of being impacted as far as
logistics large events water
system and power system
potentially impacted those fall
under the jurisdictional
department's emergency
operations center, wec, pdoc
staff all report up to the
department's eoc center make
sure all coordinated when it
comes to resources and logistics
ensuring we have all resources
necessary for both water and
power systems.
» nurit katz: thank you so
much. I think it's helpful for
the public to elevate the
coordination needed and also
just the interdependence of
water and power which many
members of the public are not
always aware of the fact that we
have high dependence on water in
some of our power facilities
should there be a water outage
and certainly high dependence on
power for critical water
treatment facilities that
collaboration across which I
have is seen improving in the
last year is important and I'm
glad to hear of this icm
coordination in emergency
management. Thank you.
» dave hanson: although we have
done table top exercises in the
past we have cowbells and
operating orders to lay all out
we have never on the power side
activated the poc until about a
year and a half ago because of
janisse bringing on zoraya and
mona they brought expertise
here. So did we miss anything
in our explanation?
» zoraya oliver-griffin: no you
covered it all the only time we
would have a water or power
centric activation that would
require support, and activate is
like when the granada hills
water outage where it required
presentation communications and
support in the community
logistical support we decided to
activate the pdoc.
» nurit katz: got it I'm sure
with your extensive expertise
emergency management since it's
one of the first few activations
looking at hot wash et cetera
I'll be interested to see what
lessons were learned.
» dave hanson: to that point
something we're looking at
national weather service weather
events using that predictive
information making decisions
about energying what circuits we
may have to turn off in the past
as far as part of our wildlife
mitigation plan we haven't had
power safety shut off but
palisades emergency we use that
collaboration with the national
weather service to help make
that decision.
» nurit katz: thank you we're
looking forward to those
wildfire mitigation planning
updates later as well.
» com. Wilma pinder: I'm sure
we'll get them.
» allan t. Marks: can I ask for
clarification. In your report
you mentioned activation of pdoc
and dave you mentioned
thresholds of outages especially
confirmed outages at $5,000,
10,000, so forth, on the power
side. But there is also your
early report you talked about
activating eoc ahead because you
know that we're having storms
that were coming with them
events in december, so what's
the difference between
activating because you think
there is something coming
because of weather fore cast
maybe activating after a big
event like earthquake where you
still don't know yet what scope
is going to be don't need to
wait to confirm.
» dave hanson: I'll talk for
pdoc, then maybe you could come
up and fill the gaps. We look
at being proactive so there is
board action from a few years
ago maybe joe can remember we
establish a response maybe joe
can summer we establish response
level for electric trouble I
don't remember what year 2015?
I don't know if that's right we
establish response level for
electric trouble level when
we're at normal level response
that's a promise to our
customers we will respond to
your outage within four hours it
doesn't mean etr estimated time
of restoration it means response
so at response level normal four
years anybody that can look at
our outhitage map internal
numbers all driven by grgis
system we'll have a presentation
on this in the future but
response level it's four hours
if we go to response level one
from 4 to 12 hours, response two
is 12 to 24 and response level
three tbd now at response level
three we are required by board
action to proactively staff and
bring on power construction and
maintenance substation
electricians in the past we did
not do that proactively so now
that's why we see the
presentation before we refer to
five by five under the new
leadership at power construction
maintenance they established a
proactive feature like that so
we bring on two crews in each of
the five service areas before we
ever get into the boards
requirement of making them come
in it's kind of a firefighter
model we're ready on premise we
cut out 2 and 3 hour delay for
calling folks out so those
levels don't have anything to do
with activation levels by eoc or
departmented eocz.
» speaker: and specifically for
this situation for this storm in
december it really was a game
day decision after being briefed
by the national weather service
that afternoon. Of the 23rd.
because the rain, we were
getting far more rain faster
than was originally forecasted.
they also weave said in the high
potential for a tornado which we
didn't know about until that day
so truly in the morning I talked
to dave and said we're fine with
just the pdoc after having heard
the national weather service
giving a briefing we immediate
adjusted to what the situation
called for to activate eoc that
evening.
» dave hanson: actually the
same conversation prior to the
palisades tragedy that morning
zoraya and I were talking about
proactively activating the
department emergency operations
center then saw smoke on the
hill. So we were already taking
steps if that direction.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
very much. Are you concluded?
» speaker: thank you very much.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
for your presentation. Is there
there a second? That concludes
that. We have heard our
commissioners attending one
event are there any other
reports by a commissioner on any
committee activity?
» nurit katz: not at this time.
» com. Wilma pinder: and I
don't know what committees you
ultimately will be on, as I said
I'm on the retirement committee
and I'm holding that down, I
just enjoy it so much. But
whatever committees you
ultimately will be working on, I
really want you to roll up your
sleeves and dig in. It can be
quite enjoyable. So, no
committee reports in that
regard.
now, this is a matter that does
not require a vote. It is for
the presiding officer or next
time the president to direct the
commission secretary to file
items one -- k one through
k-nine, which are various
notices that we get through the
government, et cetera, and
they're basically considered at
this point historical documents
that are remaining for us to
peruse should we need to. On
item 11 we have already handled
the minutes. Item m?
» nurit katz: no new motions at
this time.
» allan t. Marks: nothing here.
» com. Wilma pinder: any motion
on your part? Thank you.
secretary, I have missed
anything so far? Oh, yes, is
there any discussion with the
neighborhood council
representatives? Are there any
in the audience or have any
notices been filed by
mitchell: no community impact
statements or formal positions
were filed by any neighborhood
councils on the items on today's
agenda.
» com. Wilma pinder: either now
or in the future would you let
this board know how many
neighborhood councils there are?
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: joe's office let us
know that there are 99 councils.
» com. Wilma pinder: so there
are 99 councils that could have
filed something with us or could
speak to us at any time. So
that will always be on our
records that's something that we
should take care of. Now, if
I'm not incorrect, I think we
have moved to the point of
election of officers. And, by
the way, we are -- we do have
another commissioner, I think it
was mentioned earlier, who is
still waiting to go before city
council. It would have been so
wonderful to have had that
person today, since we kind of
were in a kumbaya type of mood
here and many things that are
not normally said on the record
were said on the record. But
when that person comes, I will
hope that you will be as warm as
you have been in welcoming the
two commissioners to my left and
to my right. Still, at this
point, we do have a quorum. So,
we are always able, today, to
make any decisions for this
board, even absent our remaining
commissioner.
so, at this point, I would move
to the point where we are to
elect a president of the
commission. And I would
entertain a motion for said
office of president.
» benny b. Tran: I would like
to nominate commissioner alan
marks to be president of the
board.
» allan t. Marks: thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: alan
marks, if voted in, would you
even accept that?
» allan t. Marks: yes. It
would be a privilege. Thank
you.
» com. Wilma pinder: with that
having been stated, I would now
call for a second.
» nurit katz: second that
nomination.
» com. Wilma pinder: having
heard the motion having heard
that this person would be a
willing president if elected.
our vote.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: katz?
» nurit katz: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: marks?
» allan t. Marks:
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: tran?
» benny b. Tran: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: with unanimous
consent, motion adopted.
» com. Wilma pinder: our
president of the board will be,
forthcoming.
» allan t. Marks: and I would
ask you to continue to preside
over this meeting commissioner
pinder.
» com. Wilma pinder: I will
conclude this meeting then and
continue, with that said, again,
it will be more formal welcomes
when you do, in fact, take over
at our next meeting. And I
congratulate you on that now
before everyone. I will now
call for a motion for a vice
president.
» allan t. Marks: I would like
to move and nominate
commissioner nurit katz to be
the vice president.
» benny b. Tran: second.
» com. Wilma pinder:
commissioner katz, in fact you
are nominated are you illegaling
to serve?
» nurit katz: it would be an
honor. Thank you.
» com. Wilma pinder: calling
for the vote.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: katz?
» nurit katz: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: marks?
» allan t. Marks:
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: pinder?
» com. Wilma pinder: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: tran?
» benny b. Tran: aye.
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: unanimous consent.
motion adopted.
» com. Wilma pinder: madam
commissioner -- madam commission
president -- I mean, secretary,
will you please double check the
entire roster to make sure that
nothing has been overlooked
before I move us into closed
session?
» board secretary, chante
mitchell: all items have been
addressed.
» com. Wilma pinder: madam
counsel, is there any other
matter that you feel that we
should go over before you -- we
move into closed session?
counsel.
» speaker: no I'm ready to take
us into closed session.
» com. Wilma pinder: ready.
» speaker: as you know the
california open meeting law the
brown act requires that we list
the matters the board will
consider in closed session
please bare with me as I read
the list today we have several
items seven in fact I'll be
reading the case nameses and
court numbers for the record.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you.
» speaker: the board shall
recess into closed session for
conference with legal counsel
regarding the following items.
gabriel gonzalez versus los
angeles departments of water and
power, los angeles superior
court case number 24stcv 31461.
longmanhe versus ladwp los
angeles superior court case
number 20 stcv 34249.
carageo, versus ladwp superior
court case number 23stcv30350.
kia versus ladwp los angeles
superior court case 24stcv
04955.
randy simon versus los angeles
superior court case 23stcv
07592.
kathy pimatelle versus ladwp los
angeles superior court case
number 22chcv00934 and lastly
molnar versus city of los
angeles superior court case
number 32888.
» com. Wilma pinder: that
concludes the announcements that
have to be maintained on the
record I would say to our
commissioners please take ten
minutes before we adjourn into
the conference room for our
meeting. At this point the
meeting is officially brought to
a close.
» speaker: we will be after
closed session however we'll
come back on the record to
adjourn.
» com. Wilma pinder: thank you
very much. Close close.
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» com. Allan t. Marks: this is
alan marks president of the
commission.
» speaker: we're back in open
session report-out actions from
the closed session start with
action item one involving case
called gabriel gonzalez versus
los angeles department of water
and power the board did not
approve the plaintiff's offer to
compromise the case at
$9,950,000. Agenda item five
the case of randy simon versus
city of los angeles of water and
power the board consented to a
settlement of the matter in the
amount of $500,000.
item six kathia versus ladwp the
board consented to a settlement
in the amount of $775,000.
board agenda item three in the
case of kara zakus versus ladwp
the board provided settlement
authority to make a 998 offer
for $200,000. And in the
molener case, molener versus
city of los angeles no action
was taken, and item number four,
yechzkia versus ladwp was
deferred
» com. Allan t. Marks: thank
you. With no further business,