Newly appointed Public Works Director Tim Westover spoke to the Winslow City Council last week. In his presentation, Westover explained that all 2,800 water meters in the City of Winslow would be replaced with an automated system. The council approved the system installation in October of last year with the work to be contracted by Ferguson Supply out of Phoenix. The amount of the contract is not to exceed $1,036,497 and is to be paid for by a bond issue sold by the city and supplemented by a budgeted $300,000 from the water fund.
A new contract was awarded by the council last week to Mueller Systems, LLC to provide host and maintenance services for the new system. Mueller’s contract is for a five-year period, renewable in five year increments for a period not to exceed 20 years. The cost for this agreement will be an average of $23,000 per year, payable from the water fund.
According to Westover, the new system will eliminate the need for city personnel to read each individual meter. “Right now, we are utilizing our workers and they are walking three routes in the city. We (with this system) won’t have to go out and individually read the meters,” he said, adding that there were no plans to cut any positions. “We won’t need ‘meter readers,’ but we will need water employees.”
He then explained that there are other jobs within the system that employees will need to do. “We will need them to do testing and upkeep on our system. They will need to exercise the valves around town and upkeep our fire hydrants, it is quite a bit of work.”
City Manager Steve Pauken added, “Public works has been operating with the same number of people that they have been operating with since we lowered the amount of employees with the city during the great recession in 2009, so although we are finding ways to do more with less, it puts some of our departments at greater risk of burning out employees. We have already made a commitment to not reduce the workforce any lower.”
Another positive to the new system according to Westover is, “The system will be constantly reading the water meters and it will tell us, and then we can tell the public, when they have a water leak. If you have a slow leak and are not aware of it, it can be costly, so we don’t want to waste water and we don’t want the public to waste money.” Further, he said, “We will have about 150 meters with automatic shut off ability. That way, we can shut them off if we need to so we don’t have to have our employees go out to turn off the meter, we could turn them on that way as well. There are quite a few pros to this new system.” The project is expected to begin “as soon as possible,” Westover said, “With the approval of this contract, we will be able to start very soon.”
The council also approved the amendment of the Winslow Municipal Code Chapter 9, Article IV, Privilege Taxes Section 9-455. The amendment reflects the extension of the levy and collection of a transaction privilege tax on restaurants and bars approved by the public by ballot in November.
Council member Bob Shlesinger spoke during the meeting on the Arizona legislature’s decision to vote down a bill that would require municipal office candidates to display their political party affiliation on ballots. “It was quickly taken away,” Shlesinger said, “It was not a good bill. There are several other bills that will be facing us in the near future that we will need to be watching.”
Council member’s business continued with member Marshal Losey saying, “I have a few things I would like us to consider as a council. One, is putting a restroom at the new Route 66 Plaza, I feel like a downtown restroom would be beneficial. Another is to keep the rodeo grounds in our consideration and invest some money to make it more of a benefit rather than a blight.” He then mentioned the need for a new announcers booth at the city’s softball field and an increase in graffiti downtown. “I’ve noticed graffiti especially coming down Second Street, if we could work on that.”
The Council was also introduced to newly appointed County Manager Glenn Kephart. Kephart took over in October after the resignation of James Jayne. Kephart said, “Historically, the county and the City of Winslow have had a very productive and positive partnership and I want to tell you that we put a great value in that and that is important going forward.”
In other business, the council:
* Approved the quarterly court report by Justice of the Peace B.J. Little. In his report Little explained that traffic cases are the most heard in his courtroom. “October through December of 2017, we saw 342 traffic cases in the justice court, and 129 in the city court.” He also thanked the city and the county for their help in developing the new Teen Court project in Winslow.
* Approved the monthly finance report by Finance director Elias Jouen. Citywide revenues for the month of December totaled $1.3 million bringing the year end total revenues to $7.4 million. Expenditures for the period were $1.4 million, bringing year to date expenditures to $9.9 million for all city funds. Major expenses for December included $253,915 for the ongoing upgrade to the wastewater treatment plant.
* Approved the reappointment of Mary Ann Smith to the Public Safety Personnel Retirement Board with a term ending Jan. 31, 2022.
* Approved an intergovernmental agreement between the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment Services (AHCCCS) and the City of Winslow, to contribute the non-federal share of supplemental Medicaid payments to disproportionate share hospitals, and the Hold Harmless Agreement between the City of Winslow and the Little Colorado Medical Center (LCMC) for the benefit of the hospital. Jouen explained in the motion that the agreement will provide to AHCCCS the 25 percent of the one percent of Transaction Privilege Tax in the form of a non-federal match so AHCCCS, using the local match, can apply for the federal match from Medicare. The 25 percent share to LCMC is in the amount of $522,514.
* Approved an ordinance extending and increasing the corporate limits of the city by annexing territory contiguous to the existing limits. The parcel is located immediately west of State Highway 87, across from the former Duke City Lumber processing facility, south of Airport Road. The property is being offered for sale for industrial development. The annexation will provide future development with the same city utility rates, zoning and building regulations, and emergency services currently provided to all other properties within city limits.
The next regularly scheduled meeting of the Winslow City Council will be at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 13, in the council chambers, located at 115 E. Second Street. The public is invited to attend.
