An Open Letter to SAC Members

Blunt.
Honest.
It needs saying, so here goes.

You've read and worked hard to comprehend ~1,000 pages of technical memoranda, hundreds of pages of TM summaries, you've listened to bureaucrats and consultants, all of whom were involved in developing Master Water Plan 2012.  An independent professional review was refused by politicians and bureaucrats alike, and not just because it costs money!  You've donated your time and attended many meetings, some of which approached three hours in length.  You've agonized over non-cost considerations, admitted by bureaucrats to be the "nice-to-haves" in a community water system.

You, like all other volunteer SAC members, sat dutifully and sweated the big stuff.

It's only big stuff because it's not in your repertoire, it's not your bailiwick, you have little if any experience with this technical stuff.
It's not in ours either.
Or in the public's.
Elation is only being felt by Cunningham and Garlick from GVAC.
And bureaucrats.

You're tired.
Both physically and emotionally and want to go back to just spending time with the family, your normal life.
That's understandable.

But now, as SAC deliberations of the Master Water Plan review approach their conclusion, take a step back and consider this.

You're at a party a year from now.
You overhear a conversation about residential water rates here being much higher than in Penticton, Kelowna, Armstrong. 
What do you do? 
Join the conversation and tell them you were not allowed as a group to review the water utility's pricing strategy?  Or even consider political decisions?
Or do you slink into a chair and hope the host doesn't betray that you were a SAC member on the water review committee.

You're in a coffee shop a year or two from now.
You overhear a conversation among three residential customers and one sentence in particular stings:  "What did they do in that review?  They're now putting filtered, not only chlorinated, water on farmlands! And we're still paying more than any other community in the Okanagan for water that rained down from the same sky."

Stakeholders Advisory Committee members?

You're frankly angry at those comments.
How ungrateful they are!
Do people know how hard you worked?

What people know is that the local newspaper printed diddly-squat about SAC deliberations for six months.  Do SAC members know why?  Because "mainstream media" (a stretch in this case) tends to support the status quo.
They will however happily print whatever bureaucrats tell them to print once SAC concludes.

I can see the newspaper heading in my mind's eye now:

"SAC recommends water option that's $35 million more expensive than the $70 million of the failed referendum". 

Don't get defensive.

That's basically what GVW's "nice-to-haves", despite being hastily edited by them two or three times, leads to.
It was intended to lead to that, don't you see?  (Remember, you're standing back!)

Has any SAC member read the Master Water Plan 2002-revised 2004 and know why it was abandoned?  Suppose not.
Then how do SAC members know how to compare MWP 2012 without having anything to compare it to?
Especially since no-one is experienced in community water utilities. 

Okay, okay.

Pretend you're back at the party, or at the restaurant, and consider this:

"...let the customers of that era

 supply the monies for those projects"

Raising the dam by 4m: 

"$10 M is a hefty sum to spend by current customers for a 1-2 occurrence in 50 years, especially since we have an elaborate Drought Response Plan, the pride of GVW staff.  If we left the Duteau source to Ag customers they would not have to worry about the supply for domestic customers and could carry on with their own management of the decreased water supply, such as determining which customers could survive a prolonged drought (like forage crops, grazing fields, etc.) and everyone would manage.  Neither Kalamalka nor Okanagan Lakes would be affected as drastically as the Duteau source (the difference in watershed sizes is enormous) so domestic customers could also manage.  Furthermore, remember that the system was designed to satisfy domestic demands of 9,670 ML in 2011 (9,880 in 2016).  If we could not supply the current average demand of 5,935 per year then something is seriously wrong with our MWP.  One has to look for the logic of the answers from staff."

"...Is it normal to build a plant and then forecast the demand?"

"If we do need additional water in 20-40 years then let the customers of that era supply the monies for those projects. We have been paying for an awful lot lately on failed planning.  The loss of value on the DCWTP should be just one of the serious miscalculations regarding the MWP.  (The proposed filtration plant at Duteau requires 110 ML of DAF treated water annually yet we designed the DAF plant at 169 ML/annum,  47% larger than needed).  Too bad the SAC members did not ask for an alternate view on the bureaucratic dogma.  When you build a $30 M plant and spend an additional $20 M for diversion of untreated water to bypass the expensive treatment plant then you try to justify all of your actions in that perspective.  Just check out the date of the first draft of the Water Demand Table: February 16, 2012. We completed the Duteau plant in 2010!

Is it normal to build a plant and then forecast the demand?"

 

The current Aberdeen reservoir capacity is just over 18,000 megalitres.

That’s approx. 50% more than the average domestic and agricultural consumption (combined) over the last 4 years.

Are you still with me?
Here's an opinion--gut reaction more accurately--from someone who hasn't even attended the meetings:

"Here is my revised brief summary of the MWP review process over the past 15 months:

In the fall of 2014, a referendum was held to approve funding for the GVW's 2012 MWP.  That referendum proposal was soundly defeated.

GVW management and elected municipal officials claimed the public didn't understand, and later admitted enough may not have done to inform the public.

In response to continued pressure to review and revise the MWP, a SAC was formed.

SAC members were selected based on their lack of involvement in developing the MWP.

All information and facts provided to assist the SAC in their review came from GVW staff and the consultant who prepared the MWP; no independent experts were allowed to contribute.

SAC was told they could only review and make recommendations on non-cost topics, even though the SAC was formed in response to a failed funding referendum.

To further ensure the desired SAC response, GVW and the elected officials leading the SAC focused the SAC members on choosing wording for non-cost evaluation criteria; lest SAC try to get into the substance of the MWP - like maintenance & construction, operation, infrastructure, water rates, domestic vs agricultural use, water supply, water treatment, etc., etc.

While the SAC review was underway, GVW carried on with projects and expenditures consistent with the MWP, as if the referendum had never occurred and there was no review.

In order to silence ongoing questioning and opposition relating to the GVW system, its operations & the MWP, a long ignored administrative rule was used by GVAC & RDNO to remove the most informed elected Director from his seat on GVAC.   

The exercise is now almost over and it is seems certain that GVW, and the associated GVAC and RDNO elected officials will proclaim "An extensive review of the 2012 MWP by a large and diverse SAC has found no need for substantive change".   

The foregoing is a sad statement about abilities and responsiveness of our local government bureaucracy where elected officials and staff are supposed to act in the best interest of the rate paying customers and voting public."

So you see, SAC members, you're not being blamed by the public.

It's not a felony to be naive and hopeful.

Sadly, it's also not a crime for authority figures (bureaucrats and politicians) to mislead all of you. 

Those same bureaucrats and politicians will throw you to the media wolves!

Remember that during the last municipal election, most sitting councillors of today announced they themselves would vote NO in the water  referendum!

There's more:

Whether or not you agree with SAC rep Terry Mooney, who chairs Citizens for Changes to the Master Water Plan, consider that 1,000 residents (your friends and neighbours?) signed the petition for a water rate/plan review, asking for an independent professional review.  Had time allowed, it's safe to say easily one-third of GVW customers would've signed that petition!   Remember that during the last municipal election, most sitting councillors of today announced they themselves would vote NO to the water plan referendum!


So, lastly, consider this result from the hard work of one of your peers:

"Without deep analysis of the cost/benefit ratio of the remaining Options 1,2,3 and further consideration of a hybrid Option which combines the best elements of the remaining Options as proposed by Mike Carlson, and without correction of the flaws in the matrix through the presentation and defense of the following additional criteria will result once again in a flawed MWP that is unsupportable by the regional public.

The Proposed Option must:

1. Eliminate the distribution of potable water for irrigation use

2. Stop spending on scheduled improvements to the DC system

3. Pay more attention to the climate change factors in choice of Options

4. Make significant reductions in the base fee charged for domestic and agricultural water users and perhaps most vital

5. Ensure Security of Supply."

Consider those 5 points as you look at the following table of what's in--and what's been Thrown Out!:

Imagine!  Bureaucrats and politicians have said "NO" to the consideration of a Hybrid Option.

Yet that's the only option, considering what remains of options above.

But as someone said "they were mostly shite to begin with..." 

 

 "When you build a $30 M plant and spend an additional

 $20 M for diversion of untreated water

 to bypass the expensive treatment plant

 then you try to

 justify all of your actions in that perspective."

Look back at the Options chart and consider this:

"Option 3 is better than Option 2 but it is the worst of the other total separation options, for the following reasons:

1.    The cost is basically the same as Option 7.

2.    It will have a duplicate domestic main going from Duteau down to Goose Lake. Can't push water up in case Kalamalka has to shut down.

3.    It cannot supply all of Greater Vernon with domestic water in case MH has to be shut down (24 ML/d maximum capacity).

4.    We'll have to mothball 85% of the DCWTP.

5.    We'll waste all that money we spent on diversion of irrigation water (~$19 M).

6.    All the efforts we put into the Duteau system will be wasted when Okanagan Lake will become the new system (remember the 50,000 ML license that GVW has applied for).

7.    We'll still compete wit agriculture in low water years.

8.    Annual treatment costs will be $400,000 more than with Option 7.

We have to remember that borrowing costs amount to $70,000 per year per 1 M borrowed (currently $2.75 per account/annum or 69 cents per quarter).  So borrowing costs should not be overarching consideration.  It's the operation and maintenance costs that are killing us."

However all this shakes out, a sincere thank you to SAC members--well most of them anyway (minus the plants)--for all your hard work.

Greater Vernon Advisory Committee politicians

 agreed that base and user fees would be 50/50;

what we have is a  63/37 split.

How best to achieve the 50-50 split? By starting 50-50 from the beginning. 

During the last year, the number of water accounts increased by more than one thousand customers.  Consider that a $400 base fee per account would have taken care of the 2% rate increase scheduled for 2016.   Also, there is a total of $19 million in reserves almost covering the annual budget yet we are putting over $600,000 more into reserves.

"Yesterday, a Penticton friend and I compared total 2015 residential water costs.

Similar consumption, same number of occupants.

Mine was 187 per cent higher.

That’s quite the growth management strategy, elected officials!"

Here's an eye opener:  "From VID to MWP to VID"

 

One more comment from an observer:

"At what point do these stark differences in water costs

 impact the economic well-being and growth of the community? Retiring Canadians have many communities to choose from

 when relocating to the Okanagan;

why pick the place with the highest cost water, and

 by implication, the poorest governance?"

Why indeed?

So, SAC members, you're almost finished.

Thank you for your hard work, dedication and commitment.

Now go home and order Silence of the Lambs on Netflix.