EWEB Board of Commissioners — April 1, 2025

0:01 board to order. My name is John Barski. I'm board president this year. Going to read a few things about uh our meeting space here and safety and awareness. Uh e webb e webb management and subject matter experts are presenting the room and virtually. The meeting is being livereamed and recorded. Please speak loudly and clearly so everyone can hear you. Public testimony is welcome. Sign sign up forms are available at the back of the room. Visitor access is limited to the board meeting room and the restrooms. Restrooms are located on the first floor. Exit through the interior door at the back of the room and a security officer will direct you to the

0:46 location. In the event of an emergency such as a fire or security incident, follow all instructions given by staff. And if an evacuation is required, please calmly proceed to the nearest safe exit as identified and directed by staff and evacuate away from the building to the farthest points in the parking lot to allow clear and immediate access for first responders. Okay, with that being said, we will start with agenda item one, which is the agenda check. Is there any board members that would like to weigh in on the agenda? All right, seeing none, we'll move on to item two, which is items from

1:32 board members and general manager. Cindy, um, this is something that I wrote in my premeating questions and I know it was answered, but I just want to mention that I was contacted by a number of upriver residents this past month about the um, of irregular, not irregular, but unusual billing cycles that we had where for some customers their bills were estimated for two months and then we had an unusually cold February and so their true up was a a lot more than they expected it to be. I know that this was it was an anomaly. This is not something that happens very often. So hopefully it's just a one-off thing, but I just do want to mention for some people it

2:17 really was a shock how much their true up bills were. And um I do think it caused a bit of mistrust. And so I do hope that going forward if there's a two months in a row where we have to estimate bills that we kind of look at the previous years instead of um just relying on the way we always do it looked at the one previous year but if a human could look and say like you know what those past year it was exceptionally warm and make make an adjustment. So, I know that we're um going to be installing smart meters up river, so hopefully this won't be an issue again, but for a number of people, this was a hardship.

3:03 Commissioner Mor. Well, thank you. Um my item is is it's kind of parallel to what's coming up. We've got a consent calendar item on uh Gate Creek for up river res restoration which I'm 100% in support of Finrock Reach and Quartz Creek and now Gate Creek. But you know I'm here for my primary reason is to protect the wershed and and and make sure that we have clean water for as long as we can in our community. And I'm on the downhill side of my I got a couple years left and that's it. I know how long it takes to get stuff done. I don't see a lot of money being spent on the lower river. Never in my 18 years of sitting here have I seen a large amount of money like this being spent on lower river issues. And if you really read into that last state of the McKenzie report, that's where all our problems are. That's where

3:48 all our challenges are. And it's right in front of our intake. And I would like to, you know, float the idea with others that maybe in the next sometime in the next 24 months, I'm going to see if we can't get it on the agenda and find out how we can better fund lower river restoration and deal with I'll give you an example. We had a sewage spill back in December and and it and it wasn't an equipment failure. It was a system failure. So, it's going to happen again and we're doing nothing about it. And so, I mean, I'm now I'm not trying to I'm not disparaging staff or anything because it's not our system. It's a city. It's Springfield's. And we have all these storm water things. You know, we have the ecoli into the water. And years ago when Carl was here, we had we found that it was people with dog kennels washing stuff out in the storm drain. That's stuff like that. But I

4:34 know that there's some projects that we could participate in coming in on some decommissioning of some of the IP stuff and everything else. And so I'm kind of planting that seed with the other commissioners to see if maybe we can get this on the agenda or or something to where we can find a way to better uh take care of our lower river as well as our upper river. So I'm holding that to you. All right. Other commissioners Sonia Well, um, off of the items that Commissioner Slashberg talked about earlier, u, I was just curious if maybe the formula that we use to do the estimation could be adjusted for degree heating days if we have, um, you know, a certain time where

5:22 it's just really hot, it's really cold. Either that or extending it so it's not just a one-year look. That was the other thought that I had too to just maybe adjust the formula a little bit so that maybe it's just kind of an automatic thing that happens so then we don't have to have an individual. I mean I love having people look at it and I think that's you know the right thing to do but also it we have the capability to have automated processes and we have a lot of smart people that do forecasting. So maybe if somebody could take a look at that because that that was really an extreme bump for many people and that can cause really big hardships. Um, aside from that, I also there was some information about the uh disconnect notice and kind of the timing of the payments and I was curious

6:09 if any other commissioners after looking at um the notice of service disconnection and the timing had any interest in reviewing that further. I asked because I had a constituent who was very scared when they received this. they came back and um had a medical issue came back and saw this and it was just a lot for them to to take in after it. And I notice on the service of disconnection for non-payment notice that I mean it it definitely it says if you don't pay everything it's going to be disconnected but it doesn't talk about you know call us and get help. Um, so I don't know if there's others that had an interest in looking at it or if we should just let it ride as is. One head nod, but Commissioner

6:56 Morris, I'll put it around. Okay. All right. Thank you. Um yeah, I ju I wanted to highlight um Commissioner Carlson and I uh last month at 10 uh went up to the Oregon legislature and we talked to our Lane County delegation and it was a really great meeting and Sonia led the charge on so many conversations and is extremely knowledgeable. Um and thank you Jason for also leading the charge and keeping us uh keeping us going there. Um and yeah, I'll I'll share um my my concerns for the the late fee timeline and I'm in support of of pursuing. Yeah. Um both of those were noted by the I may um I think I'll bring it up in future

7:41 agendas when we at the end of the main meeting and we can talk about it at that point. Frank, yeah, this is a question really mostly for Commissioner Carlson. I was just curious whether um your interest was in discussing the communications and the messaging or whether it was um actually looking at the the collection uh process and sequence um which we modeled intentionally around best practices a few years ago. Um given that when we delayed certain parts of that process, there was a lot of confusion between which bill it was related to the first bill, the second bill. And so if it's an issue of communications, we'd be happy to work with any of the commissioners individually on on communications. If it

8:27 is looking at an overall policy, then that would be a board level discussion. So I just wanted to get some clarification of what your interest was. Yeah, I'd like to look I mean, I just saw the notice uh this afternoon, but if there's interest in pursuing further, I'll um talk with staff. I'll look at the other recommendation again and and just see if it's more of a notification issue or if it was the timing of it. Um it might be a little bit of both, but I'll I'll look at both and I'll work with staff and then I'll make a recommendation. Yeah, that'd be fine. I I'd be happy to work with you and staff on on that. And then if we need an agenda item, if there's issues that we think go beyond working continuous improvement methodologies, then we'll

9:12 bring it uh I'll bring it back to you. Um, President Barovski, great. You're next. That's it. That's it. Okay. All right. And I have nothing at this point. Um, we did meet with the city of Eugene today, but that's later on our agenda as you'll see. So, with that, we will move on to correspondence. Uh, there were several correspondents in the I think I'm just wondering if any commissioners uh Yes. Yeah. just just to introduce this. Um I think this is a record number of items for correspondence. Um a number

9:58 of these overlap with some of the discussion we just had around billing and collections. Uh some updates that commissioners had in the past. U I would like to note um item number five, the um PCP plume report. um starting next year that will be included in the state of the watershed report um which we will uh concurrently do um this month on a sort of regimented um scheduled basis. Um and I would also note that the the last item um state legislative updates um even late this afternoon I got some new items related to things going on at the state legislature. So, I'm expecting that to

10:44 be pretty fluid um over the next several months, and I'll find ways through our our individual check-ins to provide commissioners with more more up-to-date items um on on that particular front. Questions or comments about correspondence? Sorry, I'm looking at the notes that I typed in my phone. That's why. So I I wanted to find out on the uh there were two bills that UEW Webb had drafted on the for the legislative update and one was still listed in LC form and I was curious if that ever got a bill number because otherwise it means it's dead, right? I mean it's um I'm going to defer that one to Jason Huer, our correspondent in Salem.

11:33 Yeah. Uh, Commissioner Carlson, uh, that would be LC 369 and O, I believe, the solar consumer protection legislation and yeah, it's uh, very frustrating that that is still an LC format. It is not been returned from legislative council and you are correct. Uh even though that was a priority bill requested by uh Representative John Lively from Springfield, who's the chair of the Climate Energy Committee, uh that bill did not make it back in time to be posted uh as a as his priority bill. Um we're on to a plan B. Uh fortunately, that's a consensus bill now. Um, we had an agreement reached between consumer advocates, utilities, and the Oregon Solar um, Energy and Storage

12:20 Association. So, we we've got like a consensus uh agreement on what should be in the legislation. That means we we may have a chance to have uh the bill introduced in the rules committee uh with a special dispensation from the speaker of the house. Um, I I think we have a chance to do that. it. We still need the draft back from LC though to do that. It's still not back. It's um really unusual. I think you all know there's a record number of bills and record number of amendments uh that have been brought forward this session. So, um I I think we still have a path forward. Um there's also a potential to uh gun stuff uh the LC when it comes back uh into a bill in the House

13:06 Consumer Protection Committee. Again, uh if this was controversial, I don't think we'd have these options available, but because uh there's a consensus reached on, uh uh a policy to protect solar consumers, I think we have a chance to do it. So stay tuned. And then the other one, um SP 1192, that was the one that um Senator Manning put in for e webb. I didn't see an update on that one. Did it get scheduled? We ran out of time. It it was introduced again the LC lag. It took over a month to get that bill returned and it came out uh right literally at the day that we would have had to have it scheduled and it went to a committee that was unexpected that that the two

13:52 committees we thought we maybe had a chance to get it posted for a public hearing it did not go to. So, um the good news on that though is um I I think we've had a little bit of a breakthrough with the Oregon Water Resources Department. We're still in a waiting uh mode on the administrative procedure uh we've pursued to preserve our water, right? But uh we've heard some some positive things, but but we'll have to wait and see. Okay. Well, that's good. Yeah, those were that one specifically as it relates to our water rights. It's very important to get through. So, I'm glad there's another pathway. Thank you for letting me know. Okay, other commissioners. Um, for me, I just want to say that I went through the hedging

14:39 and the power training compliance. Um, thanks for all the work on those teams putting that forward. It's uh kind of a geeky type of a of a process, but it it Thank you, Commissioner. Yeah, it goes it goes to uh hopefully saving our customers money in the long run by balancing our our what we pay for power and what we sell our power for and the ability that we have to make that move forward. So, thank you to the staff for that. Yeah. And just one comment on that uh president Baroski the um the way that the um power trading operates within e webb um there is a riskmanagement

15:24 committee that is has certain degrees of delegated authority from this board. We operate consistently within the guidelines of of that committee. It is designed to really limit the risk of the organization while trying to optimize the fact that there are times when we do have surplus and anytime we have a surplus and that surplus can be leveraged and sold that is ultimately for the the good of our uh retail customers. And so um while it's not always written in um correspondence like this, it is operating under the um control and the direction of the board. Thank you. Any anybody

16:09 else? All right. Thank you for staff that put all these things together. Um do note that they were read even though some of them were lengthy. Um we appreciate it. All right. Next, we're going to move to public input. You'll see what is expected up there on the on this big screen up there. So, I'm not going to go through and read it again. Um, right now we have three people signed up for public comments. Um, the first is Eric. I'm just gonna say Eric because I I can't read. Oh, we got a couple more. Good. And then it's Eli and Jared after

17:08 Good evening everyone. Um Eric Jura uh residential customer. I live in Ward 6. Um couple of things I'd like to to speak to you about. um uh both of which were are had to do with um uh posts on your website uh your the little news section of various things going on um with rel related to ew web and so forth. Um one of them was an article uh about uh group the groups that are suing e webb uh with regard to um um what's the short way of putting this? uh preserving fish essentially that's what it comes down to and so forth and uh although I I understand your point of

17:53 view and and and the things that were written in the article I wouldn't say are not are are justified and so forth I thought the article was rather heavy-handed. Um I think this I I understand that you don't have a lawyer on staff and I know it costs money and so forth. uh perhaps I I don't understand the magnitude of the issue. I but it doesn't seem like uh it would be that an expensive that much of a hit on customers bills uh to deal with this given your budget and so forth. I I appreciate your concern about that always very much so. So don't misunderstand but I just thought the way the article was written was kind of kind of harsh under the circumstances. So um second thing I I wanted to talk about and this has to do with uh also an

18:39 article that was posted which was at least for me personally very very helpful uh and it was it referenced a uh the Northwest regional uh power loads and resources forecast and uh so I read I read the article very interesting and there was a ref there was also a link to the report itself and so I downloaded that uh I didn't read it all but I did read the executive summary which was very helpful. Um I'm sort of on a sojourn to to learn how e web works and so forth and so it was really helpful to see that. Um so two things about that. One is is I'm really grateful that you're paying such close attention to all of the issues that surround that the the future of electric power uh in our

19:24 part of the world. Obviously, in my in my short time in in keeping track of e webb, it's it's I'm impressed about what you're doing, but I'm also a little bit terrified by that report. Um, with such a huge ramp up in demand, I really I'm concerned that that we're we're ever going to be that that EWB or or any other utility is going to be able to meet those demands. there's just it's unbelievable and it's very very technical and it's very and we're very limited in in terms of the technical solutions that we have to deal with that. So grateful that you're keeping an eye on it. I urge you to keep doing that. Thank you for posting it. I think it's sobering but I think it's something that we need to hear. So thank you. Thank you. Next we have then Jared.

20:22 Hi, my name is Eli Tome. I'm the director of conservation at McKenzie River Trust. And today we have in front of you um there's an item to increase uh funding on our memorandum of agreement with e webb to help us purchase a property for source water protection up in the Mackenzie River. I want to thank y'all for all the support that we get for the work that we're doing up river for source water protection. Uh we work really closely with e webb staff with Susan Fricky and her team of people and the work we're doing up there we could not do if it weren't for e webb if it weren't for the partnership we have with the forest service with Mackenzie watershed council. There's lots of organizations that are all coming together to do some really big work up there. Um this summer you're going to see some equipment mobilizing into

21:07 Quartz Creek. We are going to be doing a very large restoration project up there, lowering flood plane elevations and essentially building a filter on the river similar to what we did at Finrock. That's the future of this property that we're looking at um in Gate Creek. And uh the goal is to be able to um tackle the sediment producers of the tributaries to the Mackenzie River. That being Courtz Creek is number one with the amount of sediment that comes into the river. Gate Creek is up there as well. So, we're really hoping that uh this project results in a big filter on it and essentially uh makes better salmon habitat, filters the water so that it is higher quality down river. And um we're also looking at getting more into some forest management and

21:53 building some climate smart forestry up there. We're already working on forest management plans with contractors and uh it looks like the future's bright up river trying to find ways to bring back some resiliency to the landscape and this happens through land acquisition and organizations like Mackenzie River Trust and all of our partners coming together to find these solutions and do some creative work up there. So, um speaking in support of that and then also in support of all the work that EWB does to help us out up river. So thank you. Thank you Wait, followed by Diane Bernell.

22:40 Good evening. My name is Jared Wbright. I'm the executive director at the Mackenzie Watershed Council. I'm also an e webb customer in Ward One. Um, I'm back here again this evening to once again thank e webb um for their support of all the upriver projects and programs of which you Eli did partially describe um in particular as we're wrapping up holiday farmf fire response through the pure water partners and also through the collaborative flood plane working group um that includes ew webb watershed council to trust BLM forest service we couldn't have done that work post fall farm fire without eb 's financial support and leadership. Ew Webb's uh willingness to administer and take on collectively source grants from state sources significantly helped our ability

23:27 to contract at the level that we did. And just once again just want to reiterate support and appreciation for EW Webb's willingness to step into that role because some of the smaller NOS's locally here just you know were not equipped to do that. With that in mind, um looking forward to what comes next post holiday farm fire recovery. Um just want to um highlight the significance of the role that EWE plays locally with um conservation and restoration not only on the McKenzie but kind of region uh regionwide. Um the importance that EWE plays in the financial landscape. Um we've done a lot as a partnership to uh

24:13 diversify our funding sources. Keeping EW web at the table looking forward through the next 5, 10, 15 year years is uh critically important to making those what comes next in terms of watershed restoration and conservation uh successful. Um so maintaining eb support um whether that's through rate fees or other mechanisms is significant in terms of um supporting what we do um in the next 10 years. So thank you very much appreciate web support and thank you for your time. Thank you, Diane, followed by Marie, I believe it is.

25:04 Hello, my name is Diane Bernol. I live in Cedar Flat in East County. And what I want to request tonight of the EW Webb Board of Commissioners for both my East County neighbors and myself is accurate meter reads for accurate bills. Estimates take away your customers control of their electric use. If I'm comfortable with my monthly bill, I would tend not to change the way that I'm using electricity. On an estimated month, we don't know if our use is high or low, and we lose the ability to change our use. Estimates need to be smartly and accurately calculated with a goal of being within 20% um of actual use. My January bill was more than 50%

25:50 off. My January bill showed 950 kilowatts of use. My catchup bill, February, showed 3,700 kilowatts of use. My March bill showed 935 kilowatts of use. So 950 to 3,700 to 935. I mean, how can that be with consistent use? So, now you see why we are angry. I learned how you calculated our low January bill. You use the kilowatts daily use in January of 2024, a very inconsistent month with a 14 to 16 day power outage and a 38 day

26:36 billing period. Why? And how could this algorithm possibly give your customers a reasonable estimate? The bottom line is that your customers want control over their use. We want to pay monthly for what we use monthly. On months where you can't read our meters, let us email a picture to you of our email of our meter reading. Anything is better than a poor estimate. Your customer counts on you for fair pricing and fair bills. Ew Webb needs to rebuild customer trust again. We are all stuck holding the bags with these outrageous bills. Most of us can't believe your bills could be two to $400 off from January to February. We are in

27:23 disbelief and we are suspicious. Ew Webb must figure out how to be more accurate in their estimate billing. Let your customers be a part of the answer and email meter reading pictures on a specific day. We don't want to be in this position again. We are counting on ew web to find a solution and not let us down. Thank you Marie. That's our you'll be our last speaker unless somebody else is in the audience and hasn't built one. Hi, my name is Marie Latino. I live in Cedar Flat. I am going to discuss the high bill.

28:08 January, I was I was just in shock. In January, I had a difference of 2,89 kilowatts low. Actually, January was low. And I thought it was kind of peculiar. But when I got my February bill, I was 7,861 kilowatts over more than what I ever do. I have never, and I have a spreadsheet. I have never even gone that high. The only time I've gone high was when my heat pump was going bad. It was on emergency mode. I accept that bill. But this one for $877, I don't accept it. I did pay it,

28:56 which I if I thought about it now, I wouldn't have I would not have paid that bill. We just want to be able to trust that I'm retired. A lot of people want to be able to trust that we got an idea of what our bill's going to be like every month. Give us some sort of an idea. But when I go from a $500 bill, my heat pump was bad. I expected that. But I went from a $240 bill to an $877 bill, back down to my last bill, which was $296. That is triple the cost. I don't have a bill in the last year over $347. Where did $877 come from?

29:45 and it was in the estimate. We want to be able to help solve the problem. If your billing program has an issue, maybe you ought to put a safe stop in it that nothing gets sent over 20%. Something went very wrong here. I know we were told different stories. We were told that, you know, you didn't have the people to go out and read, so you estimated the weather. We got quite a few different stories, but if it's that you need help, we'll be more than happy to send a picture. As Diane said, anything, but to have an $877 bill, that was that was just really bad. You've got

30:30 a lot of people on social security that only bring in 2,000. They had a $1,000 bill. Oh my god, how are they going to be able to pay that? So, I know there's a solution to a lot of this. I used to work for a public agency. There are solutions to it. We will be more than willing to help out to be able to find a solution and help, but we got to come up with some answers. We need some answers. Why? And thank you very much. Thank you. All right. Jones people in the queue. I will post the public comment and then ask commissioners if they would

31:17 like to speak to the public comment. Commissioner Carlson. Well, I wanted to speak about the um the last two women who had bills that were I mean it it is it's ridiculous. And I don't know if you heard um our comments earlier, but we were trying to find other solutions. I like the idea of a an email. I don't know how um logistically that would work, but maybe it's a possibility. I also um would love to hear from Frank and the team about our ability now that we have the new system and um my understanding later this year is that we're going to be getting the meters that will do the automatic reporting. And I think that that's probably the quickest solution is that once those get installed, it will automatically send that information to us.

32:03 Um, but also if you're if we have a time where it's uh high um you know it's very cold out, we have high heating days, duckless heat pumps don't work very well in very cold situations. Um, I wonder if our new system, our new um, customer software system will allow eventually, not right now because I know we just launched it, but allow eventually for customers to see um, more of their bills real time. So maybe they could even set up an alert. Hey, I know I'm going to have an issue if it reaches $300. So I just love to hear from Frank if at some point in the future something like that could be possible. Thank you and thanks to the rest of the folks who came um to

32:49 testify. I appreciate your comments on all the other fronts. Thanks. You want to address that now or? Sure, I can I can address that now. So certainly I think that that we share the desire for accurate trustworthy um both metering and and billing processes. the new system um has more potential to look at different um types of algorithms there. Um I was just speaking with a colleague uh earlier today who spoke of an algorithm issue that they had up by Seattle uh which was a significant issue u using the same system they were able to make some adjustments. So there is that potential. Um ultimately it's probably not in

33:37 the in perfecting estimations. It's avoiding estimations is the ultimate solution through improved metering. Metering then opens up the the possibility of other types of alerts like we have leak detection on the water side which uh looks at unusual patterns of consumption. That's an option. Uh we also have budget billing which is an opportunity for those who want the the same billing every month. Um that's another option. Um but we will look at the algorithms associated with estimations in the meantime. Um there are issues with overestimations as well as underestimations and ultimately um customers through the catchup true-up process do ultimately are build for what

34:22 they consume. there is um uh there are challenges with the uh unevenness that that creates. Um it's also why our customer service people were willing to offer times to catch up on that um that excursion. So that that extreme bill and so we did work with customers to give them more than a single month to catch up on those payments. But the ultimate solution is not the perfecting estimations. is it's avoiding estimations and that's where our primary focus is going to be. Yeah. Um I really like the idea of having the ability to um like on the water side when we had the leak

35:07 detection sending a notice if there's an extreme bill that that we already see. Obviously, that can only happen once the smart meters are the the meters are put in place, the automatic reading meters to to do that. But yeah, and to be able to do things like we've talked to the board about where we're doing prepay and other things, you have to be able to assess the the metered value at a much um higher frequency um for example, than you do a a monthly read even even though we're set up even automated metering on approximately a monthly basis. So, um the the meters are capable of of storage um every 15 minutes. Now, that's not what we would bill, but um the dynamics are something that we're looking at

35:53 going forward. If if there is an extended power outage like we saw last year, um are we still able to capture the automated reads during that time somehow or does that require power to get to the meter to be able to get the information back? So I appreciate the the technical detail that you're asking about. So the um the meters do have a temporary I'll say means of storing a certain number of power. In in many cases they will do a a last gasp broadcast of what their information is. Um that's that's something that we'll have to see whether we do how we use in the programming of the meters. Um but they that's how you

36:39 um for example get information on outage management is the meters have to be able to communicate their status and so there is a certain amount of power storage on the meters to be able to do things like that. Um but there's also if you didn't have power there would be no reason to broadcast usage data. So um it's it's matter of status at that point but there there is significant capabilities. uh as an organization, we're going to have to look at how we prioritize where those where those capabilities fall in the system. But yeah, thank you, Mr. Slober. Yeah, thank you for coming tonight to give testimony. Um there's been a lot of discussion about what happened with the upriver billing um in the last few months. Um, I do think that smart meters

37:26 will eliminate a lot of this uncertainty and we'll have a um you can have a real time read of what your usage is. Um, I do have a question for you, Frank. I don't know what the timeline is for installing the smart meters up river and it seems like the the biggest um times where there's fluctuations would be in the winter when it's really cold and maybe over the summer when it's hot. And so if the meters aren't going to be installed like within the next year, um I do think that there's some kind of outreach or something we need to do with uprivers because we've created a trust issue here and um I know that trust is really important for us and um also integrity and I feel like there's some

38:13 bridge building there that we need to do. Yep. Totally agree. Uh, Commissioner Schllothberg, um, the latest schedule had smart meters installed in 2025. Um, I'll confirm with staff what the more specific schedule is on on the installation of smart meters in the Mackenzie Valley, but that the schedule was to to do those installations in 2025. All right. So then I guess my last comment is or suggestion is just as we get closer to summer, just maybe some outreach or communication with people who still have their meters estimated about kind of what to look for or how to plan when we get to the hotter months if they don't have a smart meter.

39:02 Commissioner Morris, thank you. Yeah. Um Diane Marie, I thank you for coming and providing comments and um in my my day job, I work with folks who couldn't be able to afford that kind of increase of bill and so I hear I I want to echo my colleagues and say you're heard and appreciate you bringing that forward. Um and um yeah, I had a lot of questions regarding smart meters as well going up there and and I'm glad to hear in 2025 that seems to be the plan. Um, and and look forward to hearing more more about that. Um, and then I just want to want to share my thanks to Eli and Jared. Thank you for coming. I think they both stepped out, but uh, thanks for that. And to Eric, um, thanks for reading the articles and even if you're reading the executive summary, still great and thank you for doing that and appreciate you

39:48 paying attention to that. So, um, yeah, thank you. Yeah, Eric, thank you very much for your testimony. I appreciate it because you do your homework. Um, since we're pending litigation on the one topic, you talked about the letter. I'm pretty sure it's inappropriate for us to comment about the details, but thank you. And, uh, Eli, um, I know Jared's gone, but I'm not against the project. I'm your greatest supporter up on the MRT on the upper river, but I also in my my comments earlier were I want to get something for the lower river. Uh, because that's where to me the big the biggest threats are and the biggest challenges are. So, thank you very much. And I plan on supporting uh the agenda item. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Um, yeah, I'll speak to Eli and Jared. Thanks again for

40:33 coming and reiterating the importance of the work that both the trust and uh the wershed council are doing to help enhance and protect our wershed. Um, you know, it's my understanding that the the agenda item that's on our consent calendar about the million dollars for to help with the acquisition was something that we just kind of facilitated. It wasn't e webb rateayer money. It it was money that that came through and needed somebody to have us facilitate it so that those uh entities could utilize it for us. Uh this is something that EW's done several times in the past. Um, and it's again it goes to show the partnerships that we have

41:19 throughout our upriver and our community as a whole. Um, I'm really encouraged about this acquisition in particular. Um, Gate Creek is a a creek that I'm fairly familiar with and the section that that is being uh proposed to come under the trust's uh purview is an area that is in my opinion in great need of protection and enhancement. Um it was a it was a a commercially logged area for a lot of time and then the southern the second part of it had uh had impacts from the holiday farm

42:05 fire. It had properties that were were lost and the trust is going to acquire those properties. It's taking care of the the septic tanks and things that were there. Um, and so I I'm really uh encouraged about that project moving forward. I hope that that the funding will come up in the future for a restoration project. I mean, this is the first step. Acquiring acquiring the property is the first step. The next one is the big the big leap is going to be finding the the funds to do the actual restoration of of that creek. But I'm very encouraged by that. And I'm also encouraged by the fact that the trust is moving beyond just instream and and

42:50 nearstream uh buffers and restorations and actually looking at forestry practices on some of their properties that will enhance the the watershed as a whole. So it's very encouraging what you're doing with this one and so thank you for coming and keep up the good work. Thanks. And with that we will move on to our next agenda calendars number five. Oh wait two. Oh I see we have we have one that

43:36 we want to pull. Okay. Or put up here in this thing. This is a contract. Would you like to introduce it? Yeah, President Barovski, just um just a note on process um um recognizing certain um procurements that come to the board rise to a certain level either of dollar value or of public interest. Um, as staff, we will uh ahead of the uh agenda item, we will hold that um um specifically because of those two reasons. Um, this one specifically, I'm going to um have uh Lisa um introduce um

44:21 and and talk about just to give you a little bit of background before we ask for uh your approval of the contract. Thank you, Frank. Decided to move up here so you two don't have to turn around. I just wanted to provide a really brief overview um of agenda item number five, which requests an additional approximate $3.3 million to be added to the design contract with Jacob's engineering for license required projects at Carmen Smith. Um this amendment is specifically related to advancing design of the license required for trapping hall facility. So the permanent fish passage facility to incorporate um design changes that are primarily related to uh the trailbridge uh sinkles sinks and trailbridge reservoir. However, I did want to note

45:06 that the contract as a whole, so that larger 18 plus million dollars um included design for many other projects. It did include upstream passage but also downstream fish passage, improvements to the spawning channel, the load bank, the Smith spillway, um expansion and flow release structure uh among other things. So it's a very large um blanket contract that we've conducted most of our engineering design services for a lot of license required infrastructure at Carmen Smith. Um, approval of these specific funds for this amendment will enable us to finalize design of the license required trap and hall facility and the total cost of that design, including this amendment, is $3.8 million. With that, I respectfully request your

45:53 approval and I'm happy to take any questions you might have. Mr. Moral. So, thank you uh and thanks for the response to my why is this so much money. Um, so downstream passage, we just under the assumption that we're going to go ahead and design and construct what we thought was approved with a license and that downstream passage is still going to be spilling and not the the eye in the sky $60 million trap that we had conceived initial iteration. Yeah, I fully understand um why you're asking the question. Um we are moving forward as we're required to with the projects as required in our current license which is the trap and hall facility at the base of Trailbridge Dam and downstream

46:38 fish passage via modified spillway. uh you know we are under a compliance obligation to move forward with that and un until or unless we get um uh a mandate to do something different we we have to continue with that. So yeah downstream fish passage is still envisioned to be via the spillway. Um, as you know, we there is pending litigation and so and I I appreciate your note earlier about um you know, not commenting on on that publicly, but we're continuing to look at options. Thank you. Other questions or comments? Yes. Just one comment related to some of

47:23 one of the other aspects which was you mentioned um downstream passage. We have filed what's called a new exhibit A with the Bonavville Power Administration reducing Trail Bridges output to almost nothing um in compliance with the license direction that Lisa mentioned. So that is still the plan. How many fish fish were caught last year? I don't know the number off the top of my head there. I don't know if she she knows it. Um, so we have we're doing multiple things. And so just for clarification, if you're asking about the temporary trap and hall facility that we have in the spawning channel or the angling activity that's occurring at the base of Trailbridge Dam, they're two

48:08 different things. The spawning channel trap and hall uh had no fish uh captured, but it was also a very um surprisingly low numbers of fish in the upper river and very in particular in the spawning channel. the um the run did not materialize in the spawning channel itself. There are various um you know theories as to why that occurred, but um essentially there weren't fish there to capture in that temporary trapol at the base of Trailbridge Dam. They're angling for bull trout and I don't know off the top of my head how many were moved. Thank you, Mr. Morris. Thank you, Chair. Um, if uh out of curiosity, if this

48:53 board decides not to vote in favor of this or decides to move forward, what would be uh like a financial or fiscal challenge to that? Um, and I'm I'm noting in particular um because it uh I'm reading the project timeline and it shows 2526 27. Um, but I'm I'm curious if there's like a monthtomonth or like what does that sort of look like? Um, yeah, it's a good question. So again, we are under compliance obligation to move forward as quickly as possible towards upstream fish passage in our license. That deadline was May of 2022. We were not able to meet that deadline because of dam safety issues and particularly St. Paul and Trailbridge reservoir and changes in the seismic um hazard uh

49:40 assessment and vulnerability. So, um, anything that we do as an organization now to not prudently continue to move forward could have a significant financial risk relative to fines by, uh, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, uh, for not not doing what's prudent to fulfill our responsibilities. Um, I've got myself in the queue. So this is 3.5 million of an eight on top of the 18 million that's been budgeted already. Uh no this is 3.5 on top of the 15. So it was originally the contract was 10 five was previously added and this is adding it you know three plus

50:25 million more and and how much of that has been spent? I mean, and the reason I'm asking that is if if for some reason the litigation were to go a different direction, is all of this money spent or is there it's being spent over the next three to five years? So, I'm looking at Patty to see if she she has more detail, but I would say generally um a lot out of this broader 18, if you approve the amendment, $18.5 million contract has been spent already on numerous other projects, not just the Trap and Hall facility. Uh I think that uh we needed an additional 1 something million uh for the Trapen Hall facility to get it to

51:12 final design. So, uh, Patty, do you know off the top of your head how much is spent? I don't know the exact number of what has been spent. I can tell you that the three remaining projects are upstream passage, downstream passage, and the expansion of the spillway while other projects are either completely constructed or uh completing design and waiting for construction. Bank is being constructed, spine channels complete. Uh, okay. So then, so this is design and then there'll be another there's money that's already been set aside for construction but not spent. Correct. So if we had to go a different direction, that money, the construction side hasn't been spent.

51:57 Yeah. So what I think what you're getting at is what is our risk of spending money on a on a process that we ultimately don't end up going down and and we do have some risk there if there's a change. Uh but it's it's in the couple of million dollar opposed to um bigger than that. Okay. And that's what I just wanted to know. At some point if we have to shift, how much of it are we flushing? Okay. All right. Any other questions or comments? All right. Yes, Commissioner WS. Yeah. Thank you. You know, I I'm having concern with moving forward with this project, and I I know that staff can't make comments, but

52:46 I'm I thought I had a question, but I think I just have a comment of I know affordability is the number one thing that our customers are looking for, and if we're continuing to invest in this project, and it does make a sharp left, I think that's a concern of mine. um that there's a significant investment into this. And so I'm wondering if our commissioners would want to would want to put this on a diff on a future agenda item to discuss and make a decision on in the future um to be able to have that that conversation. Uh yeah, I'll I'll pause there. Right. I'll just make a comment, Commissioner Morris. I think there's significantly more risk by sending the message that we're not pursuing everything of our obligation to

53:33 the existing license than there is in the um I'll say stranded design perspective. The the risk is incredibly high if uh we don't adhere to the obligation of the existing license in whatever expeditious way we can demonstrate. think the risk is incredibly high on that side of it. Mr. Rob, yeah, I'd just like to comment, Tim, to help you with a little perspective. So, you notice there's no no fish there now, and you got to remember that dam's been there 60 years. And so, how there hasn't been any fish getting over there other than ones we've been trapping and hauling in a temporary facility. And if there's no fish there now, you know, we're how many millions of dollars are we spending on this? It challenges my my acceptance of common

54:18 sense too because I'm a big- time fish person and everything else. But, you know, how many reds did we create at at the Finrock Reach? You know, 70. There's 70 pairs of salmon in there responding now and creating more salmon and that's 20 miles downstream. So, that's an aside, but this is a a necessary evil of owning hydro that's affected by salmon. And we've been at this I think we got the license approved in 2008. Uh no 2019 or something. 2019 when the license came out and but I have something that predates that the first approval and the second the second approval came out. So this this thing has been going on for decades and I you know I'd love to save money too but um

55:03 this is in in my opinion necessary. we we have to do this and uh and this is the best way to do it is to comply with what they want to do and uh there I don't think there's any stopping I would I would be against delaying because of because of the pressures on timing Mr. Carlson, I I initially was, are you talking we're talking about just this portion of the project or the entire Kerman Smith project? Just this to respond. Uh just a just this portion of the project, the final design um approval of this budget. Um noting that there is uh already saved aside money for the physical construction of that, but this seems to be the final button before it could go

55:49 further. Yeah. Sure. Okay. I just wanted to clarify because I didn't understand if you were concerned about the entire Carmen Smith project or just this piece. I mean, I'm I'm very committed to the Carmen Smith project and this was the approved plan that we had that we have continually been working towards the entire time I've been on this board. Um, and yes, we've had hiccups along the way, but none of the other things that have come in have changed my opinion that we need to keep moving down this pathway. We have got to get this done. It's the right thing to do and it's the most cost effective thing to do given the situation we're at. Even though it seems like a waste in some regards, but it is the least waste

56:34 possible given our given what we need to do to get the project back up and running and generating power. So, for that reason, I'll be supporting it. Right. Just one clarification for Commissioner Morris. Um this is not the last button to push when we um just say that there is budget set aside. Um that's purely budget long-term financial plan. If we actually go to construction, there would be contract awards associated with that construction. So this is for one phase, the design phase. there are another there are other opportunities to weigh in uh on the progress toward the license fulfillment.

57:20 Just just to clarify for you and those are the some of the big dollars associated with and and for me this is something that we committed to you even years before I was even on the board. It was part of a license agreement that we said we would do it. We had to pause it for several years because of several different things. Seismic sink holes, fires, a number of things. To me, this is just what this is what happens when you pause a project for a number of years. The the costs go up. Um and and the cost for this one has gone up another $3 million in this pause. But it doesn't take away from the commitment that we made to all of the

58:05 settlement parties, all of the parties that agreed, okay, this is what you have to do to build a dam. And they all said checked off and said yes. And this is one of the boxes that got checked that we are responsible for doing. Because of no fault of our own, it has gone up in price. No matter what, if we say we don't want to design this, that just puts us back into a whole bunch of mess. And so these are things that we've committed to that we need to move forward as a board and move forward. I just want to make sure I didn't mis mis speak. You I I saw the look on your face and I may have said something misleading. So if you want to correct me now is a good No, I I don't think you did. I did want to provide just a little bit of clarification on what's included in this design and why

58:51 that the the cost has gone up, if you will. It's it's largely related to change in scope. So we were we had already progressed the trap and hall design to the 100% design phase um when sinkholes were discovered. So the changes and the increase in cost is relative um to adding in additional monitoring equipment and bolstering essentially the the the whole system um for seismic hazard um reasons. So so it's not just a time issue. time probably wasn't our friend. You know, costs do go up, but uh but the the driver for this increase is that we have to change the design to ensure that um we're incorporating the

59:38 changes that are required by FK Dam safety and our professional uh dam safety board of consultants um relative to the dam safety issues. Yes, John. You ready for a motion? I I am. I'd like to move that uh we approve the contract with Jacobs doing a business as summill engineers for $3,280,000. Second. Any other discussion? Go ahead. Yeah, thank you chair. Uh yeah, I'm I'm I'm acknowledging and I appreciate all of the context and and thank you um uh uh for the clarification. Um yeah, I'm my primary concern I think is moving forward. We have a very new and interesting federal

1:00:23 administration um that is changing uh our federal agencies and I know that we're beholden to them. I know that there's a new lawsuit at the table which you know I I'm aware that uh there's no comments and we shouldn't make decisions based on you know things that might be happening in the community but um my my concern was are there enough changes to warrant a pause in this conversation. So that's that's where I'm coming from. Thank you. Can I just make one final comment on that? I share your apprehension around the uncertainty, you know, of all the things that you that you mentioned and I also share Frank's uh opinion that, you know, the risk of not moving forward as expeditially as possible with our compliance requirement is much greater than the potential to have to write off some of the design

1:01:09 costs. And and I appreciate you looking into it and thinking about it that way. That's something that we do should do as a board. Ask the question. So with that, any other discussion? All in favor of the motion? I oppose. Unanimous. All right. Now we can move on to consent calendar item. We're on item number six, approval of consent calendar. A move to adopt consent calendar. Okay. Any discussion from the board? Seeing none, all in favor? I opposed.

1:02:00 Unanimous. Okay. What item would you like to pull? Okay. So, is there a motion to approve the consent calendar B minus the resolution stated by Commissioner Carlson? Move to second resolution 257. Okay. Discussion. All in favor? I I Okay. And discussion on the resolution. Got two quick questions on GP8.

1:02:48 Sorry about that. Um GP8 uh hold that back up. My computer's been doing interesting things here. about the updates there. If we have a new media um organization that comes in and gets approved, do we have to update this policy again or is that just or do do you have the authority to approve them and we don't have to amend it again? Go ahead, Ann. She raised her hand. Entities listed in the policy were ones that we already recognized who had not

1:03:33 necessarily come forward and requested to be approved as other media. And so as those folks come to us and request to attend, we keep track of that in the general manager's office. We don't necessarily publish everyone's name each time someone's added, but we do let security know that they are authorized to attend if they meet the criteria yet. Okay. So, this new policy as written allows for Okay. I just wanted to make sure we didn't have to amend it again later. Okay. And then, um, my second question was on GP 11. Um, okay. Let me get to that place here. GBP11. It is the one relating to bill

1:04:25 stuffers. There we go. I I was curious. I know in our new um I appreciate that in our new uh billing system that we have the link to the actual bills. I'm just curious if people are actually using this and if this policy is something that's maybe needed moving forward. Um I know we we reviewed this last time and and we can do it again next year. I just would like to have kind of a thought about the the bill stuffers and if we're actually um if people are opening the online bill stuffers as much because I'm guessing that we don't really they're on the decline. I would assume that we have fewer people that are actually getting

1:05:11 um mailed bills to them. But anyway, if at some point I could get some information on kind of percentage of electronic bills versus paper bills and at some point if we think that that's that that the online bill stuffer system is actually functioning. It just reminded me of it. And that's it for me. Yes, Commissioner Carlson. We can certainly provide updates as to the the the trends associated with uh paper versus electronic. Um this particular policy I think started several probably a couple decades ago relative to controlling the content of direct mailings and advertising and things not related to eweb. Um um as we

1:05:59 go forward, we'll get some more data as to its relevance for today, but um can do that. Yeah, we I'll vote to to move these forward. I was just curious if it's something that, you know, over the next year, we could think about if it's really something we need. And with that, I will move to approve resolution 257. Second. Any other discussion? All in favor say I. I. Okay, next up is city regime

1:06:45 update. Okay, I'll I'll lead it off. Um, so we had this meeting today. It was attended by myself, vice president Slothburg, uh vice president of the uh city council Lindseay Leech, general manager Lawson, and uh city manager Sarah Maderi, and mayor Kudson. Um it was the first meeting of this group uh with with the new mayor and the first time Lindsay had been in there as as council president. So, it was a little bit of a getting to know one another. Um, we talked about several of the issues that were put on our agenda back in February. Uh, we talked to them. Uh, we put basically put out

1:07:32 under the table some of the things that we're dealing with. Those being the college hill, uh, obviously the fire fee, which we'll be discussing later on on the agenda, so we'll we won't dig into that too much in this agenda item. Um, we talked about fire hydrants. We talked about Bonavville and the uh the change in the new administration and how that is affecting uh Bonavville and some of our other partners. Um it was a in my view it was a productive meeting. Uh they were um very uh eager to learn about the stuff that we had going forward. It was I think it was mostly us putting things out there to them which is helpful

1:08:19 because a lot of times uh they don't know what we're we're doing and bringing them up to speed is good. there was a uh an interest of having a another meeting possibly before the end of you know before the next quarter would come up uh with the fire fee kind of being the main emphasis of that uh because of just the timing things like that. But overall I thought it was a good meeting. We talked about our carbon some of the things that are in our in our uh packet tonight. the carbon manual or the climate manual. We talked about our fire emitting the fire uh report that was in there. Um so they were all interested in those and and

1:09:04 seeing how those could be utilized to uh do broader out outreach throughout the community just for us as eb. So I think that was it. I'll let Mindy speak to it next. Yeah, I think you covered most of the basic points. I think that um it really was a good first meeting because both Mayor Kudson and um Lindsay Leech were new and as I was new with this group. So, it really was just a talking about what's of interest to us and um they had a lot of questions and I think what I took away from the meeting is that um they are very interested in finding synergy and places where we overlap and can help each other.

1:09:56 Yeah, thank you guys for taking that one. uh keeps me I remember when I was in that leadership position you had to go wait for out of the and that talk to public forum um fire hydrant fee um I don't think we've quantified and qualified the economic impacts that will have to us yet so I'm just assuming we've not made a commitment to take that on yet um because it's my understanding that a lot of the fire hydrants have not been maintained and there could you know how much is that going to cost us is my question Commissioner around and there's there's kind of two issues I think you sort of mingled there. There's a a fire fee which is uh the choice of the board as to whether to be the the billing and collection agency of of that. The the

1:10:41 other is actual um assessing the ownership of the fire hydrants which historically been owned by the city of Eugene. Um many water utilities actually own the fire hydrants. Um, I've just recently received um from staff a detailed assessment of what the the risks and the costs of that would be. I I've not fully digested it yet. Um, but this is um a decision um because there would uh potentially be rate impacts on that that I would work with the board before any commitment is made and that's that's my commitment to this board. Um um um but it is something that there there could be long-term value and benefit for the community, but there

1:11:26 will be impacts on e webb and I'm in process of assessing what those impacts are. Yeah. And and we just we just raised that as something that we know is coming forward as as a investigative type of thing. Yes. And I would I would also note on on that subject that um while we've had preliminary discussions with the city, I've had preliminary discussions uh with um Sarah Maderi and Matt Rodriguez, those um have we have not worked out any potential details of which I could bring back to the board at this point. And I would expect that to be part of an early process before you would um before I would come before you.

1:12:12 I just want to assure John and everybody else on the board that we will not make any deals with city council before all of us uh discussing things here. So I know know there's an effort to you know everything has a cost to it and if the if we're taking on a system that's not been maintained and then we have to bring it up to standard and then maintain it it's not money will fear but you know we there's all these pressures on rates both water and electric and so I just want to make sure I know what we're getting into. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. We won't we won't discuss things with them that we haven't discussed as a board. So, and and the reason the reason that I brought it up because it was on the list of things that we approved in in February to to talk to them about. So, it was and it was a very short

1:12:59 thing. It was just like, hey, there's these fire hydrants that may be of interest to both parties going forward. Right. Notice Mindy did not include me in that commitment. So, I'll I'll make sure that I include myself in that one. Um I I also just wanted to mention a topic that was briefly touched on was um the support that we're likely to look for going forward relative to changes in the public facility services plan and potentially the metro plan associated with um a potential new uh filtration plant in um Glennwood Springfield. So that was that was mentioned. That's the only thing um President Barovski that I can think of that you didn't mention so far. Right. Any other questions?

1:13:44 Um, again, I think it was a good meeting. I think we'll the tone between the two bodies, I think, is very positive. It has been for This is the second year that I've been doing this and it's been very positive. So, thank you. All right. Next item is the City of Eugene fire fee uh e webb billing and collection. This item isformational only and and I want to I want to just parse this out there to the my fellow commissioners that this is an item that has been referred to the ballot. Um and

1:14:32 so staff definitely has to play a very neutral role on this. us as commissioners, we can ask questions and stuff, but but just know that anything we say regarding our support or or uh nonsup support of us being a collection agency for this type of fee could be construed one way or another as uh to the voters. And so just keep that in mind when you're asking your questions and know that we may ask questions and staff may not be able to answer them because it may may lean one way or another and that's something that they're not allowed to do as far as staff goes. Um so that's how we're going to start out the conversation. I'll I'll

1:15:17 pass it over to Frank and then we'll move on. Um, thank you, President Barovski. I was I appreciate the comment as uh publicly elected officials. You can certainly weigh in on uh with your perspectives on whether uh the the billing and collection of a city fee should or could or or might become um part of um the eweb's utility bill. um we are um as a public employee uh I am really not allowed um or permitted to make statements that could potentially influence the outcome um of uh something

1:16:05 that's referred to the voters. So, I will be very careful uh if if I'm posed with with questions um I may at at least for this meeting um make sure that I have a record of what those questions are and can respond and or have staff respond in a way that is that is factual um and um and backed up by by data or or whatever. We'll have to we'll have to be careful with that. Um because I want to live up to that obligation. Um I would just point out just a little bit of context and history. Um Eb by charter is uh obligated to uh collect the costs for

1:16:52 uh storm water and um sewer utility charges. that um is an obligation um that is long captured in in history. Um any billings or collections beyond that point which includes um the city fee um would be a decision that this board um would would make. It's it's not something that is in city charter such as the um storm water or sewer water. So this is uh really uh a choice and a decision that uh you as um Eugene Water and Electric Board um are authorized uh to make passive back to you. Okay.

1:17:43 So I guess one of the things that we hope to find out here tonight is the questions that the board may have that would be relative. I do want to uh just put out something that was shared with us about the timeline of how the this ordinance would move forward. Do you think that's appropriate at this point? Just to give the board a feel. So, the city passed an ordinance uh implementing a a fee, a a fire fee is what it's being referred to. Um and that ordinance was uh referred to the ballot by uh a signature gathering uh campaign and they

1:18:29 connect collected the appropriate amount of signatures. So that meant that it would be referred to the ballot. The the procedure after those have been uh certified is that the city manager will uh tell the city council that this has been referred. The city council has several choices at that point to make. One is they could just repeal the ordinance and say we're not going to do it. The second is they could say we are going to uh either support or uh be opposed to the the ballot initiative. And then the third

1:19:15 one is they could just say let it go to the ballot. Um that timeline has to happen within 20 days of when the city manager had it uh certified. So it what has been uh conveyed to us is that there's going to be a city council work session on April 9th where the city council will make that decision of what they're going to do. Um so until that time we really don't as of right now the ordinance is set to go to the ballot if they if they don't repeal it. So that's where it's at. So I will just put it up to the commission and then I'll go with Mindy and then Sonia. It seems to me that the question or the

1:20:01 thing for us to um try to understand is what belongs on an e webb bill. Not about what we think about this the fire fee or um anything specific actually to this but like what are the what are the parameters for things that belong on a bill. So, we know that we have to include obviously electricity and water, but storm water and wastewater. And then beyond that, like as a board, I I'm assuming that um if we make a decision that some type of policy would come out of this. I don't want to make a decision specifically on a thing because I think that gets too much into like weighing personal preferences, but just in

1:20:46 general to think about um what is our policy regarding outside fees on an e webb bill. That's kind of how I'm thinking about it. I don't know if people are thinking about it differently. I'm curious to hear what everybody else thinks. My my point of clarification was more around kind of the decision tree. So, if it moves forward and goes to vote and passes, then we still have that to make that decision. Yes or no, it goes in the bill, right? Um, but if it doesn't move forward or they change it in some way, we don't have to grapple with that yes or no right now. I like how you're thinking about it what

1:21:31 belongs on a bill. Um, for me that thinking about that yes or no piece, it it feels kind of premature for me to have the discussion and because I'm not even sure if we are going to be forced to make that yes or no decision at the end of that decision tree, but I'm very curious about the um the process and how it will all pan out. Thanks, Mr. Brown. Several questions. Thank you. Why do we call this a fire fee? And I've been it's teed up there and and just curious why we refer to this as a fire fee. Um that's what it was put forward as in

1:22:18 the ordinance. Is it a fire fee? That's open to interpretation. Okay. So, it's basically a general fund fee. I just because because it's my understanding and clarify John because I know you're in there that this can be used for anything and it can be raised at any time at the discretion of whoever is the city manager um without any input. They can just if they need more money next year they can just raise it and it just adds to the bill. Is that correct? I can give a little perspective. the way the ordinance is written um it theoretically you can't bind another uh you can't bind a future uh council's decision. Um what is written into it is that any increase over 5% per year would

1:23:06 would trigger a council vote as of right now. So that's the way it it it is written. Comment. So, I know you have strong I can tell you have strong feelings about this. I guess I just want to avoid um engaging with this that way and maybe distance ourselves a little bit instead of um judging the merit of this specifically because people might all have different ideas and I don't think that it's our job to um dig into what we each think of the of the fire fee. But I think the question that's being asked of us is if this fire fee or some other fee in the future comes forward, what what

1:23:52 are the parameters of that we put on the EWT bill? Is it just that these types of fees that come from the city would go on the bill or as a board, do we want to say we want to kind of put some guard rails about what goes on the bill? I I love that perspective and I I support that 100%. It's just that for me, I want to have this conversation at least get it out a little bit early because this is forever. Remember back in the 50s, the the ordinance for silt is 3%. But we pay six. Why? You go back and look at the historic perspective, you know, I mean, even our uprivers, 6% of their bill goes to the city of Eugene general fund. That'll never change. And if we do this, this will be forever. It'll never go away. Uh, and I'm just wondering with

1:24:39 our new billing system, so if somebody doesn't pay or they partial pay, how can we do that? Is this new billing system going to be able to accommodate some of the things that um that this would do or do we have to sacrifice some of the things that we've done there? And I think that that'll be one of the questions that again staff may not be able to answer this evening, but it it will be part of the conversation. I think if if we are asked to do this. Um yes, just want to make sure that I get clarification around the question. Commissioner Brown is your are you posing the question um how is a partial payment what what I

1:25:26 just want clarification on what question you're asking. I'm concerned about shutting somebody's power off or that. So some people just partial pay and you allocate it to water, electric, sewer, and sanitary. And then would you also allocate it to this additional fee if it's added to the bill? Yeah. The the way that the system Yes. The way that the system works now with um storm water and wastewater, if a customer makes any kind of partial payment for for any reason that is allocated across the different equally across the or proportionally across the different billing elements. So electric water, storm water, wastewater gets whatever allocation that that that um

1:26:12 payment would represent. Okay. But I I really agree with Mindy's perspective about saying this this should be about public global rather than be getting all fired up about it. But you can thank you for your observations. You're right. Um because I got a lot more questions than I have answers, but it sounds like we're going to kick the can down the road until we find out if this is going to be referred to this even has a life. Tim, thank you, Chair. Yeah, I um I do agree with uh Commissioner Schlashberg of uh not diving too deep into the uh the conversation of if this is a fee or not or a good fee or not. And I think that there's u many many city council

1:26:57 meetings that we could watch and watch our counselors talk about just this exact topic. So, um I don't know if I would have anything else to add that was not said o over the course of a year plus. Um I uh so I agree. I do uh want to caution us though against um making a decision in in just a neutral bubble. I do think that we as an organization are what we do does affect our community partners and and in in interesting ways. I know that we're um for example, we had public testimony tonight from our McKenzie River Trust and uh who talk about just our impact as an organization and it's more than just um financial or not of what we do. We we offer a lot more. So I I just want to caution us

1:27:42 away from from trying to remain as as sterile as possible and recognize that there are other factors and elements to this conversation. Um, but I also, um, shoot, I had another thought that has escaped me, so I'm sure it will come back as that's all right. I think this is a couple round type of a a conversation. Uh, I put myself in the queue. I I agree with Mindy at this point that this is the level that I would like to see the discussion had at. Um, I think that going forward, hypothetically, if somebody comes to us and says, "We would like to add something to EW Webb's bill, I would like to be able to do the pros and cons

1:28:27 for what that means to our customers, what that means to our community, and what that means to uh our infrastructure and our plans going forward. It's it's a holistic conversation that that each one would have. I don't that's why I don't think it a a straightup policy saying yes we can put things on the bill or no we can't put things on the bill because I think that each indiv this is my opinion each individual thing will have very several interactions that need to be considered at a policy level and so until we actually have one of those in hand where we know this is what it's going to be this is what the cost would be this is what the the implications to

1:29:14 our organization would be. This is what the implications the community would be. I I don't feel we have to make that decision. And so, uh, this is just kind of te in my view, this is teeing up the conversation for if and when that does come to us. Um, and those would be the questions that I would want to have answered at that point. So, I'll go back to Mindy. Just a quick question. I think something I would want answered is that if in whatever form this does p this does pass, how long when would we have to make a decision? Do we have to make a decision before it goes to a vote so that if it does pass then they're ready for a collection mechanism or is it

1:30:00 something that if it passes that we have some time to make that decision? So that's just what I something I would want to know. Second round. Yes, Frank. Do we know if our new system can accommodate? We don't know what they're going to ask, but do we know if our new system can accommodate that without making any sacrifices of functionality of what just invested in? You don't have to answer that now. That's that's going to be my question is Yes. I I'll make a note to to the effect um Commissioner Brown that what you're asking about is um some feedback on the capabilities of

1:30:46 our system to do additional billing attributes and and what might be the impact of that. I also understand um Commissioner Schllothberg's question around uh timing. Uh we did hear from from the city that um every month has a has a cost to them um if they're not able to implement the the fee. And so I'm sure there would be some degree of sense of urgency from their perspective. Um but I'll I'll get back to um the commissioners um probably when the time is appropriate. there there is some degree of of um not having to do this be not not

1:31:32 putting effort into something before it's actually passed um or whatever route that that goes through as part of the referendum process. So, um I would not I would I would lean into the board in that case um as to whether there's there's work that occurs before that. I that I would wait for board direction on that. Um, President Barovski, I did want to um provide one sense of context relative to uh this body's mechanisms for providing guard rails or or uh other things going forward. There's really three mechanisms that this board has at its disposal to

1:32:20 make decisions. One is simply taking actions or action items. um that is generally a pretty discreet um encapsulated issue you're voting in favor of or against a particular proposal. Um the other one is a is a resolution. Uh the resolution tends to be very specific. Um but also captures more of the justification. um we use resolutions for certain things because it it it sort of captures for the record the long term not just what this board has agreed to but why. And then the third one is by policy which will tend to be longerlasting and will survive the individual um members of of this board um until a a new board were

1:33:08 to repeal or or change it. And so, um, a longerl lasting direction tends to come through board policy. And that if you were wanting to set guard rails around what's on a bill generically or what's not on a bill, um, that would typically be um, through board policy, that policy. So, this isn't a charter thing like silt because I know that we can't change silt without a amendment of the charter. This doesn't have to be a charter. That's correct. So, it it's around that. Okay. Thank you. Other comments or questions? Um I'm sure there will be more updates

1:33:55 on this. Like I said, there's a a a decision point April 9th. Um that will make things a little bit clearer. It may not make them totally clear. maybe se August or September before we have a a final resolution to to this issue as far as whether it's there is going to be a fee imposed on the citizens of Eugene or not. So, um President Barsky, just one clarification. You said August or September. What um I think we heard um was that the soonest it could be referred to the ballot was was August, but then if it's part of the normal schedule would be November. November. Yes. So exactly August somewhere between either August or November was was kind

1:34:41 of the book ends for the timing. My understanding is is that it is if nothing is done, it would go on the November ballot if it's referred. That's the the next scheduled election that it would could make it on, but the city could do a special election and that if they chose to go that direction, it would be in August. All right. Any other comments or questions at this point? Uh, general manager, do you have what you need from us at this point? I I have more than what I need from you at this point. Um, President Barski, thank you. All right. Next, we're going to move on to item number 11, the water master plan. Now, let's get into some actual water and electricity.

1:35:27 That's why we're here. Good evening, commissioners. President Barovski, uh Mike Masters, water operations manager. I'm here with Chris Irvin, the water engineering supervisor, and Nathan Indicott, project manager for our water

1:36:12 system master plan update. So I wanted to talk to you a little bit about the purpose of of master planning. So this is a regulatory a regulated thing from the Oregon Health Authority. Um it uh you know we evaluate the water system needs for a 20-year period to identify water quality and service goals, estimate water demand projections, evaluate system needs and correct deficiencies. There's a new aspect to the plan this year um to develop a seismic risk assessment and

1:36:59 mitigation. And also this is a major tool in in developing our capital improvement plan. There's also for the regulatory police piece the the master plan at the end gets submitted to OHA who would then either concur with the plan or submit back to us uh with suggested changes to that plan. Again, some of the some of the benefits of doing this are to proactively address the emerging risks, uh, produce a solid, wellthoughtout financial budget. Um, this is required every 20 years. It's actually a really good regulation that we really like. Um,

1:37:44 it's recommended on a 10-year cycle, and that's the cycle that EW is currently on. So, Chris is here. I'll turn it over to him. He's going to share some of the updates from the past progress over the last 10 years from the plan that was developed in 2015. Good evening commissioners. I'm Chris Urban, water engineering supervisor. Uh here to reflect on the progress we've made on the 2015 master plan uh before we move on to the 2025 update. So there were many areas that we focused on in the 2015 master plan. However, the primary focus was on our large critical

1:38:31 facilities such as the Hayden Bridge filtration plant, our large diameter pipelines, and our base level reservoirs as shown on the attached map. Oh, that's there's the there's the map. There's two slides up here. Um the master plan was developed just two years after the re release of the Oregon resil resiliency plan which urged utilities to increase the seismic resiliency of their systems. In response, EWIB prioritized improvements to our critical facilities and large transmission pipelines that connect these facilities together. This collection of infrastructure is what we refer to as our resilient spine. And work has been further prioritized focusing on the red pipelines from our

1:39:18 first priority backbone and adding a new connector pipe as shown in yellow uh for additional redundancy to our critical laminate river crossings. Uh I'll use this background map for the of the resilience spine to walk through the key projects we've completed since the 2015 master plan. Hardening our sole water filtration plant was one of our primary goals in the 2015 plan and I'm proud to report that we've completed all planned projects. These improvements are operational and have already proved their value. First, the sodium hypocchlorite facility saved us from a statewide chlorine shortage scare in 2021 and then again in 2024 ice storm.

1:40:05 The new backup generator at the plant allowed us to keep treating water after we lost all three primary p power feeds. However, since relying on one treatment plant is still a big risk for our community, we are also moving forward with plans to build a new water treatment plant on the Wamtt River. The new plant will serve as a critical backup to the community in event of emergency. We submitted environmental permits last year and are planning to initiate detailed design later this year. Another focus of the 2015 master plan was hardening our base level reservoirs that store water for everybody in Eugene. We built two new storage tanks at East 40th and are working on two more at College Hill. The current master plan

1:40:50 will look at options for rounding out our base level system by addressing needs for Hawkins Hill Santa Clara and also looking at additional locations for storage in the system. Additionally, we're underway with several transmission projects to link all these critical facilities together. We're wrapping up a major transmission project on Hilliard Street to connect our new East 40th tanks into our resilient backbone. We have also completed two out of three phases of the 42-in riverfront connector to provide redundancy to our WamiT River crossings. Ew has also secured FEMA grant funding to investigate options for hardening our river crossings at the Nickerbacher Bridge and Day Island. This summer we plan to start

1:41:36 construction on a missing section of our transmission system along 23rd Street and we'll start uh and next year we'll start transmission improvements to connect the new College Hill tanks into the rest of the system. One key change from the 2015 master plan was the board's decision to delay the water lamic treatment plant project so the team could develop an emergency water station program. I'm proud to announce that we completed the seventh and final emergency water station. There we go. So we have capacity to provide two gallons of water per person per day to everyone in Eugene in an emergency. We are planning a demonstration event at

1:42:22 the Kennedy Middle School station this fall and we will continue to work on our public education campaign. In addition to the large capital project, EW strategically invests in renewal and rehabilitation of its water distribution infrastructure, including replacing up to three miles of smaller pipes a year. We also work with the city to strategically install new infrastructure ahead of major road projects, replace pipelines based on prioritization from our risk model, and modernize our pump stations with new controls and electrical equipment. These routine projects are critical to keeping EW's water system operating reliably. So, with that, uh, like to move on and

1:43:07 have Nathan talk about the new planning effort for the 2025 master plan. Yeah. Hello, my name is Nathan Indicott. It's nice to see you all. This would be your first time. Um, I'm the project manager for this master plan. I'm in the water engineering and planning group. Uh my slides will cover progress, focus areas and next steps of the 2025 water system master plan. So an important aspect of master planning is working with consultant Kroo engineers to gain a fresh perspective of our system. This figure shows completed in progress and future tasks along with the critical path. Currently, we're

1:43:52 working through the crux of the planning process, which includes a completion of the demand projections and staffer verifying hydraulic model updates. These updates are critical for developing system improvement recommendations and updating the capital improvement plan. Water demand projections are complete as shown in this figure. Historical water use is plotted on the lefth hand side where average day demand ADD is represented in blue and maximum day demand MDD is represented in green. While customer connections have increased by a half a percent annually, water demands have remained relatively constant over the past decade. The projected water demand is

1:44:38 indicated on the right hand side as shown by the solid lines. Add is projected to increase from 25 to 28 million gallons per day and the maximum day demand is projected to increase from 50 to 55 million gallons per day over the next 20 years. Ew worked directly with the city of Eugene planning department to acquire population and buildable land data rather than contracting the service with lane council of governments. This resulted in a collaborative and cost savings benefit for e webb and the city. The billable land data suggests that growth within the city will be primarily infill until 2041 as the available land within the urban growth boundary is expected to be exceeded. Also, Eugene is expected to absorb the projected population growth

1:45:24 with a relatively modest impact on water demand consistent with the trend observed over the past decade. Therefore, this master plan will focus on optimizing existing facilities rather than expanding to meet projected water demands. As mentioned, this water system master plan will focus on optimization improvements to our base and upper level facilities. This is our hydraulic profile. The base is on the bottom of the figure here and the upper level shown above. So by quick observation, you can see you know majority of our system is classified in the upper level. Ew Webb and the consultant are developing improvement scenarios for use in the optimization software targeting

1:46:09 enhancements in water quality and hydraulic performance while reducing life cycle costs and greenhouse gas emissions. For example, a base level scenario will evaluate improvements to the existing Hawkins and Santa Clara reservoirs while considering trade-offs with new storage locations in West Eugene and the Wamut treatment plant. However, optimization software scenarios will target the upper level system which contains a greater number of small storage facilities and pump stations. Mike talked about the new requirement from OA, Oregon Health Authority. So, the Oregon Resilience Plan OP served as the basis for EWE's seismic resiliency plan in 2015. Since then, seismic risk assessment and

1:46:55 mitigation plan requirements have been published and the Oregon administrative rules effective January of 2019. Generally, the new requirements are consistent with the OP, the organ resilience plan that EW used in 2015. However, the most notable change from the 2015 plan is the emphasis on prioritizing critical facilities that provide social and economic relief. This extends beyond hospitals and critical care facilities to include county, city, and airport and assisted living facilities. Iba's first priority is the can continue hardening transmission pipes and base level facilities known as the resilient spine. Chris talked about that extensively. The next priority is hardening facilities for social and economic relief, and it's a 50-year

1:47:42 planning horizon. Still, this effort is challenging due to the overwhelming expense of seismic improvements and the transient nature of assisted living facilities and local agency offices. With affordability in mind, the EWA project team addressed these challenges by establishing resiliency improvement priority levels and meeting with local agencies to discuss innovative alternatives to meet the intent of the organ resilience plan. For example, EWB met with local fire chiefs a couple of weeks ago and determined the acceptable level of service for their most critical fire stations. They had 10. We were able to pair it down to two. That would be connected to the resilient spine that Chris talked about. EUB expects to complete the optimization and seismic resiliency work

1:48:27 in the 20 in 2025 this year. However, the final water system master plan and presentation to the board will be extended into early 2026. EW is on track to launch a public outreach campaign this month by publishing website content and conducting presentations with local no neighborhood associations soon after. Additionally, a May current connections e newswsletter will be published to showcase our commitment to prioritizing affordability during the planning of the water system m of water system master plan improvements. ELIP staff anticipate presenting the next water system master plan update in five to six months which will include preliminary optimization results and resiliency plan findings.

1:49:15 Thank you for your time and we appreciate any questions and comments you may have. Thank you. All right. Who wants to start? Hey. Um I am curious about um can you go back to the slide? Either one that shows the map. Um so this one Oh, hydraulic profile. Sure, that one's fine. So um obviously this shows the majority of the infrastructure is in the hills. Is this in part just a historical um reason for where it's developed or is it mostly because that's where the height is to store and then you the the gravity to to feed the rest of the

1:50:02 system? Maybe it's both. I'm just curious. Yeah. To clarify, so this is this graphic shows our hydraulic profile and it's represented with, you know, the highest elevations there in our facilities. So I guess by quick observation you'd see where our facilities might be located between 800 and 975. It's kind of difficult to see the elevations on the far right hand side all the way up to 1325 where some of our highest facilities there there's reservoirs gravity fed pump some of the pump stations are the the lighter blue symbols there. So the Santa Clara one is actually below that kind of main point. So it's actually a lot harder to get the water. You have to reduce pressure into the tank and pump out of it. I see. Okay. And so

1:50:47 obviously I'm sure that that presents a challenge because most of the population growth I would assume that we'll get is in that northern and western region. And so that area is in that lowest line level. Oh, I see. It's not necessarily represented spatially across Eugene. So you are correct when you said we where we're expecting growth and we've worked with the city and they've provided urban reserve lands and that that's something we're planning for in our master plan not necessarily represented on the hydraulic profile. Okay. Uh we'd have other graphics that could show where buildout would be located and we can definitely provide more information on buildout which gets more of that spatial. I'm trying to see out. So for me, I

1:51:32 represent that region that only has one um water tank in it. And so when I look at it and think of the population growth, I both want to make sure that that I'm representing that population base, but I also understand that there's an engineering component to it that may make that all challenging. So, it's and I and I understood you said that there were different locations that were being considered kind of in that western and northern region a little bit, but that just means then we have to build them up higher wherever they're at, right? We have to elevate the tanks themselves to clarify real quick. Go ahead, Nathan. Is your region you're interested in North Eugene or was it west? It's north and

1:52:18 west. North and West. Yes. And so with our geography obviously sloping uh towards the river and then on north is the lowest elevation. So we're just we're in shortage of elevation where we gravity feed from. So that's why spatially we wouldn't have very many facilities located in the north where we're elevationally challenged. Um but in the west we actually have a lot of contour and property that could be expanded there for future reservoirs and that could also serve the northern the northwestern based on hydraulics. It feeds the whole system. So okay uh so they're well served in the north with high pressure. Okay, I guess I could just clarify just for a second. So the investments we've been making in East 40th, the transmission mains and college will serve everybody in Eugene. So the water that you drink out in North Eugene, it's

1:53:05 um it's stored in South Eugene in the hills and just the nature of the engineering. It's cheaper to build it on a hill than it and it makes more sense from a you know energy and greenhouse perspective to to build it on the hill and let gravity work than it does to um let it reduce the pressure then pump back up. So even though it looks like it's all on one side of the map, that's what's serving all of Eugene. So totally get that. Um just when I'm thinking also about our emergency water systems, you alluded to part of the reason you had half of it. The other half of the reason that we paused was that we wanted to try to work with sub to see if we could not build four uh water treatment plants within the region and only, you know, build two that were major that could fill both

1:53:50 utilities, which was in some respects the bigger um reason that we paused. But this was definitely a a a piece of it. And for me when I look at this map too and we we talk about this has the capability to serve two gallons per day. Um is that based that's just based on the amount of water that can be pumped at those locations. That's correct. Is that correct? Okay. Um because I can imagine trying to get that many people to one of those eight sites per day is not enough. Um, I'm just putting that out there and I do hope that we get the secondary um, treatment plan up and running, but that's still going to be a logistical

1:54:35 nightmare with only eight um, regions served. So, thank you for everything you've done. I appreciate um, where we're going and I support the work that you're uh, that you're doing to make sure that we are continuously improving and supporting our water system. Thanks, Mr. Bra. Thank you. Several real quick questions. Um, you know, Amazon's got the big distribution thing going in out by the airport and that's going to be a huge fireflow demand on by three or 400,000 square feet. Do we still have capacity to serve the rest of the development, all the new industrial land they've designated on Clear Lake Road, the hundreds of acres and all that in in northwest Eugene?

1:55:25 Um I'm not super familiar with exactly the area you're referencing, but it's west of Highway 99 north of Airport Road. Yeah. So from the city, which is where we're basing our master plan on for the city, right? Yeah. For the urban reserves lands. Um and this is the land that we'd be looking at and the master plan for providing growth to. So Okay. So you're you're you're planning on capacity because Clear Lake is urban reserve but Airport Road the the Amazon facilities in the city and I just wondered just it sounds like we do have capacity or they wouldn't be as far as um number two do we have any more uh un riverbed crossings like the one that broke belt line where where the water line that crossed the bamut was on the riverbed rather than suspended. Do we still have some of those or are they all gone?

1:56:11 Sure. I can I can answer that question. I'll go back to your um previous question which is um previously um we haven't found any capacity problems with serving development out the airport. We typically have if it's in the base level storage um we have the pipelines and capacity to serve pretty much anybody. And so what we uh advise the city is that you know that would be a preferred place that they develop in the hills are more difficult for us because of all the pump stations work it requires. Um, so I just I'm wondering because of you're talking about Day Island. I don't know if that's the Oxen foot bridge or or what, but because I know the others suspended, but do we have it? We had some that were just went in on the bed of the river. We still have waterline crossings like that. Yes. So, we have uh

1:56:56 four total crossings. We have the one at Beltline. There's one by the Valley River in there's one by the old EWE headquarters. And there's Nickerbacher Bridge. So, two are suspended and two are on the bed. Uh, the 45 in by the old headquarters is buried in the um the bottom of the river. Yes. Okay. Yeah. And so is the 30 inch by and and they're are we going to leave those or I just curious because we replaced the one by Bell. I'm just wondering if we're going to bring those up or leave them on the on the riverbed. Yeah, there they're in a little different uh geological you know that scenario. So the one at Belt Line is because of the way the bridge was constructed, it caused erosion. Um, but one of the things that we're doing um with the

1:57:41 connector is going to make it so that we can actually work on any of them because what we've discovered is that we really don't have the ability to take Nickerbacher or the headquarters pipe out of service to fix it or replace it because of how critical they are. So when we complete that connector pipe, we'll be able to work on those crossings. Um, secondarily, the original 30-inch pipe from uh, Camp Creek is still buried under the river. And so, we're looking at ways to potentially rehab that pipe at a low cost to provide an extra level of redundancy on our river crossings. And that's one of our two FEMA grants that we have to study both uh, what to do with the Nickerbacher Bridge to make it withstand the earthquake and then also uh,

1:58:26 potential rehabbing that 30-inch pipe near the old headquarters building. Thank And I'd just like to comment. I really appreciate your on the 23rd Avenue the huge line you're going to replace that's going to be very disruptive to that neighborhood. And I'm Thank you for breaking it up because putting that big of a water line down that residential street is I I would assume that it's going to take it, you know, it it'll be a challenge with public relations and things, but I noticed that you split it up into two projects. So, thank you for doing that. I think that's Commissioner Barsky's. No, it's Tim's. No, that's Tim's. Well, I can get it for you. All right. Thanks. That's all I have. Thank you. All right, Commissioner Morris. Thank you, Chair.

1:59:11 Um, uh, very quickly. Hi, I'm the new guy, so I'm going to ask some silly questions. Um, can you, uh, first of all, great presentation. Appreciate it a lot. Um, and it was very clear and and, um, easy to understand, so thank you for that. Um, can you repeat what you had said about how many residents receiving gallons of emergency water per day? It was two gallons per day. You you had spoken very quickly and also Commissioner Carlson did as well. So, I just wanted to to have that repeated if that's possible. Yeah. And I'd be happy to answer it because I I did want to follow up. Uh, Commissioner Carlson. Um, so it's designed for two gallons per person per day over a 10-hour operating period. So that's so our pumping

1:59:56 capacity is the two gallons per person per day, but it would extend beyond. So if you assume everybody shows up in the 10-hour period, you would continue you could continue throughout the night. It's assuming like the daylight hours for the 10 hours. So the capacity is actually a little bit more than double in a in a full day period of time. That's our capacity during a 10-hour operating period. We just break it down as a simple form to communicate the two gallons per person per day. Um, I hope Yeah. My my main point is that people physically can't get to that location to get that in that just the logistics. But logistically that sounds like a complete nightmare to get that. Yeah, that's all I'm saying

2:00:41 with that few of stations. Yeah, you may be able to pump it, but but can they get there? Probably not. Yeah. Okay. And then another aspect or tool that we have is the distribution trailers and also um couple treatment trailers. And so there's a plan that the treatment plant staff have developed that's very robust on how to you know roll out these other forms and tools. And um but I think it's a good consideration and something that we'd like to look into more. Other questions too? Uh very quickly, um I had an opportunity to when I was doing some touring stuff, uh for the 42inch river front connector, and that's if you haven't, it's really cool when they like put the little camera through the pipe and it was just rad. So, I just want to

2:01:26 highlight that. That's cool. Um and I'm really excited to hear more about that, especially the the critical pipeline in between those two. It sounds like that's a that's a very key feature. um uh for the pipe that's going out or for the uh storage that's going out into Santa Clara. I'm crystal ball uh trying to think through into the future 10 20 years in the future once that's put in place once that's finalized is it easier if um Eugene continues to expand or continues to grow density height or widthwise would that make it easier to sort of spiderweb out from that for future storage um once that's completed once that put in place my thought process just again new guy hello but um current pipe structure there's not much

2:02:12 that seems to go that far north. And so I'm I'm curious the ease of creating new storage if necessary in the far far future. So that was actually addressed a little bit in the 2015 master plan and that was kind of on the way way out. If development happens, there would be another there there is some bigger pipelines that don't quite make it on the map that would actually loop all the way around kind of like belt line does to that big pipeline. So even though the storage would be in South Eugene, there would be a big loop of pipelines to serve all of Eugene. So and the decision on Santa Clara hasn't been made yet and that will be brought to the board as part of the 2020 the findings. Just to clarify,

2:02:57 Commissioner Morris, for your sake, that Santa Clara is an operational reservoir at this time when we're looking for the master plan to inform us of its future and and future storage in that area. Um just to clarify though and it's kind of like Santa Clara is the first point if you if you panned out and coming from Hayden Bridge Treatment Facility it's gravityfed and Santa Clara is the first reservoir in our base level. So just something to consider and and bring you up to speed on that. Frank, did you need to weigh in or did they answer the question for him? I I think they answered the question fine. And I was just going to elaborate a little bit uh on the um how we look at

2:03:45 resiliency. I I know there was a number of reasons we pivoted from focused on the WAMIT plant to developing emergency water sites. Um we have to be resilient to multiple different failure modes and we realize that if there's a an issue with the distribution system that creates a different kind of response than if we have a threat to the to the drinking water source. Um, our commitment at the time was was five emergency sites in five years. Uh, we've done seven in five years. So, we're a little bit ahead, but I would correct that we may not be done. So, if we say say we're done, there might be some additional ones. Part of the big challenge in developing this was actually the traffic management plans and some of those things to be able to

2:04:30 handle this two gallons per day per person in a more condensed time frame, which is what Nathan mentioned. So there's there's m there's maybe some more work and more things that we want to evaluate here going forward. Um but this is just one of many options including um storage trailers, treatment trailers, um emergency local sites that you could get to more easily plus all the other things that that we're doing as part of the master plan. And then my final comment um President Barski was just you know two um new I say relatively new presenters that Nathan said this was his first time. So well done Nathan. You even got a compliment from you know Commissioner Morris here. And the other one uh Chris is the new supervisor for for water uh water

2:05:16 engineering. Um um really Wally McCulla was probably the face you were used to. So I don't want to say Chris is the new Wall-E. that I Chris is the new Chris. Um, congratulations to him and uh, expect to see more of of this trio of people going forward. Indie have any questions? Okay, so I put myself in the queue. Um, thank you. Great presentation. Um, Mike, it's really inspiring that you get a whole plan named after you. you know, the the master plan. Uh I don't know if I would sign on to a Barovski plan, but

2:06:01 I think that that's great. Um couple of questions on the and I I think I know the answer to this, but on the regulatory water demand slide, there's a spike on both of them in 2035. Is that because of the second treatment plan coming on? That's a great question and I I didn't touch on that. So, we made an assumption that wholesale uh e-web could provide wholesale water regionally. Um and if we had to assume a value, we would assume 5 million gallons per day at a future date and we picked that uh 2034 roughly as a future date. So this is just completely hypothetical and also

2:06:46 it's only on the high scenario. So these are scenarios. There was a low and the planning is the solid line and I talked about the solid line and then the next dash line above it is a high scenario. So it's like this band of scenarios that we can consider for water demands but we're the planning scenario is the one that we're sticking to for our our system and our buildout. Then my second question has to do with the uh the Nickerbacher Bridge uh resiliency. Um that one is in my district and it's it's I'm just curious as how how that goes. Is that going to be a rebuild or do you envision a rebuild of that? And if we do do a rebuild of that, are

2:07:31 we considering also the resiliency of the actual bridge for transportation in case of an emergency? Because right now it's a fairly narrow bridge. I think maybe an emergency vehicle could get over it, but we have very limited number of crossings that are seismically uh resilient at this point. And basically the I5 bridge is the only one that goes over the river right now that's that's resilient. This could be a second one. I'm just wondering is that thought process in there? So as part of the study um our consulting engineers have considered um fixing the bridge in place to seismic standards uh replacing the bridge and constructing a tunnel underneath and using triple bottom line

2:08:17 analysis. it appears that a tunnel will be the most um have the the most benefits because of the challenges in retrofitting an old bridge and um the extreme difficulty and cost of building a new bridge. So, okay. Um, I think that that would be something I would hope we could talk to our our partners at the city and see if that on the transportation planning side of that and just put that in say, "Hey, we we're probably going to go underwater, but if you want to partner with us on this, it might be a a win-win for both both uh our utility and the community." Just looking forward. Um, the other thing is on the OA and the the the fire resiliency, you know, they said

2:09:02 and and I'm not real clear about this, but they say that they wanted 10 stations resilient, but why would you want the station resilient? Why wouldn't you want where the fires are going to be resilient? Um, because in my mind, the truck leaves the station. Maybe you can fill it up there once, but is that kind of how you got from going to 10 stations to two and you're you you're looking at areas throughout the the community that would have resilient hydrants. Yeah, you nailed it. That was that was exactly the e web project team's uh question and um during some of our workshops that we've had with our resiliency consultant and they are the expert. They're they part of their team authored the organ resilience plan. Very knowledgeable

2:09:48 folks, but we were challenging them with that same type of type of question. So when meeting with the fire chiefs, we brought this up to them. We wanted to hear their input and they agreed. And so we were able to narrow it down from extending backbone pipe to every fire station to the two most important which is the EOC and then if and then uh completely opposite side of their system fire station. So they picked two also hydrants located off the back off the backbone pipe. They were very interested in that and that's something that I get to follow up with and share with them that the hydrants that are located off so it'll fill their trucks. They didn't need water to every fire station. Great point and that that makes sense. That makes a lot of sense and I'm glad you went that way. And then the last thing is if you put the timeline up there for me which was completing and and

2:10:33 basically adopting early part of 2026. Is that correct? So, so for me that begs the question of we're going to have be having conversations about our S SDC methodologies um in the coming months and I'm just wondering if it's appropriate to do our SDC methodologies when we haven't really finalized what our master plan is going forward because the master plan is going to in my my understanding will definitely be the driving force behind the water CIP. So if we're if we're developing the master plan which and which drives what's in the CIP and the

2:11:19 CIP drives what the methodology is for the SDC's, should we think about uh pausing that discussion at least on the water SDC uh methodology until this master plan is is put through. Commissioner Ar. Commissioner, I've been I've been promoted. Um, thanks President Barovski. The simple answer is no. We have to have two conversations. The first one is really around SDC methodology principles um how we would use SDC's and for what purpose. That's more of a policy discussion. The second piece of that is to then apply test test the policy by applying it to the next um to updates

2:12:04 based on the next master plan. So there's really two different purposes. Both I think are are important um because I really think it's important for this board to to sort of pass on in the future the philosophies of when and how we use SDC's. Then we get an opportunity to apply it, check it, and see if there's things that we might want to might want to implement. Part of that is because we only do a master plan once every 10 years, but SDC's will be often referred to and updated many times in between there. So there's two purposes. So my simple answer would be no, we shouldn't postpone the policy part of that. Okay. Thank you. Um but maybe setting the rates might wait till right applying the pol the policy and the

2:12:52 principles to the actual rates as updated by the master plan. That's a separate step. Okay, that that's what I was hoping for. I don't want to set rates on things and then all of a sudden we throw all these new projects in there and the rates are based on that. That's that was one of my concerns. Um, with that, I I don't have any other questions. I appreciate you guys coming and presenting. um as somebody who uh talks in front of this body as as a non uh professional communicator, it's great to see engineers and other people come up here and it gets easier as time goes on. So, thank you. All

2:13:37 right, this is going to be my first one that I'm going to go over. All right. Okay. Next is our climate guide book. Actually, we're pretty close to pretty close to All right. Thank you so much for having me here today. My name is Kelly Hail. I am EW Webb's climate policy analyst and I'm thrilled to be here to say happy April. Welcome to April and to talk about EW Webb's climate guide book. Um, as you may remember, uh, EWB annually puts out a resource called the climate guide book. It's designed to describe

2:14:24 how EW is implementing the goals and the components of strategic direction policy number 15 related to climate change and climate policy. Um, you'll notice that it's on our website. There are two ways to read it. You can read it as downloaded as a PDF, and that's what's been updated for version 3.0 currently. We will be updating the HTML web content throughout the month of April. So, you'll notice that there's a difference right this second in terms of the versions. Um, but that will get resolved the rest of this month. Um, as I go through today, there's a lot in that content as you probably saw in your packet. I'm just going to hit on a few of the highlights from chapters 1, four, five, and six. And I know that I'm the only one up

2:15:09 here tonight, but I just wanted to say a huge thank you to all the super smart, super dedicated folks that I get get to work with across the utility. Many people contributed to this document, and it's my favorite part of my job to work with. So many wonderful people across the utility. So, diving into chapter 1. Um, and I always love to start with some good news. So, we started the process of um putting the climate guide book out um a couple of years ago and uh pleased to see that customer satisfaction um has increased since we started this process. Um sat satisfaction with EW's efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions has increased by 15% and really appreciate our communications and

2:15:54 marketing team's efforts to promote this um uh the work in the in the guide book. And so that's just really exciting to see that. Um so moving on to uh chapter 4 which is about EW Webb's efforts and commitments to help our customers decarbonize. Um I wanted to start with some of the changes because there's been a lot of um movement in the transportation electrification space. So um as you may remember the first image on here is from um City of Eugene's CAP 2.0 know, and it shows that more than half of our community's emissions come from transportation. So, it's important to see what's happening in the transportation space. And I'm pleased to um share that there's been a 35%

2:16:39 increase in electric vehicles registered to the DMV in EW service territory in the last year. Uh and that builds on a 29% increase the year before. So, we know that adoption of EVs is growing. Um, and that relates to EWB's um, funding that we get under the Oregon Clean Fuels program. So, the number of credits that we get from that program is tied to the number of EVs in our service territory, but the value of those credits is dependent on the value of those on the market. And there was a significant change in 2024. So after years of kind of stable credit prices that were all in the above $120 per credit, the price significantly dropped um in 2024 and it ended the year right

2:17:26 around $50 a credit. So that all um relates to how much money we will have in 2025 moving forward for investment in our transportation electrification programs. All right. So also in chapter 4 you'll notice that there's a discussion um uh related to the contributions of various customer segments to EW's energy efficiency programs and resulting greenhouse gas emissions in the community. And I know you're familiar with this graphic up here um but there are a few nuances that I wanted to unpack. There are many reasons that a utility might offer energy efficiency programs to the community. And I think it's helpful to be really clear about what we want to accomplish so that we

2:18:11 can most effectively target the types of activities that will have the biggest impact on our intended outcomes. So in this chart, you can see there's three bars. In the first bar, the one on the left, that represents the number of energy efficiency projects completed over a 2-year period. This chart covers 2023 and 2024. The second bar represents the share of the available incentive funding that went to various customer segments. And the third bar shows the energy savings in megawatt hours from the first year of those efficiency projects. And because this is a discussion about greenhouse gas emissions, you can use that third bar as a proxy to understand which of those projects also resulted in emissions

2:18:56 reductions. If our goal from this community investment is to achieve the maximum amount of energy savings and resulting greenhouse gas emissions as quickly as possible, we can see from this chart that um targeting projects that have scale and leverage private investment can be the most effective. So I'll call your attention to the green and yellow sections of the chart. You can see that commercial and industrial se uh customer segments represented only 6% of the projects um utilized 40% of the funding but generated 78% of the energy savings and resulting greenhouse gas savings. So that's significant and that again

2:19:41 relates back to leveraging private investment um and scale. Conversely, if our goal is where one where we want to focus on equity, investment for our most vulnerable community members and supporting improvements to home comfort, right? That we might choose to invest more in residential projects, especially in lowincome residential projects where e webb pays for most if not all of the cost of the incentive project being implemented. Um and so when we look at um the residential sector specifically the the red part of the chart up here which is the low income we can see that that has represented 10% of the projects 22% of the funding but generated less than 2% of the energy or GHG savings.

2:20:28 And so there's no right answer as to which um way we want to go and it doesn't mean that either type of project is not worth doing. We just need to be really clear with what our intended outcomes are. And it's somewhat disingenuous to say that we want to really focus on low-income projects if our goal is is climate action because it just doesn't generate the same level of emissions reductions. All right, so moving on to chapter five, which is about climate impacts on e-web and resiliency and adaptation. I just wanted to briefly touch on this because I think it can be helpful to think about natural hazards and in chapter 5 you'll see that um the results of the natural hazard mitigation planning um are being discussed. That's

2:21:14 a a a community effort and there were three impacts or three risks that were noted to be the most significant for e webb infrastructure and the community. Um, and again, these are natural hazards, so beyond just climate change, but they were storms, winter storms, wildfire, and earthquakes. And when we overlay those risks with the other climate modeling that is done specifically for Lane County, we see that the next tier of risks relate to extreme heat, air quality impacts, specifically from fires, flooding, and landscapes often in exacerbated and fire damaged areas, and drought. So it can be helpful to understand that those are the some of the most impactful risks that are facing our community from the experts when we think about

2:21:59 implementation of SD22 our resiliency policy moving forward. All right, moving on to chapter six and the results of our greenhouse gas inventory for 2024. I think this chart shows a couple of key takeaways. uh in SD15 there are some specific goals that we have set out for um reductions that we hope to see from our internal operations and those are marked on the chart here uh in the dotted lines. So you can see um the black dotted line shows our goal uh of a 25% emissions reduction compared to baseline that we were hoping to meet by 2020. And it's exciting to see that we've met that consistently ever since 2014. The second goal in our policy says that

2:22:45 we hope to get to a 50% emissions reduction by 2030. That's represented by the red dotted line. And I'm pleased to say today that for the second year in a row, we have consistently met that goal as well. And we're rep uh showing that we achieved a 55% emissions reduction over our baseline in 2024. Uh we hope to get to carbon neutrality by 2050. That's the green dotted line at the bottom of the chart. And we can see that there are three main stories to tell from the three sections of our our chart here um in 2024. The bottom part of the stacked bar chart in 2024 is our electricity and both our electricity and our natural gas which is the light blue section of the chart. Um we're significantly reduced in 2024

2:23:32 partly in in result from selling our headquarters building. This is the first full year um of not having headquarters as part of our inventory. And then you can see the the top section of the bar there is our transportation emissions and that has been a significant driver of our emissions reductions over time. Um and but unfortunately in 2024 they actually went up a little bit and we'll talk a little bit why that is but that was about uh availability of bofuels. All right. So boundaries um it's always important to uh think about what boundaries go into our inventory and uh when we think about uh GHC accounting we know that there are protocols that are out there that guide how this is done. You can think about financial accounting and uh how there's

2:24:19 generally accepted accounting PR protocols uh and principles in financial accounting. There's the same process for GHG accounting. The three scopes here are how we organize our um inventory and uh in the protocols uh scopes one and two are required while scope 3 is voluntary. So our uh policy is focused on scopes one and two. That's why those are the things that are included in the inventory here. Um I think it's always good to reflect on what is the purpose of a greenhouse gas inventory. Why do you do it? And it's really important to remember that you draw a circle around the in our case the assets that we own. We take a financial control approach to our reporting and you look at how efficiently are you using your assets

2:25:04 and your equipment to do the work that you need to do for your for fulfillment of your mission. And we have been able to increase the uh efficiency and utilization of our existing assets over the time period that we've been doing this. And that's really what it's about. identifying where you can improve and figuring out how you can better utilize those assets. So again, here's the detail on our fleet and I would just say that the main thing to notice here is that policy changes at the federal and state levels are really changing drivers in bofuel demand and prices. Uh that's the main takeaway for our fleet. That's why um our emissions went up in 2024. And I would just say we're so lucky here at EW Webb, we have folks that are really

2:25:49 forwardinking. So many years ago when bofuels became an important part of the market, um EW was a leader and took the step of creating the uh a contract called the Greater Oregon Fleet Collaborative that serves to increase the buying power and manage both access to fuels and prices for things related to our fleet, not just fuels, but other products as well. and we um increased the purchasing power of all of these community members. So, this has helped really make sure that we have access to things that are contributing to our emissions reductions not only for Eb, but for our whole community and he was here earlier, but u we have Gary Lynch to thank for that uh our fleet supervisor. Um so our natural gas has also decreased

2:26:34 again um significantly uh primarily due to the sale of headquarters. And as it relates to our electricity consumption, our total uh KW or megawatt hours of of consumption are down about 20% since our baseline year. And as you were just hearing from the water master plan, um a majority of our internal facility energy use, electricity use specifically is for the water treatment and the water pumping. And so we were able to coordinate and um really make sure that we're looking at efficiencies and ways that we can uh reduce energy electricity consumption and greenhouse gas emissions as part of that master planning process. this year. Um we have just the newest

2:27:19 greenhouse gas uh emissions intensity was just published for 2023. It's always a little bit of a year lag um from DEEQ and so that's on here as well and we make that available to our community members so that they know what emissions factors to be able to use in their inventories. And I'll wrap it up with what can you expect um moving forward. I think there's a couple of things to really focus on in 2025 and what you should expect. So, there's significant updates coming related to chapter 3, our power supply and transmission chapter. Um, we will be making the BPA product choice decision. This year, we will have an updated 2025 energy resource study and action plan kind of representing our our integrated resource planning

2:28:05 process. We will also um have the results of the demand side potential assessment this year and that will really get at some of the goals that we might have in our conservation program that I was mentioning earlier. So those are significant updates that we can expect that we'll be able to report on the following year. The other thing that we're doing is we are updating the methodology we use to calculate our greenhouse gas inventory. And um what we're really doing is we're able to not only take the boundaries that I included before, which is on the the graphic here, but we're expanding and adding additional boundaries into our inventory related to the power that we generate. Um, so we own different resources as an electricity as a electric utility and

2:28:52 there's a separate protocol that builds on the one that we're currently using that's specifically for electric utilities and it adds additional emission sources that we can include depending on what type of utility you are. So there are different utilities that only have certain numbers of those columns on the right hand side of the chart. We happen to be a utility that has all of those columns. And so there are different emission sources that do relate to our operations and we will be including emissions associated with those activities in our inventory moving forward. So you can look forward to updated results coming soon. That will happen this year, probably in about August. So with that, I'd love to take your questions. Thank you so much for your time.

2:29:44 Thank you, Kelly. Um, this is an exhaustive document that you've created. Um, I have a just a a couple questions. So, one is um on the side with the transportation trends and the clean fuel credits. So, you mentioned that the price the the value of the clean fuel credits has dropped a lot in 2024 and that's the money that we put into like our transportation incentive programs, right? Like ebikes or other things like that. So, does that mean that in this coming year that those programs will shrink because we have less money to put towards it? So um we have been looking at what we expect right and so the number of

2:30:30 credits increased the value of each credit decreased that does incre uh make a smaller pot of funding that's moving forward so we are thinking about what are the um priorities to be able to fund and I believe that um there was a memo um late last year that talked about where some of the funding will continue to go um and that will be an opportunity to continue that discussion moving forward as we look at where the funding is available. Um, and yeah, yeah, I was I was just going to weigh in a little bit on this, Commissioner. Um, the the team that really is chartered with the use of the the clean fuel credits funds um did a lot of of look at the value of the different

2:31:16 programs this past year and I think the update was in December. Um, one of the areas that we were not comfortable that we felt we needed to do a bit more research on was the ebike program. Very popular program, but one where we had to understand what difference is our incentive making on people's purchase decision. And so the simple answer is is as these funds go down, uh, we either have to look at the investments we're making in programs or the offset potential rate impacts of those if we want to continue the same level of of investment. So that that process actually started this year in this year's budget and will continue as we look at these uh clean fuel credits

2:32:02 going forward. The good news is we're an aggregator of EVs, so there's more credits, but the value of those credits in the market can be offset. So, it's it's something we just have to manage actively year-over-year and we don't know what will happen with the credit price moving forward. So, this could be a temporary decrease or it could be here to stay, right? Um okay, have two more questions. Um, another question is we've done a really great job of internally um lowering our greenhouse gas emissions and a lot of that is due to the sale of the headquarters building, right? Um, and so I'm just curious. So, this this document doesn't it just it just reports, right? It's not like this is a strategy for us

2:32:48 to continue to decrease our internal greenhouse gas emissions. It's more like it's just reporting on the state of Yep. It takes a look at a snapshot in time. It looked at what was the snapshot of how we delivered our service in 2010 and it looks at a snapshot of what we did in 2024 and it compares the two. It is not an action plan. Yeah. Okay. Great. Um and then my last question is do we know who's utilizing this climate guide book? Like do we have data on how many clicks we get or who is using it? uh or how it's being used in the community. We know some of that. Um I don't have good data on the clicks. Um so I can't share that and I'm not sure that that was something that we had been working with

2:33:33 our communications team to see if it was possible and I'm not sure it's currently possible. Um I was pleased to hear that the city of Eugene was talking about it earlier today. So that was exciting. I know there are many different um places that I hear referenced um in the community. I know that it's um something that uh people do reference and ask about. Um the University of Oregon uses it in some of their classes to teach students about things. I hear um community members reference it. Um we've had public comment of people coming and saying, "Hey, I read this in the climate guide book. Thank you so much." But I don't have comprehensive. I I do know that um you know as part of the public outreach plan, we intentionally went out

2:34:18 and and uh provided very direct outreach to our environmental community, a lot of the nonprofits that we work closely with, um to make sure that they're aware of it and they know how to provide feedback for what they would like to see included in the guidebook moving forward. Thank you. Uh yeah, quick. Thank you. Excellent report. I really appreciate it. Mindy asked a question I was going to ask about utilization. Um go back to the slide about um the um GHG on pumping water and and paint bridge and it shows that it's like 60 64 and 17 just in the water. Um so but we're using e webb electricity

2:35:03 and it's 95% green. Correct. So, is that factored into the fact that how how that's I mean, how do you calculate? I'm missing something there about if we're using all the the non-carbon electricity. Why is that is that just a percentage of of of one or what? What's going on? So, this chart here just shows uh electricity consumption. So, the units on this chart is megawatt hours. And so of the megawatt hours that we consume about 80% go for water pumping and water treatment. Okay. And then when we look at the greenhouse gas emissions associated with our electricity consumption that's what's shown on the left side of this chart and you take that total megawatt hours and you

2:35:48 multiply it by the emissions factor uh for ew webb's electricity and that's based upon e e-w correct or carbon content. Okay. Yes. That's verifying that's all I have. Thank you. Okay, great. Okay. Um, can we go to the I have four different questions. The page with the rental or with the um chapter 4 summary page. This one. That one. Thank you. Um I'm curious on the residential um low non low income versus the res low income. We don't have any sense of um if any of those are renters, correct? Or do we have a sense of those? Renters could be

2:36:34 included in residential non-lowinccome or residential low income. Okay. They wouldn't be considered like a commercial property because it's an investment that somebody makes. It's not a separate business. I don't think so. No. Okay. All right. That was that question. And then um on chapter six um you you start I think you alluded to this a little bit later that you're going to be expanding the um what's included in the inventory from just scope one and scope two to include um some additional pieces in scope 3. And I was curious if concrete from our major developments fit into one of those other categories that you listed. there was a bunch of different check marks, but I couldn't tell if it fit in that box in

2:37:19 one of those. So, I think it's useful to think about um the scopes as you were just talking about. And actually, I'll move forward to this one just so you can see the other Yeah, there we go. Um component. So, on the left hand side, that graphic showing the three scopes is uh from the protocol that applies to any type of business in the world, right? It doesn't matter what your business model is. It's talking about, you know, your scope one is your direct emissions from owned equipment. Your scope two and three are indirect emissions from shared equipment. Scope two is a special type of shared associated with the product you buy from your electricity provider. And scope three is everything else, okay, that you might share. Um, the table on the right looks

2:38:04 at here are extra emission sources that are specific to electric utilities. Okay, so those are emission sources that are additional that could be in scope 1, 2, or three that are specific to electric utilities and we'll be adding some of those things there. We do look at the concrete associated with our capital projects. We don't include it here on an annual basis because our goal in SD15 is specific to um scope one and two but we do take a triple bottom line approach to all major projects and we um have joined a green concrete group that is part of the city of Eugene that's following the work that the city of Portland is doing. Those two are leaders

2:38:50 in um the space to look at additives to concrete and ways to um reduce the greenhouse gas emissions associated with construction projects and specifically concrete. Um so we have joined that group. We are following the um results there. Um the we are bound by in many concrete applications we're bound by the specs that the city uses. uh in a couple of instances specifically related to the water treatment tanks which has been the lion's share. I think we've calculated that it was 75% of our concrete usage over the last couple of years as we built the new water tanks at 40th. Um we are not bound to the city spec in that application. So, we have some flexibility to do things, but there are specific rules for concrete that is in

2:39:35 touch with drinking water that don't allow for some of the um fly ash or other additives that can help lower greenhouse gas emissions from concrete. So, we're kind of following the best science. We're doing what we can to follow what's possible and um we're plugged into, you know, all of the channels there and doing the best we can there. Okay. Thank you. And then on the pieces that we're adding that are in the so everything in the scope 3 section that we're adding um is exempt anyway from our um our SB5 SB15 goal. But the other ones that we're adding above that in scope one and scope two. If we're adding those in now, how does that impact our ultimate goals to stay below the 2030 line and the 2050 line?

2:40:21 Ultimately, you'll see that in goal uh seven, the annual organizational goal seven of this year, that once we start adding this, we'll need to rework some of the goals that are currently in our policy uh to change the definitions, to change how we're thinking about them, to change some of the language that's being used um because it just doesn't quite line up the same way we've always done it. And and that will be part of that process. Okay, great. I mean, I'm supportive of trying to capture what we can and what we need to because it's a better picture. I don't want to just hide, hey, we're doing a great job because we're focused only on these things. Um, but I I was curious and then um I was curious as well on the uh emissions that we were seeing. I didn't

2:41:06 really see a ramp down from um our meter uh driving uh going away because of the smart meters. Can you speak to that a little bit? Yeah. Um we've been looking for that um as well and the miles driven. So um again back to your question earlier about how do you calculate electricity emissions? Megawatt hours times emissions factor. In fleet, you look at um you know, gallons consumed, which are directly proportional to miles driven times an emissions factor per fuel. So, we're looking at miles driven and trying to understand what is um driving that. And right now, without being fully implemented in AMI, there are still needs to go out and read meters. And

2:41:51 sometimes you you would think that there would be a significant reduction but sometimes until we get fully implemented um it might still result in similar to the same miles but fewer meter reads along that route, right? Because you still have to go to different points but you're only reading a few meters at that location instead of walking and and um doing some of the additional meter reads that would still take that mileage. So, we hope to see that decrease over time, but at this moment, we're not seeing that yet. Maybe most of that's because it's the up river part that probably has the lion share driving. I don't know. Maybe not. Not not completely. Commissioner Carlson, part of the reason that when um Kelly refers to fully deployed, the water side plays a role in

2:42:36 that. And so, we're not fully deployed on the water meters yet. And so many of these routes continue and in fact in some ways are a little less efficient because your your your intermittent reads are are there. Um but we do expect that to change over time as we get fully deployed upriver as well as on the water side and the electric side. And then at that point there may be a more specific cost associated with those manual meter reads which is something that is is coming um down the road um to to assess. So okay and then final final question um for me the business um if if businesses are located at homes are they

2:43:23 eligible for commercial credits or is it only if you are at a official business residence? How how does that apply? Everybody is looking at me. Um, you know, I there are there are a number of issues associated with home businesses. You know, how those are classified. I think we'll have to look into that, Commissioner Carlson. Um, we do have a number of business people who are coll-locating businesses in their residence. I believe that those are probably from an energy efficiency standpoint still considered residential projects. Okay. But I'll I'll have to get with staff and see if there's any further clarity around that. Okay. Thank you. And thank you very much for all the work on this. And the one thing,

2:44:08 Commissioner, that you brought up, I sorry, I was supposed to ask for permission from President Barovski to to speak. Um, part of goal seven was to recognize that there's new protocols associated with carbon accounting. We recognize that in some ways we're going to have to press the reset button on some of the policies that have existed because we're going to talk about new baselines, new expectations. Um, some of that we think will occur this year around what those some of those numbers might look like, but the policy development part and the internal execution of that might be something that we push from this year to next year because it's probably um a lot more work from the implementation perspective than

2:44:53 we kind of originally anticipated. So, um, don't be surprised if in the next month or two I come back to the board around goal 7 and restructure that just a little bit. Um, again, thank you for the work. Um, we did mention it to the city of Eugene today. Uh the mayor was quite interested in the uh ability to integrate it with some other plans that are going on in the city. Um uh in particular the sustainability commission. Um I think it might be who

2:45:39 of you to maybe reach out to them and ask if there's an opportunity to make a presentation to them. I think that that would be a a good way to get this out there to our community and to the people that are plugged into these these uh conversations. Um so I'm just throwing that out there. Um the question that I have is on the clean fuel credits. Do we know why they went down so much? Is it that there was less? I mean obviously it's a it's a supply and demand is is always what drives prices. So there was there that much more supply of them and that's what what drove it down and what is leading into that amount of supply increase. So

2:46:27 there are a number of factors that go into that and you're exactly right. It's a complicated mixture of supply and demand. In 2024, there was an increase in renewable diesel that was coming to the market. But what's interesting is that that is changing in 2025. And so there's some volatility there. There's increased demand for things like renewable diesel across many different states and with the adoption of Washington's clean fuels program getting up and started um with California regulations, there's increased in demand there. Uh there's also increase uh or a change in federal policy from the inflation reduction act that actually removed a credit the blender fuel credit uh for um uh renewable fuels that are um

2:47:13 created abroad right in favor of locally domesticated uh production of bofuels which negatively impacts the renewable diesel that we have been able to purchase in Oregon. So, there's a number of factors that have been changing. That's why I was saying I'm not quite sure if any of you have a crystal ball. Uh, I know Frank has one in his office. Thank you. Uh, we'll consult that to um see what the fuel Oh. Oh, great. You asked for it. Ask and I shall receive. Right. So, can you ask it what the credit price will do this year? because there was um additional renewable diesel that came into the market in 2024, but now um there's a change in in where that's going. So, we'll just see how things move forward.

2:48:00 Okay, that was basically kind of my my question is what was driving the the the significant price drops and do we I guess the other question is is do we base our projections going forward on the price that we have now or do we h how are we planning on you know because we have to put in a budget that says we we're going to have this much money for incentives obviously we have reserves or things like that that we can fall back on. But going forward in our budgetaring process, are we will we base it on the $40 or will we base it on on something different? And I'm directing that I don't see Deborah here, so I'll direct

2:48:45 that to you. And here's the crystal ball if you need. I I think um this this is an area commissioner where we um we would make some I I'll say relative conservative initial estimates on how we budget um knowing that there's some degree of flexibility with within the entirety of the budget. Sometimes you'll you'll see on a consent item managing within the budget. Um, the clean fuel credits are a portion of our larger uh customer solutions budget. So, there's opportunities to look at at trade-offs between programs in in that entirety. But, I think what we'll probably do is is consult one of the three crystal

2:49:30 balls in my office, look and see, okay, this is what we think is a reasonable estimate. Um, the other thing that's a piece of that is how many credits we actually get. we are seeing growth. So, um we'll do a budget estimate and then as things evolve throughout the year and we get nearer the end. Um this last year we had to look at programs and program efficiencies. Um the clean fuel credits are not general purpose funds. They are dedicated they're because of the way the program works. They're dedicated to things that facilitate or help us adapt to transportation electrification specifically. So they have some at least intended um types of programs and outcomes. So we just I guess that's a

2:50:16 simp kind of a a way of saying that we'll take an initial estimate at it and then we'll see if it if it adapts or changes as we go throughout the year. The other thing that we can do is look at when we sell those credits. And so if there's a way to lock in value early, kind of like we do with with hedging, there might be an opportunity to to do that from a budgeting perspective. So there's a number of tools we have. And I guess what I would want as a a commissioner in building the budget forward, seeing as how it was steady for so many years and then dropped and and there's balls in the air, I would hope that we would have at least be able to have the conversation of being able to possibly temper that uh fluctuation in

2:51:04 the upcoming budget so that if a program were going to go away just because it's at $40, we could say, "Well, let's maybe look at some other areas including highest investor uses of reserves to maybe keep a program going until we know that it's a more stable thing or that yes, it's going to be in the $40 range going forward. I would hate to cut a program on data that is is wonky when it may just be a little blip on the on the ocean. So, I would like to have that conversation when it does come to the budgetary side. And that's just me. I don't know if that'll just one just a couple comments. First of all, it hasn't been stable. It it has been accelerating for a long time. So, it was it was

2:51:49 ramping up significantly because of the value of the credits and then the number of credits. Then it sort of this last year or so sort of tanked the other way. Um but a little bit of perspective, it's 1% of our budget, right? Um, so we we uh just just to give you a little bit of context, we're constantly going to be reviewing those programs for effectiveness. Either way, the fact that a particular funding source dedicated to something is something we think we have some flexibility on. Um, but like this last year, there was a number of things that we mentioned to commissioners that these programs are being looked at and adjusted. And um if that's a detail that you want to I know you're a budget type of guy. If you want to dig into that portion, we'd be happy to do that as

2:52:35 part of that process. Yeah. I mean, I just I just feel that personally for me, if we're looking to re reduce greenhouse gases in our community and the largest contributor to it in our community is transportation. If we start taking away money from trans or programs from electrif making transportation less carbon intensive that goes against what I want to do see as a as a commissioner. So that's that's just kind of where I'm coming from. So sorry just one quick um piece of that though the transportation side. Um while great and I completely agree that I want to tackle the um the highest and best

2:53:21 use of funds, it also it doesn't um it doesn't impact our demand side and our supply side um or our demand uh needs. So, if we're trying to get that second bang for our buck and reducing the demand of our customer base to deal with our other um rate pressures, it doesn't get at that because we'll still need the energy to to serve those loads instead of reducing the amount of consumption that they're taking on. Maybe I didn't say that very well, but that's my main point. Other com? Yes, just one quick. Do we get credit for the number of people that don't come to work?

2:54:08 We do calculate our emissions associated with employee commute as well. So there are some scope 3 sources that uh we calculate internally um and are not part of today's reporting. Employee commute is one of them and the dynamic workforce policy that we've implemented really does impact um our overall emissions associated with employees coming to work. Thank you. All right. Any other questions or comments? Okay, we are done with this one. Thank you. Thank you. Um, we do have a break scheduled here. Let's go for five minutes instead of 10 because we're a little bit behind behind schedule.

3:01:58 We're going to come back into session here. Next item on the agenda is item number 14, the wildife, excuse me, wildlife wildfire mitigation compliance plan and annual updates. We'll turn it over to Janine, I believe, at this point. Tonight I am here to talk about the 25 uh wildfire mitigation plan. We'll have some time to review and discuss and ask for your do that. I wanted to start with a quick recap of where we've been over the past couple years. So many bud. All right, let me go

3:02:46 back. Okay, here we go. Better. Yes. Down towards you a little bit. Ready to sing. Um, so a high level overview of where we've been. This sounds so loud today. Over the past couple years, uh, 21 and 22 were really the building years. We mapped our first highf fire risk zones. We captured some opportunistic reliability projects with wildfire mitigation co- benefits. We added some situational awareness tools. We got the weather station and the camera installed. And we finished out that period with our first PSPS event 2022. 23 and 24. We were really iterating on lessons learned while planning for new mitigation work. Uh we did a lot of the research and development that's needed to select some

3:03:31 of the equipment for the pilot projects. We're going to talk about a little bit more. And now in 25, we're really transitioning from that planning to deployment of those pilots. And all this to say that my focus right now is really on implementing the projects we've got in the queue and then beginning that planning cycle all over using that continuous improvement framework. I talked to you um in July about some of this work, so I'm going to go super quick, but this is a re a quick recap. The map is showing you the location of the fire mitigation fault indicators that were installed. Those are those little um yellow diamonds. These devices help locate faults faster for quicker restoration and they also coordinate with our wildfire safety fast trip or instantaneous trip settings. So we've got 160 of these devices installed

3:04:18 upriver and as part of that installation we used a 2023 load study to change out 177 fuses on our upriver circuits. So these are smaller fuses. They'll release less energy if they blow because we're looking for ways to reduce the ignition risk. Um, note that we didn't, if you look at those blue diamond or yellow diamonds, we did not replace the fuses in Sou Eugene because our plan is to instead pilot non-expulsive fuses on this circuit. We've got 40 of those devices in stock now and they're ready for installation. The picture on the right really fast is that second EWE weather station. This one was installed up at Baton Heights. So now we have that local weather station um the data for our upriver as well as sou eugene for

3:05:03 seasonal forecasting and real-time operational decisions. 2024 was our second year of the AI enhanced satellite imagery that we're using for veg management support. Um there are 2024 results validate that web's annual pruning cycle in the highf fire risk zones is effective at managing for clearance. In both years, we found that less than 10% of the high fire risk zone circuits had areas with higher risk. Um, another feature that I particularly find interesting is that this tool can identify clusters of hazard trees near our infrastructure. So, the tool counted 60,000 trees in striking distance to e-web lines. Luckily, only 1,500 of those were in declining health. So, these are the ones that are more likely to drop branches or

3:05:49 fail altogether. And then using the tool to narrow down even further, we can see which of those have both striking distance and in poor health. And 75% of those trees were on four upriver feeders. So they're really concentrated in one area. Now, I can't tell you using this tool if those 335 remaining trees are leading towards the lines, which would be a higher risk, but so there's limitations to the technology, but we do know that trees outside the rightway cause quite a few of our outages. So, it can be a useful tool to further target tree removals uh with the cooperation of adjacent land owners. That's not always easy. I'm going to move forward to looking to 2025. And this year, I'm not going to make any predictions because I learned my lesson last year. Um 2024 was

3:06:35 forecasted last year to be a typical wildfire season. We were coming out of a long period of drought, but instead it turned out to be a record year in terms of acreage burned, mostly in the eastern part of the state. But note that our Carmen Smith facility was impacted again. Um, as we've seen from recent fires in other states, wildfires are just more unpredictable in timing, in severity, and it just requires us to be ready for almost anything every single year. So, as we get ready for this season, we'll continue to build that culture of wildfire safety at Eb through annual crew training and equipment certification. We do that with Oregon Department of Forestry. We'll plan our second tabletop exercise to practice our PSPS decision-making framework. And we ramp up our internal communications during extreme weather events because we

3:07:20 really want to make sure the crews have that situational awareness. We're leveraging the forecasting services, our cameras, and even the Watchduty app for that real-time safety info. If you guys don't have Watchd Duty on your phone, I highly recommend it. So, we keep working the plan. We're getting a few more projects closer to implementation. And the picture on the left, is it your left? Anyway, the picture of that white thing is a rec-losure device. These um new devices also coordinate with our wildfire safety settings, which is another way to say instantaneous trip. So, if a fault occurs downstream from this device, the entire feeder shouldn't go out. So, we'll have fewer customers out of power and hopefully quicker restoration. They also clear temporary faults. So, we

3:08:05 expect to see reliability improvements, especially during the winter storm season, and that means fewer truck rolls, which is staff efficiency. So, we're stacking those benefits on top of each other. And then, pending FEMA and city permitting approval, we're ready to build the do the Dillard 4734 rebuild. This project will underground about a,000 ft of distribution lines that are running through a natural area in South Eugene. We'll rebuild the transmission line using metal structures with new components for fire resiliency. Uh this project's planned for late summer, early fall. Um and communications will go out to neighbors pretty soon. So the combination of this rebuild plus the non-exlosive fuses on Dillard 4734 will combine to have significant risk reduction benefits for this WOOI area.

3:08:55 This is a bit of an eye chart at almost 9:00 at night, but I just wanted to call attention to our wildfire safety settings. This is a really important operational practice that we use. We're enabling those instantaneous trip settings on all of our highf fire risk circuits for the entire wildfire season, which is ending up being about three months. It's a very conservative approach, which means that our customers who live in those highf fire risk zones are probably seeing more frequent outages, but they're definitely experiencing longer outages. We're seeing about 3 to four hours for restoration versus a system average, which is about an hour. So, and that's because we're doing the to post um um we're doing the u post patrol inspection. So, um, it does demonstrate though how we're prioritizing risk

3:09:40 reduction over reliability. And we're tracking these out this outage data to further target our mitigation strategies, but then also looking at ways to fine-tune it so we can keep that risk reduction, but maybe improve the reliability metrics and the trip savers are one opportunity in that regard. So, you guys know this, but wildfire is not an e-web issue, it's a community issue, right? So, another key part of our plan and part of our overarching resiliency messaging is helping customers be prepared for potential summer outages, whether that's to the the wild fire safety settings or an actual PSPS event. We've enacted this watch and warning system after the 2022 event. And the goal is really to give customers as much time as possible to prepare for a potential PSPS. Maybe they

3:10:26 need ice, they need to fill up their car, uh they need to fill up water tanks. So this includes personal outreach to customers who are medically reliant on power. So these are folks are especially vulnerable during power outages. We're calling this the enhanced PSPS support program. And we have about 15 people enrolled who have asked us for direct personal notifications um from e webb staff to make sure they're aware of a planned outage and that they have a safety plan in place. A significant effort in 2024 was to validate and refine our highf fire risk zones. So currently these are set at the substation or feeder level and they're based on pre2020 wildfire data. So in late 2023 we were able to contract with

3:11:13 Pyrolologgics. They're a highly regarded wildfire uh modeling consulting firm and they gave us updated analysis using best-in-class methodology and the most recent data sets. So, how do they do this? And I'm not a fire modeling expert, but high level, they're combining fuels and landscape data layers, plus over 200 different weather scenarios to determine the probability and consequence of a fire that originates on e webb equipment. It escapes initial attack and it grows into a large wildfire. So, the combination of probability and consequences results in what they call a wildfire threat index. They simulated some 11 million fires on ew webb's overhead system to do this analysis. So the thing to know about

3:11:59 this is that the the WTI is relative to e webb service territory. So it's not risk compared to the state or the northwest or California. So you have to translate the analysis through benchmarking against other risk assessment tools and fielding. And our fire partners have gone out and done this with us and e webb staff are in the process of doing that. So we have high confidence in the results. so far, but it's really a work in progress. So, a sneak preview, but before I do that, I just want to tell you the importance of applying the analysis correctly so that we direct our investments and our operational practices to the areas that have the most public safety and risk reduction benefit. That's really the value in having good risk mapping, right? So, in town, you know, you can

3:12:45 see the urban area doesn't have very much fire risk at all, right? But um in the sou eugene area, we did not find any new feeders beyond the Diller 4734 that we would categorize as a highf fire risa. That said, we are field checking about three dozen potential areas in the South Hills and southeast Eugene for potential adjustments to our maps and practices. But these are really smaller sections. They're anywhere from a few blocks to a few spans. And that map on the right, my right, um is the zoomed in view. So, it's overlaying the risk maps with our GIS data. And you can kind of see how there's just a couple of poles in a couple of houses that are showing up as some higher risk. So, it's going to take a more nuanced and surgical approach to work through these sites.

3:13:32 When we get to upriver, it's a different story. So, all circuits are going to stay as high fire risk zones for this year. And if you see that large section in green that's showing relatively less risk. The green being less and red being more. That's the holiday farm fire burn scar. So the reason why that's green is because there's just not as much fuel available anymore for a catastrophic fire. We believe this is a temporal condition. So we're leaving those circuits as high fire risk zones. There are areas closer to Eugene that merit additional review for potential delisting as a highf fire risk zone. Again, we want to use due diligence. So, we'll be working with our fire partners and field part and field staff to check these areas prior to making any recommendations for change. But I will point out that one of the benefits of

3:14:18 this modeling is it really is helping us hone in from seven or 10 circuits to key areas where we want to prioritize that work. And if you see those orange and red areas, you're really looking at those Camp Creek and Deerhorn and Cedar Flats areas as maybe the areas you want to focus on the most. So speaking of up river, we're continuing to pursue the Oregon Department of Energy grid resiliency grant for more fault indicators up river, additional recloser devices, and a grid hardening project along Cedar Flats. Remember, Cedar Flats was one of those high-risisk areas, and it also has a high concentration of hazard trees. So, it makes really good sense to focus there. This project includes some targeted undergrounding work as well, kind of similar to the Diller project, but it's adding a lot of complexity with

3:15:04 our granters. So, it's been slowgoing. We're actively monitoring the Oregon legislative session. We're watching two bills of interest. One would offer limited liability protection to public utilities that opt in to a standard of care and additional oversight by PUC. The other is a stable funding um bill for statewide wildfire suppression activities. They're looking for some 200 plus million dollars. So, as you can imagine, neither of these bills are without sensitive. Where was I? Oh, I'm going to go panel. Okay, last couple slides. So, I'm going to wrap up with good news. Uh we were selected as

3:15:50 one of five utilities to participate with the APA and Argon National Labs to access um expert guidance to improve our wildfire mitigation plan, quantify risk using advanced tools and develop our best practices in collaboration with these other larger utilities. So our first meeting is in midappril and I'm really excited to be part of this group and we'll be working with them through the end of the year. Rep asking for board approval of the 2025 wildfire mitigation plan. The PUC rules state that the plan must be directed to protect public safety, reduce risk to customers, and promote electric system resiliency to wildfire. The 2025 plan lays out a comprehensive approach to a complex and dynamic community issue. It demonstrates ongoing

3:16:36 maturity of our plan and with the numerous pilot projects underway, EW's now poised to build out a longerterm roadmap of risk informed mitigation work that aligns with our strategic focus on resiliency. It also represents the efforts of numerous staff across the organization from communications to GIS to design and operations and I really need to publicly appreciate everyone's contributions to this plan. It is not a oneperson show. So with that, um, we open for questions and discussions. Um, Josh Reic is in the audience if you have stickler questions that I can't answer. So thank you for being here, Josh. And there's a motion queued up if the board's ready to think about that as well. Thank you. I will

3:17:23 open it up for discussion, questions, or comments. Yes. Um, I just one quick question. So when we give the notice to turn off power and those folks that I mean there's some that we're already notifying kind of more individually but then there's a broader group that gets the general notification. Um I know that when we had upriver um outages in the past due to cold weather which would not be a wildfire situation but we set up the generator program. I'm curious if um the generators themselves pose a risk during these times and if there's something that we can communicate or need to

3:18:10 communicate around them if that if that is risk you know that did come up coming out of the 2022 um PSPS uh people were worried about activating their generators and it is one of the new key messages. So, when we talk about summer outage safety, we have text in there that talks about using your data safely during summer months and wildfire season. Some people still choose not to because they're worried about it, but we definitely added that as some key messaging because that issue did come up. Okay. All right. Thank you. Okay, that leaves me. Um, yeah, thank you. Very comprehensive report. very interesting. A lot of

3:18:56 uh really to me cool things that we're doing to uh cover our bases and also protect our our uh assets and our community. Um one of the questions that I have is on the PSPS notifications. You said we had 15 people that are at high risk, but do we have more people that are on there as the notification? Um because and the reason I'm I'm thinking about this is we we have an upper meeting coming up in May and I think that would be a great opportunity to to highlight this and and tell the people about how they can get signed up for it so that they know because it's generally is going to be impacting our

3:19:41 up river customers more so than others. Um, so in general, we aim to give at least 24 hours notice to anyone who's impacted by a PSPs. So that has been the goal and we were able to do that in the 2022 event. We had enough advanced notice to be able to get that notification out through multiple means. The enhanced support program is really targeted for people who are medically reliant on power. So they have mobility devices, they have oxygen machines, maybe they need it for cooling or um for refrigerated medication. That's a much smaller population. These people have opted in. They've self-identified as folks who'd like that additional support. And the difference there is that we are picking up a phone and

3:20:26 calling them. And if we don't reach them, we're calling their caregiver or whoever their emergency contacts are to make sure that they have they know about the PSPS. They have a plan to keep themselves safe and they can ask for additional support and we'll relay them to some other community support services if so. So, it is a pretty small population. Is it everyone who has a medical device? Probably not. There could be a lot more than 15. Uh, we'll do more outreach moving into this wildfire season and see if we can make sure folks are aware of that program and get some more signups. I I guess I'm not as concerned about I I understand that one there. I'm I'm considering the the population at general. Is there a an optin to like a text thing when a PS

3:21:12 thing is going on? Um, and and that's what I'm thinking about especially for our uproot ones. you know, there's the general, we put it out to the media, we put it out to this and that. I just I didn't know if there was a something that they could opt into that would be a a text to action type of a of a uh a program or not. So, we don't have a opt into a texting program that I'm familiar with that Aeron's here and he may have some other information, but um I would say that emergency notifications and alerting is something that's in my work plan for this year and we're looking at a numerous different tools. Um lane alerts is another way that you can broadcast to large numbers of people. So, we're looking at that tool as another way to get PSPS or even boil

3:21:59 water notices out. So, not yet, but it's definitely on the Okay. docket. Um, the other thing that I was encouraged by is that we are, if I read it right, we're we're voluntarily um going to the standards that investor owned utilities are subject to that. We may not be since we're uh you know not an investor owned one but the their level is a little bit higher and we're buying into those higher levels of things. I'm I was encouraged to read that um in some cases. Yes. Yeah. And then um again I'm I'm really encouraged by the fact that we uh were one of five people that five utilities that got to

3:22:44 get the the grant and go into that uh program from Argon National Laboratories. I think that that's going to be very exciting going forward. And then the last thing is again there's a lot of really neat things in here. The one some of the things that came out to me was about um the birds the bird uh nest uh you know we had 400 incidences of of bird related tripages or whatever and the things that we're doing to uh to try and mitigate those you know shielding the lines and stuff like that. I think that's very innovative and I think I was really encouraged about that and I actually shared that in in our meeting this

3:23:30 morning and and it was like this is really cool. You guys should read these these reportals a lot of cool stuff in there. So thank you for all your work and at this point is it yeah got Mindy I was just gonna you're looking for a action right? Yes there's I move to approve resol resolution 258. All right, discussion. I saw Tim had his hand up before the motion got put on the floor. I I had a question mainly about the the PSPS um of how well known is is that and and my question is to the outreach as well. Um yeah, I think PSPS is probably the most well-known mitigation action

3:24:16 because it turns your power off. So people are highly sensitized especially here where we've had a significant wildfire in our community. So you know even when we are not planning a PSPS but maybe there's a red flag warning so we have heightened information from National Weather Service about weather danger people may call us and say hey are you going to do a PSPS please turn my power off I'm really nervous and you know but that's a balancing act you know if you turn people's power off you take some other risks in hand. So, um, it's it's a carefully thought through process. I'm glad that we've only had to do it once. I'm glad that we've practiced it and we'll continue to practice it because I would be surprised that we only have one event. Thank you. Yeah. And I'm I have a a

3:25:02 curiosity of of you know, if I'm a medical provider and I have a person who has medical necessary, you know, has to have power on, you know, do our local doctors know that this is something that they can refer folks to as well? that is probably not the case like so we have not reached out to you know there's there's other ways you could do re um outreach like oxygen tank providers like medical supply providers um so I think we could expand that we just piloted this program last year so I think there's opportunities to um grow that program now that we've kind of got one year of experience under and we didn't know how many people would sign up so we were a little a little gunshy about how much to promote it but obviously 15 people is pretty doable. We can those

3:25:47 phone calls pretty easily, right? Yeah. I was just going to add one thing relative to um PSPS or it's it's been in the news enough pre that utilities um have this in their tool set to preventive um preventively shut off power. And I think that's that's been in the news enough that people recognize that that there um are risks with that as well. you lose communications, traffic controls, medical devices. There's a number of things that come out of that. What we learned in 2022 was that while people understand that concept and it's very quick and easy to turn the power off, it is much more difficult to restore power. And and in fact, in these situations where when

3:26:33 you're restoring power in a in an environment that could be potentially explosive from a wildfire perspective, it is very much a manual process to go out, inspect the lines, and systematically restore that power. So, you can turn it off instantly, but it can take, and I think it took maybe a day or two um of our crew work to restore the Mckenzie Valley. And people thought, "Oh, we can shut it off and we can turn it back on." So, hey, turn it off for a couple hours. I don't care. It's not that kind of a process. Yeah. And and I think the other thing again talking about the upriver meeting, if we could convey to them the fact that that when it gets when we go into the

3:27:19 summer and we go into the higher higher um precautionary modes on our on our breakers, letting them know that instead of one hours, it's probably going to be four hours if it if it clicks. And I think that that's an opportunity that we should try and share with them at at the at the meeting in May. Um, and and they'll they'll be receptive to it, I I believe. But if we can put it out there, I think it's it's just knowing that it's it takes longer because we're going out and look actually looking at what tripped it rather than just doing it from headquarters. All right, there's a motion on the floor. Any other discussion? All right, all in favor? I All right, that was unanimous. Thank you very much. All right, thank you, Janine.

3:28:04 Um, next up is the general manager's annual performance evaluation and merit compensation discussion for the prior year. I'm just going to open this up just just so the public knows we in executive session we we did do an evaluation of of the general manager last month. Um, we didn't deliberate on anything. We just talked about what we felt was his strengths and weaknesses over the past year. I think it was a very productive conversation. And with that as the basis, we're now in open session going to talk about uh compensation for him if if the board

3:28:50 feels it's appropriate. So, with that, I will open it up to the board. You're the one that's on your way out. Come on. I was just going to jump in and say this is this is always my favorite 10 minutes of the entire year, just so you know. But um just sort of awkward. I am sitting at the dinner table while you're all talking about me. But it just hurt me a bit. So, no, I I uh and like I said, I've done this quite a few times and uh once again, I think you've done an excellent job of of leading this organization and I know working for five bosses and having 500 employees isn't an

3:29:35 easy task and for you to accept the challenges and and to do what I think is a great job. And I'm not an HR person. I'm not a utility person or anything else. I'm in real estate kind of. But um that that's an aside. In all seriousness, Frank, I you are um once again, in my opinion, have excelled and and led this organization to where it is. I mean, I look at the people you have around you and and you've you've surrounded yourself with people that are really smart and really do a good job and uh and that's a tribute to you. And so I'm I'm very grateful you're here. I hope you stay for long, but I probably could predict what the future says. But uh that's that an aside there. I think your regarding your compensation. I know that's not easy to talk about, but you

3:30:21 got your MAPT, you got your your bump that's in your contract. And then the only other thing that be left to us would be is if there's any merit or incentive that's as lump sum or or salary adjustment or anything else. So I'm not going to comment on that until others have had a comment to talk. So time to shut up. Thank you. Okay. other commissioners. Oh, yeah. I mean, I shared similar sentiments. We talked a lot about this when we were in the executive session. Um, you continue to be impressive and what you've been able to accomplish, lead an organization of incredibly capable people and um do it with a grace that is uh not easy to

3:31:07 achieve. Um, I really appreciate how you uh make very complex topics digestible for lay people who don't do this every day and translate between um experts and the general public and us uh to bring it into context and help us focus in on the most important pieces. So, I just very much appreciate uh your capability in that arena and continue to be impressed. So, thank you. Um, I really appreciate your patience that you show all of us non- lay people especially. Um, and I also really

3:31:52 appreciate your level of engagement at this point in your job here. I think it would be easy to to kind of disengage and I don't know, fade away a little bit, but um you're still very invested in what we're doing. And um I know one of your main goals is to see us through this BPA contract. Um and fortunately or unfortunately that's coming pretty soon, but um I just I I really appreciate your your level of engagement and um still your enthusiasm for all the work that you do here. I' I've mentioned this before. It's uh I get a small out because I was not here in 2024, so I don't got much. But um I

3:32:38 uh I wanted to just echo the sentiments of of my colleagues of of uh thank you for making things clear uh for for lay people. I think um not only I but many members of your team and on the leadership team have um helped uh me and other members of our community along as well and and I know that that's um not only challenging but also intentional and I I think that that uh that's that's very clear. Um and I um I echo the uh conversation around BPA and I think um or the the comment on on BPA but I think I want to acknowledge too that I from my observations it doesn't really matter what the topic is is that there's um an intention and um an intensity about it

3:33:24 and there's there's a continued engagement regardless if it's some small policy edit or something very large like BPA. So, um, just want to provide my thanks. Um, great. Uh, for me, thank you. Uh, everybody else kind of, um, hit hit the high points. The one area that I I think that I would like to bring up is the the uh the relationship you've had with with myself and and the past president as far as leadership dealing with the leadership uh end of the board. Uh it's been very productive and very um you know it's been a year and a third that I've been been directly on the

3:34:10 leadership part and that is um you've you've handled that very well. Um, and I appreciate you the way that you you do filter things down, the appropriate things through through the leadership and then down to the rest of the board. Um, sometimes it you don't need to go all the way through and and that's that's great. So, with that, I would just say I I concur with the rest of the board that you've done a good you did a good job in 2024. that was evident at the at the executive session again. So now it just comes down to um I guess a question that I would ask you is if if there were some sort of a compensation, is there a

3:34:57 specific form that you would uh prefer, whether it be deferred compensation or a straightup bonus that would help us in in uh crafting some sort of a a compensation if there is one that is put forward by the board? Yeah. Um, commissioners appreciate the comments. I um generally feel like um my performance is a reflection of the organization. I think that's something that we talked about in executive session. Um it did feel like we got a lot done in 2024. It also felt like it was a it was a tough year to get things done. Um kind of felt like two steps forward, one step back, one step forward, one step back. nothing seemed

3:35:43 to come easy in in 2024. I think that's ultimately a credit to um the persistence and the dedication of the team and of staff of the commissioners uh as well which um I really include as part of the team and I think the organization does the the guidance that you provide. Um but I think you made a couple comments that are are correct. There's I'm surrounded by a lot of really smart people um and have to look at this both from the attributes of the individual trying to give people the opportunities and the freedom to to make decisions and to take actions and a certain degree of independence there. um balancing that with the fact that an organization also needs to be focused

3:36:30 and aligned and some of these other things that really determine organizational success. And I think that's one of the biggest challenge of challenges of this role is there's almost too many opportunities, too many good ones. If there was one good one and a whole bunch of bad ones, that would be easy. Uh but there's a lot of good choices to make. And I think the the team really does come together including commissioners to to help fulfill that. So 2024 was a good year. Um but it was a hard year and and so uh really appreciate you know your guidance and staff's um persistence, dedication, professionalism uh associated with that. As far as um a couple things related to compensation because I always know that's that's a sensitive topic

3:37:15 especially when you discuss it publicly. Um, our general philosophy is that um, the competitiveness of the position is is what we call a structural adjustment. That's actually built into my contract that there's a structural adjustment every year that's designed to keep the position competitive uh, in the market in between the three years that we go out and actually do a market assessment, which we're scheduled to do in in the fall of this year. And so that will be updated my position as well as all the other benchmark positions that we do when you're relatively in uh my position in the competitive range which is a little tough because general managers are there's a lot of different variables

3:38:00 with general manager pay whether it's bonuses uh benefits of you know some have company cars I mean there all there's all kinds of sort of apples and oranges and grapefruits um involved in those comparisons where I'm at in the range would would not typically be a salary adjustment. At this stage, if there if the commissioners felt like there was um um some financial compensation for performance, that would typically be in the form of a bonus. um the deferred compensation. Um in in my situation, there's some there's some tax limitations to that. And so that's probably not very workable, especially um with with the way that deferred compensation is structured um within my

3:38:48 contract and within the organization. So that's that's probably not the best of options. Um but um based on where it's at, salary comp salary adjustment is probably not the mechanism to use. If the commissioners wanted to to do something in the in the sort of bonus for performance kind of arena, um that would probably be the the mechanism that that I would recommend. Um I think when we the last few years the amount of allocated um um I'll say compensation across the organization um about roughly about 2% of our allocated increase was for what was

3:39:33 called merit pay some I think that's about roughly it was 1.96% then it was 2.1 I'll just round it to somewhere around two was maybe a little bit higher than that this year if that provides any kind of a benchmark relative to the rest of the organization. But um other than that, commissioners, there is a a market study going to be done this fall. Um and any any kind of uh merit recognition pay is totally at your discretion at this point. Right. I can make a motion that we give Frank Lawson, the general manager, a $10,000 bonus for the his performance over the last year. Second. Second. Okay. Now, we're open

3:40:20 for discussion hearing none. I Let's end this item. Is there uh all in favor? I I opposed. There we go. Your hardest 10 minutes is done. Thank you. I really do appreciate it and I really do see my performance is just a mirror of yours and the organizations. So, thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. Next thing is future board agendas. That's back to you, Frank. I'm still hanging on to the last agenda item just for a second.

3:41:08 um don't have too many comments on the future or future agendas. We do have um a work session coming up later this month um to discuss the the latest sort of quantitative um assessment of the the Bonavville decision. Um one of the things to note uh we have some other events you know upriver meetings etc. I think you you've been aware of that. Um also, um I believe two commissioners will be absent in June for the June meeting. Um the June I I believe that um Commissioner Barovski and Schlawberg are both gone for the June. Is that is that correct? I'm September. You're September. Maybe just maybe just one then. Okay.

3:41:55 And and we do have I I will well maybe I was speaking of myself selfishly I will miss the June regular meeting but we'll be in attendance for the the June Bonavville discussion and then we have scheduled an update I believe for Commissioner Schllober before any action is taken potentially on the direction of the the BPA contract in July. So that's really just some administrative um items there. Um, other than that, we're really trying to balance a few things for you, commissioners. One is trying to level out the different topics for the meetings. I I think we're really trying to constantly juggle that. The other one is to and I think staff did a really good job of trying to keep the presentations within the the allotted time and try to to stick to the key

3:42:42 messages and and then provide opportunity for discussion. And so, we're pretty close to being on time. Yes. Um I may have a conflict um during the May meeting. Don't know yet, but hopefully we'll know soon. And then also the September 16th um possible work session. Um we have an an event that's planned there. So yes, the other comment just on agendas. Um I am working with the executive team and managers um on really trying to align and assess the um our sort of strategic direction, priorities, alignment with the annual

3:43:28 goals. We may have some adjustments that we're going to propose to commissioners around the annual goals um in May. Um those are uh I'll say tweaks um maybe clarity, some other things um probably not a wholesale change, but just things that we want to make sure that we're aligned with commissioners as well as the organization on. So a little bit of potential adjustment there. I don't believe that's an agenda item that's actually put on the agenda yet. Yeah. Question. So, um when I look at the May 6th meeting, the um agenda, some things will be shortened because we're probably not going to talk about the City of Eugene fire fee. So,

3:44:14 that frees up some time. But, there are a lot of things on this um on this agenda. and like it looks like it's going to be as packed as this meeting and this is a really long meeting and we have a work session scheduled you know in a couple weeks and I'm wondering if there's anything I should the work session a little and move something there um just to it just I will only speak for myself but it gets harder to focus as the night goes on and there's just some important things and I would hate to um not be fully present for them. Just speaking of myself. Yes. Yeah. Thanks for the suggestion, Commissioner. I'll I'll take a look and work with staff. Um staff often tailors

3:45:02 their work around the the the agendas and the communications with commissioners. If it's possible to to accelerate something that's in in relative alignment with the work session, that's that's even more important. Um, but totally understand the the comment about the latent. That's why we had my performance review last, just just so you you know, figured that you'd be easier to to work with in that situation. Um, but um, yeah, we can take a look at that. I think we're, you know, the thing about the agenda is we're constantly trying to adjust and work within your schedules as well as understanding that that pacing is important here as well.

3:45:48 Um, the only thing that I would say about the upcoming agendas is as they as they get closer, you know, in the the month or two that we're looking forward, they really fill up and don't leave opportunities for us to add things if if we feel like. And I'm I'm thinking specifically about the the request that Commissioner Brown had earlier on in the in the evening. Um, I don't know if there was other headnods around here. I would be a head nod as to trying to fit that into an agenda later on in the year. Um, I know that the early ones are pretty full right now, but I guess at this point it's like if we want to get something on the agenda, you almost have to start scheduling it

3:46:33 three or four or five months in advance. And so I'm looking at se August and September are fairly light right now. I don't know if there's other head nods around the table to to try and put that in there, but I just Yeah, it it's a little frustrating for me when when we start looking at these agendas and if there's items that we would want to add to them, we I would feel reluctant to like this tonight. If there was something that I felt, oh, let's adjust, you know, amend the agenda and put something in, I would feel very bad about adding to a fivehour meeting another agenda item there, Commissioner, there's there's two ways um to address the issue. one is is that we do recognize that agendas there

3:47:20 are emerging issues at times and if there was something that came up for this evening um there's things that we would potentially adjust. There's there's some things like a wildfire mitigation plan requiring board approval that would probably not be something that would we would push out something else that might have been a voluntary for information type of agenda item that's more flexible. We also in the board agenda report we do capture things that are not scheduled yet. Um at the very beginning of the report we have a queue of items. Um I would u suggest that as part of this meeting that um Commissioner Brown's earlier request for potential future agenda time gets in

3:48:05 that queue so that as we look out we can also coordinate with staff's other work. So, it gives us a little bit of heads up as to commissioner interests. Um, that's how this has gotten to this point is some of these and and I'll use the state of the watershed report as an example. Commissioners have indicated that's an important report that they'd like to receive as agend as an agenda item. We've now adjusted that to April for next year to align. So it's a it's a continuous improvement um process but we do have ways to get it in the queue and then also recognize that uh even within the the month by month there are things that we can prioritize and I think you you as the president and and

3:48:52 commissioner Schllothburg as vice president have the the straight line to to me and and to an to work on those agendas as as they evolve. So there's there's some flexibility still there. Thank you. I'd just like to say that, you know, how how we get something into the queue is not easy. And let's just say we talk about my ability or my desire to get some more attention to the lower river and and challenges we have there. So we wait and we wait three months, four months to get on the agenda. Gets on the agenda, maybe a 30 minute thing, 15 minute staff time, 15 minute commissioner time. I get 180 seconds. That's all I get for my input. And to me, that's not adequate. And so I

3:49:37 just want to make sure that if you're if we're going to do something like that or or the the ability to have the discussion around the rental pool and, you know, giving them incentive, do the math on how much time we get. It's not much time because if each commissioner gets three minutes and that's 15 minutes, that's half the presentation, we're done. And uh so I just want to make sure that our voices are heard um if and if it if we have a a thing to do that so maybe work towards that. Yeah. Yes. I just think I I also think we have all these tentative work sessions planned and oftentimes we'll cancel them if there's not a topic or sometimes we cancel them but there it seems like

3:50:23 there's enough issues or enough things that we want to talk about that we can utilize those work sessions better and and fill them there's no shortage of topics that we all want to see addressed well I think that as I worked with Commissioner Schosberg as on the and and Frank on the leadership side and if other commissioners have things that they they want to kind of try and get into the agendas, we'll we'll work and try and and figure out the best way to move that forward with with staff resources and making sure that we're not just putting something on the agenda and then there's not the there's not the bodies or the information that we're going to want there at that so that we

3:51:08 can make sure that we get what we need and and staff and Frank gets what he needs. That sound good? I appreciate that. Thank you. Any other comments? Uh we're going to move on to board wrapup. Anything? Yes. I had one um question that I forgot to ask earlier. Um I was curious why the customer cares program didn't spend their whole budget in 2024. just misreading that or what happened there is that that's shocking to me. We'll we'll look into that. Commissioner Carlson, the um we do um shape that budget knowing that

3:51:57 typically the the winter months we we kind of skew it into the winter months. that's that's when it tends to be needed the most and that's kind of where we we see it over the course of the year there there may be some variance to budget um under over so um looking back at 2024 we'll get we'll get some specific feedback for you uh and do we if we are curving it so hypothetically if we know that it's a higher month like we had two months of an extreme cold um spurt that we haven't seen in a while. Um do we have the flexibility to push more of our budget into that or or is it kind of set

3:52:43 is that curve set once it's kind of implemented? we have quite a bit of flexibility to work within the overall annual budget. And and so when we when we also as far as a goal this year looking at the looking holistically at the effectiveness of our um limited income programs, those are the types of things that we want to look at is how much flexibility and and where do we and how do we allocate those funds and so to be more effective. So that is part of that goal is to is to look at that but we do I think feel like there's a there's some flexibility there that we have. So did we adjust it in the last couple months? I don't know the cold adjusted for the cold. So it's the way

3:53:30 we shape it for January February when we have high need. It's not necessarily budget. It's how many applications we can process in that month. So that's where we limit it. we open it up to as many as we can process in that month. So they're definitely waited the January, February, colder months, there's more applications allocated and then it kind of tapers. Okay. So when I guess when we do this look, I'd love to see the comparison of how many applications, how many were rejected, and then how much you know if we had flexibility, did we move some or did we just stick to that curve? Thanks. other commissioners on wrap up. Well, it looks like we'll be back here on April 15th, tax day. So, we get

3:54:18 a double whammy that day. All right. Um, with that meeting ahead of schedule, you did it job. Perfect. Schedule.