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HomeMy WebLinkAbout06 0228 min468 The Plainview City Council met on February 28, 2006 at 7:00 p.m. in the City Council Chambers of the Plainview City Hall at 901 Broadway. The agenda for this meeting was posted in City Hall at 3:31 p.m. on February 24, 2006. Mayor John C. Anderson presided. Councilmembers ~present were: Kelvin Tipten-District 1, Mary Jane Shanes- District 2, John N. Bertsch-Distric~4, Ron Trusler-District 5 and Roland Nash-District 7. Councilmember Belinda Pena-District 3 and Councilmember Wendell Dunlap-District 6 were absent. Staff members present were: Greg Ingham-City Manager, John Castro-Director of Community Services, Leslie Pearce-City Attorney, Dale Simpson-Director of Civil Service, Gary Glass-Fire Chief, Will Mull-Police Chief, Dennis Harkins-Police Captain and Belinda Hinojosa-City Secretary. Guests present: Norman Wright and Everett Bishop Councilmember Ron Trusler delivered the invocation. Councilmember John N. Bertsch led in the Pledge of Allegiance. Councilmember Trusler moved to adopt the consent calendar. The motion was duly seconded by Councilmem Der Nash and carried by unanimous vote. Items approved on the consent calendar included approval of the minutes of February 14, 2006 and February 23, 2006; the Council granted an excused absence to Councilmember Wendell Dunlap and Belinda Pena. The Council approved the financial report~. Greg Ingham, City Manager presented for consideration Resolution R06-157, a Resolution by the City of Plainview, Texas, Authorizing Participation in the Amount of Project Construction Costs for the Canadian River Municipal Water Authority and [he Approval of an Amendment to the City's Conjunctive Use Groundwater Supply Agreement with the Canadian River Municipal Water Authority. The Canadian River Municipal Water Authority has actively been pursuing the acquisition of additional groundwater rights for the last couple of years. We originally started acquiring groundwater in the late 1990's. He stated in the last two years we have been actively pursuing additional groundwater rights. We have been doing this because Lake Meredith is showing to not be as quite as reliable as had hoped with the last six years being well below average. The acquisition of groundwater for our communities has become a critical factor in terms of our cities to assure we have the actual water available. This past year 45% of our water came from the Roberts County groundwater acquisition. We feel that will become a higher percentage and more critical par[ of overall operation. Last year our cities spent $50,000,000 on acquiring water rights and putting in infrastructure to increase our water availability. It became apparent that we had authority in the eleven cities to acquire additional water rights in a significant volume in terms of acres available. There has been some competition, there have been some restrictions and there has been some people not wanting to sell and all of a sudden they realized the Authority was paying for the water rights. Our goal became to take advantage of that. At the time there were just a few cities that were certain they were in such as Amarillo, Lubbock and us and expressed interest in going forward. Now as times gets closer the vast majority of the 11 cities are signing on. The deal is structured City Council Minutes February 28; 2006 Page 1 of 4 in such a way that if a city chose not to buy in right now, they will have an option to buy in at any t me during the 20 year debt service of this project; however for them to buy in they will have to come in to make whole any payments they would have owed on their percentage at whatever period of time they buy in. If the City of Plainview chose not to go '~ upfront and wait ten years it would cost our community an additional $1,000,000 just to buy in. The total debt service would be about $2.9 million We feeJ it is better to go in upf?nt R ght now we have about 7.3 million acre feet in terms of available water and with the additional water rights we are buying right now it is going up a little over 15 million aare feet. We've had as high as 63% of our water coming from the Canadian River Municipal Water Authority down to 40% range. This is also dependent upon our allocation. Mr. Ingham stated the basic things we are going to be looking at doing tonight are: 1) 2) 3') Authorizing the Authority to ~ssue $50 million dollars in additional revenue bonds with the Authodty's revenue bonds not to exceed $55 million dollars including financing costs. If we choose not to agree to that ~ssuance we have killed the bond issue and the project~ Any city basically has veto power. The next thing to consider is do we want to participate to the fullest extent possible? Our recommendation is to take the first option that says we will participate at our current level and we will buy-in to whatever extent is possible and available for whatever cities choose not to participate. The next item is how to fund this project: Do we issue debt locally, put in cash contribution or nothing if we are not participating? It appears the majority of the cities are recommending participating through the Canadian River Municipal Water Authority's debt issuance capacity. They have a bond rating that based on the debt capacity of all the cities including Lubbock, Amarillo and Plainview. There are a few scenarios we looked at: 1) If we went our base share of 3.691%, we would see an annual allqcation go up to 4,651 acre feet. That is an increase in our allocation from 4,000 acre [eet to 4,651 acre feet. Our debt service would be $150,000. 2) If we went in with Lubbock, Amarillo, Borger, Plainview and Lamesa our percentage would be 4.143% and our debt service would be $17O,000. 3) If we included Levelland our percentage would be 4.263% and this is our maximum level we are asking Council to go forward with. This would put our debt service right around $184,000. Mr. Ingham stated that from what we are hearng we will probably be closer to the $150,000 r.ange. We are asking that we establish a cap at the 4.263% and then allow us to hol~:l the documents to substitute the final exhibit "A" which is also the CitYCouncil Minutes February 28, 2006 Page 2 of 4 4 6,9 47 0 recommendation from the Authority's legal counsel. Mayor Anderson asked for public comment; Norman Wright of 1209 Vernon and Chairman of the Canadian River Municipal Water Authority stated the City Manager has done an outstanding job in presenting this proposal. He stated he is appointed by this Council and is there to represent the City of Plainvibw, and it has been very exciting to see how this project is proceeding. The Authority is really getting a lot of activity in the sign up of the water rights. Right now there are only two cities that may opt in to buy-in later, Water is our future. Mayor Anderson thanked Mr. Wright for being chairman of the Canadian River Municipal Water Authority on behalf of the Council and the area. Mayor Anderson moved to approve Resolution R06-157 Approving Amendment No. 3 to the Conjunctive Use Groundwater Supply Agreement, authorizing the Canadian River Municipal Water Authority to issue contract Revenue bonds for project construction Costs, exclusive of financing costs not to exceed $50,000,000; that the City of Plainview will participate at a level that maintains its Share of total groundwater supply at the same percentage and will participate in any additional amounts of groundwater that may become available; that the City will fund its portion of the Project construction Costs through the participation in the Authority's Revenue Bonds; and the City Manager is instructed to hold the Amendment and Resolution for sufficient time for all other CRMWA member cities to determine thei r desired level of participation and to substitute Exhibit A to the Amendment to reflect a minor change in the City's level of participation in the Additional Water Rights so long as such change does not cause the City's share of the Additional Water Rights to exceed 4.263%. The motion was duly seconded by Councilmember Shanes and carried by unanimous vote. John Castro, Director of Community Services presented for consideration to authorize the Mayor to sign Texas Department of State Health Services Grant 7560006391 2006 Chg No 3, funding the Plainview Hale County Health Department for the remainder of the fiscal year. He stated this grant is a regional and local state services/local public health services. Another grant the City receives is the immunization grant and the third grant is the bio-terrorism grant. The total for all three grants is approximately $174,000. The major operating costs of the health department are shared with the first two grants and a minor portion comes out of the third grant. We are asking the Council to authorize the Mayor to sign Texas Department of State Health Services Grant 7560006391 2006 Chg No 3. They are giving us an additional allocation of $28 524 which is another portion of the operating costs for the next six months of the year. There was no public comment. Councilmember Bertsch moved to authorize the Mayor to sign the health department grant. The motion was duly seconded by Councilmember Ron Trusler. The motion carded unanimously. Chief William Mull and Capt. Dennis Harkins presented to the 2005 Racial Profiling Report. City Council Minutes February 28, 2006 Page 3 of 4 Mayor Anderson moved to adjourn the meeting. The motion was duly seconded by Councilmember Nashand carried by unanimous vote. There being no further business, Mayor Anderson adjourned the meeting at 7:40 p.m. Belinda Hinojosa City Secretary 471 City Council Minutes February 28, 2006 Page 4 of 4