HomeMy WebLinkAboutmin light commission 03/12/01
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Present: Chairman Brad Wills, Commissioners:
Donovan, Amos Robinson
John D' Agostino, Town Manager
Jack Beliveau, Light Department Director
Kim Stoyle, Light Department Financial Officer
Ann Langille, Light Department Engineer
RECE\VED
CLEJ:I{S OFF tCE
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David McCarter, Lou~~LI&n
HI~SSACHUSETTS
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Light Commissioners Meeting
March 12, 2001
1. Meeting called to order at 7:30 p.m., followed by the pledge of allegiance to the
flag.
On a special note regarding the power outage in West Mansfield the Director explained
the outage affected approximately 2000 customers and was caused by a failure of a an
underground riser cable which emanates from the sub station and rises up to overhead
lines. The cable, which is over 30 years old, had been stressed in the past due to some
outages. While the crew was there they could see smoke coming from the pipe when it
happened. The outage lasted 50 minutes to an hour and the Director apologized for
evening dinners that were disrupted, but what could have been a major problem was held
to a minimum amount of time.
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Minutes of February 5, 2001.
Motion: To approve the minutes of February 5, 2001.
AmorusolDonovan
Motion passed with Amos Robinson abstaining 4-1
The secretary was not present as her mother is ill. She will do _the minutes from
the tape.
Correspondence
A memo from the Director relative to the purchase of the additional condo at 125
High Street was distributed.
Also, a letter from MMWEC, Irene P. Newman with information on the Mass.
General laws chapter 3, paragraph 5, where there are some changes being
considered regarding the definition of a power plant was discussed. Copies will
be made for all commissioners to review later.
2. Questions and Comments
None
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Light Commissioners Minutes
Page two
March 12,2001
Robot Competition
Has been rescheduled, as there was a conflict in dates so the members could not
attend. The Director praised Ann Langille for her hard work and dedication.
The Director noted he also wanted to compliment Ann Langille for her work at
Gilbert Street Station. She is trekking through the dirt and mud. We have a
wonderful Engineer in Ann and she is very valuable to our company. We are very
proud of her.
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Attorney August Regarding RIW Policy
Attorney Bill August from the Law firm of Epstein and August advised he has
been working with the Town representing them in the Cable TV franchising and
cable television regulatory matters in the negotiation of the renewal of the
franchise eight years ago and also several license transactions. There has been
interest about the interplay between cable and telecommunications. The Director
and the Cable Committee have been asking about the cable regulatory process and
how it can and cannot impact the telecommunications service and the
infrastructure. He noted there is interplay, which is changing the regulatory
landscape. At the same time there are new players such as Metricom,
Metromedia, etc. and they are branching out into new telecommunication
services, which is resulting in the deployment of additional infrastructures in the
town. There are new demands and they want to locate the infrastructure in the
right of way. _
We are on a practical level on the ground and on the poles seeing traffic jams and
streets dug up the decrease in the life of the right of way. Every time it is dug up
it takes off some life from the street. All this is creating new demands for your
municipal ways. It is also resulting a scarcity problem, which never existed
before. Right now Quincy and Weymouth have licensed RCN to provide cable
services and there is no space on the poles. They cannot meet the safety
requirements. They will be lucky Verizone to do the pole attachment to allow
cable service in less than 3 years. So with that type of saturation of the poles and
underground infrastructure we can have a new technology come in four or five
years and the problems will be where can it go. Costs, terms of right of way, use
scarcity are some basic right of way management problems so it is a very hot
topic nationally to be proactive with right of way management. The Director has
asked all the tough questions and many of his questions the answers are still being
innovated by town and cities, but he wanted me to give you some background. I
have some handouts on the parameters in this process. This is from the 1996
Telecommunications Act and this is Section6, 621, which is a basic section. On
b 1 this is the basic requirement per franchise. On the next page are limitations 3a.
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Light Commissioners Meeting
Page three
March 12,2001
Basically there are two boxes cable service and telecommunication service.
Telecommunication is separated out of the cable and is not all that clear cut. A
related statue is franchising. Right of way is right of way management and the
other is fees or money. Section 622 on fees includes language that clarifies the
franchise fee we can get based on gross revenues is for any and all revenues from
the cable system. Up to 5% for use of the right of way is based on cable service
and related revenue so there are limitations here. Although you cannot regulate
telecommunication you can regulate by a system if provided by state law. Under
Section 253A is very important as it ties our hands elimination of barriers and
entry. Under 253C does preserve traditional right of way management. This is
the most litigated section, which provides for a municipal right of way regulation.
You need a comprehensive non-discriminatory basis, as you do not want to do
one vendor at a time. This is a permissive statue not an enabling statue. It says
nothing here will affect your right to manage the right of way.
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Whether you have the right or not depends on state law. The town is a creature
of the state what is permitted here is permitted by state law. You can do that
which is not prempted by state law. You cannot impose taxation unless there is
state enabling legislation. Attorney August handled out policy right of way policy
work adapted for Boston and Cambridge. States that the city will consult with the
grant of location applicants to discuss mitigation and reimbursement of direct
costs and does not put a fixed price tag. This statute says it is permitted but it
depends on legislation. You have to be careful in right of way ~anagement. You
can pursue right of way management policy statement but in light of those cases
you have to craft and leave a record that shows that which you are doing is
designed to be consistent with DTE regulatory fees. The State Law that gives you
authority to regulate the applicants is the Granite Location Statutes. They have to
come before the Board of Selectmen and request a permit.
Chairman Wills asked how long it would take for him to write a policy. August
has a draft policy ready but mostly has to do with underground and would need to
know the needs of the town. He could get started within three weeks and it would
take a few meetings with the Director and local staff to get a reality check because
we have to know who is on the poles. You need more of an aerial approach. One
place to start is with National Electric Safety Code. There is a lot that give you
universally accepted standards such as vertical space between wires, height of
poles, minimum distance to bottom wire all this can affect your clutter. You can
apply that were necessary. There are physical standards on Ariet plans with the
town to removal of unused plants.
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Light Commissioners
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March 12, 2001
The Director hopes to come up with a draft over the next 60 days. Wanted him to
come in to see we are working on this and talk about some of the complexities.
We will move ahead and come back with a policy. We need to avoid
telecommunication coming in and installing lines with no ability to stop them
once they start.
In closing this is a hot issue with municipalities and it is worth looking into.
GIS Fly Over
The Director noted that at the last meeting of the Light Commissioners,
discussion was held regarding the GIS flyover and the Light Department's
participation in the cost as our contribution. Therefore the Director had asked Mr.
Sullivan to speak with the Commissioners regarding the importance of GIS. The
Director noted the bids for the flyover were opened today and they received a
very favorable bid of $10,600.
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Mr. Sullivan advised that basically the interest is timing and the fly over needs to
be done as soon as the snow melts and before the leaves come out. The time to do
the fly over is April to get all the information so you can process it later. It is
important to the Light Department, as well as other town departments. For the
engineer we need to know where our drainage system is as it falls under a new
federal program recently implemented which requires a study of your storm water
system. This study is to improve the quality of water that discharges. Part of that
program is a requirement that you have a map of your drainage program so you
can improve it. We have an area of critical environmental concern in Mansfield
with rivers and acquifors therefore we are lucky to obtain SRF funding for storm
water drainage improvement. We have been given $1.2million funding through
the state at 0%, which amounts to 50 cents on the dollar they are kicking in. This
program requires we start obtaining permits starting March 2003. There is a lot of
work to do before that time and one of the first steps is a map of our system. The
money we are getting from the state will pay 65%. By obtaining this loan we get
to do a good portion of our GIS program which will benefit the whole town. An
article is in the town meeting warrant to accept the funding. If not approved this
year it will go to another town and we will still have to do the drainage permitting
process. We need to do the fly over now which is why the Light Department has
stepped up to the plate with the funding now. The total cost of GIS is $650,000.
The part they would contribute would come out of their overall portion
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Commissioner Robinson felt that all departments involved should pay their fair
share of the bill for the fly over. Mr. Sullivan noted that if the money had already
been approved by town meeting this could be done, but the money has not
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Light Commissioners Meeting
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March 12, 2001
been approved yet. The Light Department has the funds available now which will
go towards their portion. Commissioner Robinson also expressed concerns that
the money could run out before the project was finished. Town Manager
D' Agostino noted it was important to start the first phase which is the fly over as
many departments in town will benefit from the information gathered from this.
The Light Department will benefit from this and the town will still have to
comply with the storm water drainage. Also the town can start with 0% financing
now and look over the net three years for different funding. The flyover picks up
the catch basins, manholes, etc. 40% of the funding for GIS has been secured and
needs to be voted on at town meeting. Over the next few years the GIS will
become standard for towns. The first priority is the drainage and sewer.
The Director felt the flyover would not go to waste one way or another.
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Motion: To approve the funds
$10,600 to do the GIS flyover.
opposed.
4-1 Motion passes.
from the Light Department in the amount of
Donovan/McCarter four in favor Robinson
Storm Summary
The Director spoke on the storm that wasn't. He noted they w_ere well prepared
and responded well to what did occur. Not many lights went out, but there were
many branches down. Our crews were out there removing the limbs, which
prevented outages. We were well prepared to respond to the worst and our crews
were ready.
North Main Street
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The Director noted that we have been trying for over 10 years to have the phone
and cable lines on Main Street placed underground. The Phone Company has
balked at doing this work and there have been many meetings. They have given
us a firm price and are saying give us the purchase order and we will put the wires
underground. 197,000 we can now make this happen and I suggest we go ahead as
this is a window of opportunity. I think all of us share the idea that Main Street
would like nicer with everything underground and it is of no cost to any customer.
We received a previous price starting 1.4 million working down to 67,000. We
issued a purchase order and had to hire legal counsel to get them to proceed. This
price is higher than originally offered we felt we would probably spend more in
legal fees.
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Light Commissioners Meeting
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March 12,2001
Commissioner Donovan asked for the location of the project. The Director
advised East/West Street intersection to Route 106 intersection, but not across.
Town Manager D' Agostino also felt this is the right time for this as DPW crews
try to maintain the downtown area and the less in the way of our plows the more
efficiently we can clean. It will add efficiency to the department and more
importantly the aesthetic value of the area will warrant this kind of expenditure
now and it may take 1-2 years. There should not be any major disruptions as
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Most of the digging will be in the sidewalk area. Commissioner McCarter noted
that we are involved in many projects and wanted to make sure we can we
comfortably do this. The Director noted the Capital Expenditures and Cash Flow
Update is on the agenda tonight and is in the Commissioner's packets. Cash Flow
Update can demonstrate what we can afford to do. The first is a detailed list of
Capital Expenditures from 2000-20004. That list of items includes what we have
presented before and listed is the North Main Street project and the condo project
that we have discussed is listed as well. Just about anything else we can imagine
and we updated the construction bids total Capital Improvement over a five-year
period is 12.6 versus 11. The other sheet essentially is orders of importance and
remaining funds. This sheet tracks. We will not get any lower than the cash on
hand assuming all these projects are completed for 2.3 million dollars on hand.
Commissioner Amoruso asked what does the attorney say about the first price we
got from the tetephone company as he feels we are in lets make_a deal. The first
quote was $198,000. The Director noted he agrees and is frustrated and his
assessment is to take them to court and sue them. We might win five years from
now and spend $50-60 thousand in costs. My opinion is it is not worth it, move
on and get this done. Brief discussion with legal counsel asking what I want to
do. Commissioner Amoruso feels we are being ripped off. The Director is not
going to defend them in their price strategy but it is sort of like a take it or leave
it. If we don't take it they will walk away. We played the game before and we
got it down to $87,000. The problem with the Phone Company is they change
their personnel every 12 months and then you go through it all again.
Commissioner Amoruso noted he had not heard from anyone that this is a
reasonable amount of money to spend for such a little area. The Commissioners
would like a cost analysis on this project. Discussion was held on a time limit to
complete this project.
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Motion: Postpone a decision until the next meeting when The Director will
obtain a time limit and cost analysis.
Donovan/Amoruso, all in favor 5-0 Motion passes.
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Light Commissioners Meeting
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March 12,2001
Financial Report
Kim Stoyle reported to the Commissioners it was not a great month, but it could
have been worse. Sales were up 31 % from last January because we increased
PPCA and consumption increase. Total Power expense 2million 28 thousand
which is up 32% over last year which is because of Seabrook being out. Last year
at this time we had a 46 thousand-dollar profit so it is not a drastic change from
last year but we would have liked a better month. Weare still on track in the
budget.
Commissioner Robinson noted that as price of crude oil goes down will we react
the same way as when it went up? As it goes down we should start decreasing the
same way we went up. The Director noted that is the way we have built it in. We
will adjust down in order to keep our profitability. When we put in the increase
we were slow to pull the trigger and increase the rate and we did not try to recover
the loss from Seabrook.
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The balance sheet was reviewed. We had 9 outages, 3 were squirrels and the
Super Bowl outage. Our major projects, the new billing and bar coding system so
the inventory will be more accurate we will also have a critical inventory report so
we know when to order things. The engineers for the new billing system have
been on site so they can coordinate the conversion. Gilbert Street is moving in
leaps and bounds. We have pictures of the construction in progress. The West
Street Bridge project, I believe will begin in April and be finished by August.
Commissioner Robinson asked if they have heard from DPU about pulling meters
in April? Weare having a meeting this week as we are considering extending the
time.
PPCA
Seabrook is back out again and will go back on line the end of this week. Went
out because of the snowstorm. All three lines tripped out because of icing. In the
process of the shut down some systems did not start up correctly. Millstone went
down and had problems with their turban and Stoneybrook had the same problem.
These two outages do not affect us as badly as Seabrook does.
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Plant Building Replacement
This is something we have talked about in the past. I have provided you with
appraisals for the facility and the asking price is $300,000. It is an opportunity
that will relieve some of the problems we are having today and it offers a solution.
Don't think we would lose on it if we decided to sellS years from now. Ifwe
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Light Commissioners Meeting
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March 12,2001
do not proceed we are committing ourselves to another solution for the space
problems such as building a new building. For those reasons I recommend we
move forward. Commissioners Wills and Donovan looked at it. Looks like it will
meet our needs.
Commissioner Robinson noted that back when they bought the first condo I was
against it as I felt we should get a place with the municipality. Now we are
looking to spend another $300,000 now you are almost at Y2 million dollars. Then
you might want to buy one or two more. Feel we should sell the one we own now
and build a joint venture with water and lights.
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The Director does not disagree with this the problem is the financing. We would
need 2 million dollars to fund such a building. The next five years don't think we
could come up with that money. This is an interim solution. Thus buys us some
immediate relief and value will not be lost on this facilities. Commissioner
Robinson states that at some point we have to bite the bullet. Town Manager on
the municipal side we are looking at consolidation on a municipal piece of land.
As far as light dept they were never part of this planning process. At that time we
were not anticipating any kind of partnership with the light dept. We should
make certain we have a future site to house our complete operation. Right now
we don't have that capability. Amo I am not say don't expand. In order to
expand I would like to go another avenue then get tied up with another condo.
Let's bite and bullet and do what we have to do. The Director does not see them
moving out of High Street. We are now centrally located now. Vje would have to
buy 5 acres of land minimum and find a neighborhood that could tolerate the
trucks. I would rather be in a nice new building but I don't see us being able to
practically afford it. Chairman Wills felt it was a good move to by this condo
now and the other two later because everything would be kept together. Also they
vehicles would have a space indoors. Commissioner Amoruso feels the price is
good and property will increase in value. So they maybe building up for a new
building some day down the road.
Motion: To purchase Unit #133 High Street and negotiate the option to purchase
the other units. Donovan/Amoruso 4-1 Robinson opposed
Construction Status
Ann Langille expecting the shipment of equipment for Gilbert Street. Ann has
worked hard to keep this on track. Finish date is roughly July.
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Contamination
Contaminated land excavating in Our High Street storage yard. This was an
industrial site at one time and this is where the oil came from. Mr. Penney took
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Light Commissioners
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March 12,2001
samples and found the size of the flume. Water accumulates in the middle of the
yard and freezes so we need to pave this area. The enclosed letter was prepared
for residents and will be delivered to all residents in the area to let them know and
be assured we do not feel this resents a hazard to anyone. We are notifying them
out of courtesy to allay any possible fears anyone might have. The ultimate
price to pave is less than $100,000, which could include storm drainage and oil
separator. The whole lot will be paved.
New Business
None
Old Business
None
Next meeting April 9, 2001
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Motion: to adjourn
Donovan! Amoruso 5-0 Motion passes
Respectfully Submitted
Deborah A. Button, Secretary
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Date
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