MINUTES OF
MEETING
CORAL SPRINGS
IMPROVEMENT
DISTRICT
The regular meeting of the Board of
Supervisors of the Coral Springs Improvement District was held on Monday, February
28, 2005 at 4:05 p.m. at the District Office, 10300 NW 11th Manor,
Coral Springs, Florida.
Present and
constituting a quorum were:
Bob Fennell President
Bill Eissler Vice
President
Glen Hanks Secretary
Also present
were:
Gary L. Moyer Manager
Dennis Lyles Attorney
John McKune Engineer
Dan Daly Utility
Billing
George Keller Severn
Trent Services
Ed Goscicki Severn
Trent Services
Jean Rugg Severn
Trent Services
Scott Jones Severn
Trent Services
Joni Hayworth District
Staff
FIRST
ORDER OF BUSINESS Roll
Call
Mr. Fennell called the meeting to
order and Mr. Moyer called the roll.
SECOND ORDER OF
BUSINESS Approval of
the Minutes of the January 24, 2004 Meeting
Mr. Fennell stated that each
Board member received a copy of the minutes of the January 24, 2004 meeting and
requested any additions, corrections or deletions.
Mr. Eissler stated these minutes are
not verbatim.
Mr. Hanks asked do you have any
corrections?
Mr. Eissler responded you will have
to go through the minutes; they are minor, and it may be insignificant.
Mr. Hanks stated we need a comfort
level and the essence of what we said is accurate.
On MOTION by Mr. Hanks seconded by Mr.
Eissler with all in favor the minutes of the January 24, 2005 meeting were
approved.
THIRD ORDER OF
BUSINESS Co
A. CH2M-Hill W.A. #25 Design Proposal for Wastewater
Plant Improvements Phase 2 (Sludge Processing, Effluent Pump Station No. 1 and
Electrical Distribution)
Mr. McKune stated this is for the
design process for the solid process handling system to conform to federal and
state regulations, upgrade pump station #1, upgrade the electrical system on
the wastewater plant side which is 15 to 20 years old. This is for the plans and specifications as
outlined in the work authorization.
Mr. Fennell stated you estimate the
work to be $250,000. First you are going
to prepare the plans and then go out for bid.
Mr. Moyer asked what is the
estimated construction cost of the project?
Mr. McKune responded $6 million, and
is money that is on hand.
Mr. Fennell asked is there any
discussion from management about what we are doing and where we are going?
Mr. Goscicki responded STS has been
working with the engineer on your capital improvement program, the phasing of
the projects and the cost of the projects.
We agree these two projects are critical to the facilities. As we move forward, we will come with a
fiscal plan to correspond with the capital plan and bring that back to the
Board over the next several months [i.e., here is the program as recommended by
the engineer, the options to phase the program given your resources, the risk
in doing so, and the impact financially].
We are working cooperatively with the engineer.
Mr. Fennell stated we have
engineering services by several different groups [CH2M-Hill and STS]. I do not have a problem with different
recommendations. It is not necessary
they all be resolved. I prefer diversity
of opinion and we are capable of making these decisions. In some cases the Board has hired a different
firm to review what we are doing to make sure we do not have a monochromatic
viewpoint of things.
Mr. Eissler stated the $238,000 is
your estimate for the scope of services and for things that will be charged
accordingly. I have a problem with an
open-ended agreement. I don’t know how
many hours this will take.
Mr. Hanks asked who sees the hourly
back-up supporting documents?
Mr. McKune responded STS reviews the
invoices.
Mr. Goscicki stated the 5% they have
is a reasonable estimate for design costs.
Mr. Hanks asked can we request this
be a not-to-exceed amount?
Mr. Lyles responded yes. If you want to provide this as a
not-to-exceed, you are within your powers as Board members to do that.
Mr. Fennell asked is the $238,000
proportional to the $6 million?
Mr. Goscicki responded the $238,000
will be spent to design the documents for the $6 million project.
Mr. Hanks asked how long will it
take to complete the project?
Mr. McKune responded approximately
120 working days from the award date except for delays.
Mr. Eissler stated I would like to
approve the work authorization amended to not to exceed $238,000.
Mr. Hanks asked who owns the
documents after completion?
Mr. McKune responded CSID.
On MOTION by Mr. Eissler seconded by Mr.
Hanks with all in favor CH2M-Hill Work Authorization 25 in an amount not to exceed
$238,000 was approved.
B. CH2M-Hill W.A. #26 Design Proposal for
New Lower Zone Monitoring Wells (Effluent Disposal System)
Mr. McKune stated we have one 24”
injection well that is 3,000’ deep, and a requirement is to have a separate
monitoring well to monitor any migration of injection fluids if that were to
occur. After construction was completed,
we had to dig a deeper hole to get it below the salt water and it was a
retrofit to the existing well. It has
lasted about 9 years and during the monitoring sequence we discovered there was
a fracture and we have negotiated with DEP for 6 months to come up with a
method of monitoring the well. This is
the cheapest method. It requires
grounding and abandoning of the deep zone monitoring well, and install a new
free standing well. We need to go
through permitting with the state and federal governments.
Mr. Fennell asked how much is it
going to cost us for that monitoring well?
Mr. McKune responded $350,000 to
$600,000 for the well through a competitive bid. Unfortunately there are only a few companies
who do this type of work.
Mr. Fennell asked how many wells do
we have?
Mr. McKune responded two. [12” and
24”] Both wells were monitored during
the mechanical intergrity testing process when it was discovered.
Mr. Hanks asked what percentage is
the design phase?
Mr. McKune responded 10% design
drawings/ 80% bidding/ 10% permitting.
Mr. Fennell asked can you put in one
monitoring well to monitor two wells?
Mr. McKune responded the way they
are spaced, no.
Mr. Eissler asked how much do we put
down a well?
Mr. McKune responded 5 million
gallons a day.
Mr. Fennell stated it bothers me if
we lose that well. There may be a need
for another well. Can we position it
where it may save us some money in the future?
Is that possible?
Mr. McKune responded you will need
multiple zones, and we can project it to a site where we may put another well
in.
Mr. Moyer asked are you running the
risk if you use one well that has some incursion that they will shut both the
wells down? I would not want to have a
common well.
Mr. Fennell responded it is a bet
that we will put it in the right spot to save us money later on.
Mr. Hanks asked how much is this
injection well?
Mr. McKune responded $4.5 million.
Mr. Hanks asked does that include
monitoring?
Mr. McKune responded as of 18 months
ago it included monitoring.
Mr. Hanks stated if you have one
well and there is a violation, is there any way to determine which well has the
problem, or do you have to shut them both down?
Mr. McKune responded you can test
each well and use one as 100% backup.
Mr. Goscicki stated with monitoring
wells and deep injection wells, is it a well failure or a formation
failure? If the formation is lost, they
will shut down all the wells. You do not
want to build another deep injection well.
Mr. Fennell asked what is the
lifetime of the wells?
Mr. McKune responded 50 years.
Mr. Hanks asked do the design
documents become the property of CSID?
Mr. McKune responded yes.
On MOTION by Mr. Eissler seconded by Mr.
Hanks with all in favor CH2M-Hill Work Authorization 25 in an amount not to
exceed $65,000 was approved.
SEVENTH ORDER
OF BUSINESS Approval of
Invoices
Mr. Fennell asked if we don’t
approve these, are they paid?
Mr. Moyer responded you are
ratifying the invoices. The checks are
already processed.
Mr. Lyles stated these checks are
cut and sent to various services, such as electric, phone, etc. The practice over the years has been to
ratify the invoices. If there are any
questions, staff can present clarification and in some cases get a refund.
On MOTION by Mr. Eissler seconded by Mr.
Hanks with all in favor the February Invoices were approved.
FIFTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Staff
Reports
A.
Attorney – Lake
Maintenance Agreement with Lake Coral Springs Association
Mr. Lyles stated on the transition
issues is the requested breakdown on historical costs and Mr. Moyer has
informed me to take that up with Mr. Keller and we will get that information to
Lake Coral Springs in order to bring back an agreement to be approved by them
and obtain your signature.
B.
Engineer
1. Monthly Water & Sewer Charts
The monthly
charts are made part of the public record and attached hereto.
2. Update on Construction Analysis and
Capital Improvement Plan for Next Five Years
This item was deferred until next
meeting.
C.
Superintendent
There being no report, the next item
followed.
D. Complaints
There not being any, the next item
followed.
FOURTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Discussion of
Severn Trent Management
Mr. Fennell stated the District has
gone through a lot of changes since I have been on the Board. It has gone from a paternalistic arm of the
developer, and one of the things we do is buy services. Since my tenure on the Board we have changed
our lawyer, our engineering firms, the management firm and the Board members
every three years. CH2M-Hill was bought
out even though they picked up the same people, and the same thing happened
with the management firm. We have
changed a lot and are continuing to change.
There was a grand old structure long before this with the people who
originally started the group. From now
on, as a business, our management services may change at our consent or be
changed, and that can happen with any of the types of services we do. We need to come up with a more structured way
of evaluating the services we go after in an organized way. All the changes were not initiated by us,
they sort of happened.
We have a sizable number of people
who report directly to the Board, CSID employees. Going forward, we need to look at how we
project that. It is important for us to
have long service and there are issues of whom in effect they really work
for. Do they work for us, STS, the
engineering firm? Who do they work for and
what are the procedures to handle any kind of problems? I did see a personnel manual a while back
because there was an issue of terminating an employee. We do have some other general problems, and
one of the things we have to understand is that we will probably end up
changing services again and we should be reviewing them on a normal basis every
few years rather than having continuing contracts that get automatically
renewed to make a conscious decision.
As we know, there has been turnover
in personnel in the management group, various issues of hurt feelings, and I
propose that at this point no employee be terminated from CSID or transferred
without direct approval of the Board. I
want to make sure there are no problems with anyone coming forward and speaking
their mind about what is going on.
Mr. Hanks asked who has the hiring
and firing authority for District personnel?
Mr. Fennell responded theoretically,
I, as president, and you, as vice president, probably do. We have a management service and our current
manual uses the term “at will.”
Mr. Lyles responded the agreement
you have with Gary L. Moyer, P.A., that was assigned to STS with the Board’s
approval, provides that the management company is responsible for appointment,
supervision, and removal of all District personnel. While the ultimate authority rests with the
Board as the legally constituted Board elected for that purpose, you have
contractually given that responsibility to your District manager. While you can make a change in that, it will
require a revision to the management contract in place.
Mr. Fennell stated that is one of my
proposals. The second, it is convenient
from a management standpoint to have employees “at will”, it is poor management
and personnel policy. We need an open
door policy where people can bring forward their issues, either up through
management or if necessary up to the Board.
Even thought we have employee “at will” issues, we need to define the
offenses within the organization such as theft.
Most organizations have Class I, II or III offenses that are written
out. Mr. Jan Zilmer needs to come to the
Board and make proposals for handling those things.
Mr. Eissler stated I believe this is
in the personnel manual.
Mr. Moyer stated we have a comprehensive
personnel manual that Mr. Zilmer put together and under those requirements of
the contract STS has followed those requirements. We seldom, if ever, are at conflict with our
employees. It is fine what you are
suggesting, but I take some exception to the discussion of changing this
employment “at will” issue because there is a legal ramification.
Mr. Fennell stated we will leave
that there, and we will talk about normal procedures for talking to
people. Given the conditions we are in,
I don’t want someone who is talking to the Board about problems feel that they
will be fired for doing that. Is that
understood?
Mr. Goscicki responded yes, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Fennell stated we are a big
enough organization where we can discuss where things are going. There are certain offenses that are an
obvious result in termination and unpaid suspensions. We need to be clear on what those are. In an organization like we have, it is
important people can freely come forward with their concerns and issues, even
if it is about another group within it.
Mr. Eissler asked do CSID employees
report directly to the Board or the management company?
Mr. Moyer responded traditionally in
this type of a management structure, the Board sits as the policy makers and
management in whatever form it takes, be it contractor or you hire your own
manager who is charged with the duties of implementing those policies you
set. Mr. Fennell suggests because of the
changes I do not disagree with for a period of time to give access to our
employees, but truly the manager should have ultimate control over the
productivity and personnel policies of the employees that STS or the manager
will be managing. We are in a period of
time where there is some discomfort. I
recognize your concerns. I am hopeful
that is not an issue in the long run.
Mr. Eissler stated there are a
number of things such as the benefit package.
CSID has their benefit package and STS has their benefit package. We are hiring a management company to manage
this on a daily basis, which we are not going to do. We either have faith in our management
company, as Mr. Moyer is saying, that we are paying to run the whole operation,
but we have a dilemma that we have gone through a lot of resignations which
always indicates a problem. Some of us
have investigated the problem to get one side of the story. How do we do this?
Mr. Hanks responded by the simple
statement the Board is open to other opinions.
Mr. Moyer stated I look back at
where we have been and we have been blessed with having a group of people who
have worked together their entire career.
There are people in this organization, Mr. Daly, Mr. Zilmer and others,
who have been together for a long time; and some of us have chosen different
career paths. The reality is at some
point will you be faced with the situation regardless of whether it is STS,
another management company or another manager and employees who have been here
do not like the management style of the new manager. That is the reality of where we sit
today. We need to recognize those
concerns of the employees, work with it, and if you are the court of last
resort that is fine for a period of time; but ultimately that power needs to be
left under the contract of whomever you hire as the manager.
Mr. Fennell stated I have to
disagree. We can have other managers
come in. It worked for you because you
are a powerful individual, with good leadership skills. The fact is Mr. Moyer left; we had another
manager, then another, and now another.
I need to have our employees know that if necessary that is a last court
of resort all the time no matter who is in charge; and that is not unusual for
any kind of group of management anywhere today.
It is unusual for a management group, by themselves, be the last court
of resort.
Mr. Moyer stated the power was
there, but we always tried to work with employees. Sometimes we did fire people.
Mr. Fennell stated that can still
happen. We probably need to be more
formal and is why I want to get our personnel manager involved. We need formal reviews of people. We need a way to tell people what kind of job
they are doing, how to improve, put people on notice when they are not, and a
way to say they don’t agree and go up to the next level. I don’t want a situation where the manager
uses his power not for the good of the corporation, but for his own standings
or his own viewpoints. That is the
problem with absolute power. You need a
court of resort.
Mr. Eissler stated we are entering
into a $17 million expansion program.
Stability is key, certainly with personnel and engineering. Our engineer is a STS employee [Mr.
Mr. Goscicki stated one of the
benefits you have is hiring CH2M-Hill as your engineer. One of the benefits of hiring a company is to
bring those resources to the table. If
you have one engineer on staff, and that one engineer decided to leave, you
lose the entire institutional memory.
When you invest in a company, whether it be engineering, legal or
management, you have the institutional framework within the company to
continue. STS is a good example. We had a turnover in managers, but we keep
the organization moving forward and meeting our obligations. There are plusses and minuses to both
scenarios.
Mr. Eissler stated from a personnel
standpoint on the plant site, we do not have the talent in house so we hired a
consultant which worked out very well.
For the second plant site, it was a nightmare. There are plusses and minuses to both. We probably cannot afford our own engineer,
that is why we draw from STS. This is
something we should think about before decisions are made. We are spending the citizens of Coral Springs
money and I want to spend it well.
Stability is prime. You cannot
have employees nervous about losing their jobs.
There are a lot of things to think about and I don’t believe we need to
decide these issues today. I want to put
them on the table. Mr. Moyer makes a
good point. You may not want to do some
of these things. They sound good on the
surface and if you think about the long range it may not be the best thing to
do. I want to come up with some kind of
plan.
Mr. Hanks stated institutional
memory is good if it is in tack. To
compliment your record, there should be a full set of records at the
District. If STS or CH2M-Hill decides to
leave, we need to make sure we have enough records for the incoming services.
Mr. Moyer stated all of the records
are yours. They are all public records.
Mr. Eissler stated we do our own
billing, but we don’t own the software for the billing.
Mr. Moyer stated you have the
license for the software, and so does North Springs Improvement District.
Mr. Fennell stated we do not own the
machine.
Mr. Eissler asked who signs the
checks? We lost a few people who used to
sign the checks.
Mr. Goscicki responded Ms. Karen
Ellis is our accounting manager and resides down the street.
Mr. Eissler asked who is the second
signatory?
Mr. Moyer responded the checks are
signed by a check-writing machine with two signatures. The use of the machine and the protocol
has been reviewed by the District’s auditors and they do that every year to
make sure there are sufficient controls on that. I don’t want to you think I am signing 4,000
checks.
Mr. Hanks asked is this getting into
a detail we don’t need to be concerned with?
We are looking at invoices and verifying the invoices. If there is something fraudulent---
Mr. Moyer stated that is the
exposure STS has. They bear the
risk.
Mr. Eissler stated we have auditors
that do this every year.
Mr. Moyer stated yes sir.
Mr. Fennell stated as Mr. Hanks
mentioned, I hope we have all the prints somewhere from an engineering
standpoint.
Mr. Lyles stated it should not be
just documents produced by CH2M-Hill, or STS.
It should be documents we approve.
Mr.
Goscicki stated we maintain a complete set of records for you and those are your
records.
Mr. Fennell asked where are those
kept?
Ms. Rugg responded they are across
the street, and at offices down the street.
Mr. Moyer stated they are also
stored in an off-site warehouse because we have 30 years of records.
Mr. Hanks asked as a Board do we
want to get into hiring and firing decisions, or do we want to focus on the big
picture and the direction for the Improvement District?
Mr. Fennell responded it has to be
both. I have had customers at these
meetings complaining about various different problems. We are the court of last resort for our
customers. If we get involved with every
hiring and firing decision, I know where the problems are. We have a management system that cannot deal
with consensus and leadership. I don’t
expect to see very many, but I want the employees to know if they have an issue
they can come to us. We delegate our
tasks, but in reality I have to sign the agreements. We have a responsibility that when services
come and go we have enough of the core system in our group that we can take a
change over in management, engineering, accounting or legal. We also need to do a formal evaluation every
two years of each group. In some cases,
we should be opening it up to bids to confirm to ourselves we have the right
people here. STS may be the best group
for us, and there is nothing wrong with them having some competition. We may have a new District manager where we
did not have a choice or a selection of candidates, or maybe we want to do
something else. We need to think along
those lines.
Mr. Eissler asked don’t we have to
agree on the manager?
Mr. Lyles responded that is in your
contract. They cannot submit someone to
do the primary duties as District Manager without your approval.
Mr. Eissler stated right now, we are
absent a District Manager.
Mr. Fennell stated we have given
temporary approval for one, but we want to think over these issues and we have
taken this opportunity to have a review of what STS offers us, what the costs
are and benefits. I did ask for this
information six months ago and I did find some information. We need to understand how much money we are
paying them, what are the prices, what are the costs, what are the services we
are buying, who are the people, and what are the savings. Without further ado,
Mr. Goscicki stated let me start by
saying STS has no plans or designs to start firing any employees of ours, the
districts, or shared employees. I know
you received some information, and we have seen the information; unfortunately,
some of the information is erroneous but there is no value in us going through
point by point on those types of things; there is no value to us to fire
employees. Our goal, as manager, is to
look at how we can provide services efficiently, effectively, and your needs
are met through District employees, our employees and shared employees. As I go through the presentation the
allocation of resources has been scrambled over the last 8 to 9 years, and this
is the opportunity to tell you who works for who and how the structure is set
up.
I will talk about STS, the resources
we have locally and nationally, the issues you asked us to discuss and how to
move forward together.
CSID’s primary role is as a water
utility and drainage service provider.
You are operating a water and wastewater system, a drainage system for
over 9,500 utility customers, 85 miles of canals, 65 employees of which 44 are
CSID, 12 are shared employees, lift stations, pipes, force mains,
hydrants. You have a lot of
infrastructure because you are a utility and drainage district.
We
talked to some of the Board about STS's core value and we hold this in high
regard, and I bring this out due to concerns of staff and the Boards. “We value high performance, hard work,
honesty and teamwork. We hold ourselves
accountable to the highest standards of ethics, trust and quality. We respect and always strive to do what is
right for our customers, our employees, suppliers and community.” We take this very seriously.
STS is the company you are
contracted with and it is a US company based in Texas, with our headquarters in
Fort Washington, Pennsylvania outside of Philadelphia. We have 5,000 employees nationwide. We are owned by Severn Trent PLC, which is a
British company, which owns Biffa, Severn Trent Water, Severn Trent Labs,
Severn Trent Systems for IT and utility billing. Severn Trent PLC has stayed close to our
knitting. We manufacture water and
wastewater equipment, filtration equipment and metering equipment. Contract operations manage water and
wastewater facilities around the world and we have 600 facilities. We have a pipeline services company for
utility pipelines, and management services which is the company you are
contracted with. I oversee contract
operations and management services in Florida.
We also have a technical services group for environmental health
specialist, personnel specialist, planning and process control, transition,
etc. Mr. Scott Jones, who is with us
today, is part of the technical services group and worked with Mr. Moore on
process efficiencies here. Our largest
operations are in Florida, Texas and the Northeast.
On management issues you asked us to
discuss, we have two contracts with CSID; one is from 1996 for management
services and fiscal management services.
In 1996 management was a $135,000 contract and fiscal services was
$86,000 for a total of $212,000. The
scope of services include general consultation, coordination, policy
implementation, manage and attend meetings, budget preparation and analysis,
negotiation of contracts and administration of contracts, consultation on
operations and maintenance, staff supervision and records management on the
management services side. On the fiscal
side, accounting, budgeting, risk management and insurance, special assessment
rolls maintenance and methodology, utility billing [was part of our contract
initially] and human resources management.
The STS personnel actively involved
in this District is Mr. Gary L. Moyer, Mr. George Keller of 1 year with STS
however has 27 years experience, myself for 3 years, Mr.
The District is managed through contract
services with STS employees, CSID employees and employees shared with other
districts. You have an attorney, Mr.
Lyles, and your engineer, CH2M-Hill.
Your shared employees are not just CSID employees. They get a paycheck from CSID, North Springs
Improvement District [NSID], some from Turtle Run, Pinetree, Sunshine and
STS. This is one of the challenges this
District and we, as your manager, are facing.
These employees cross over multiple lines. These employees include field technicians,
maintenance, field supervisors, utility billing, and human resources for a
total of 12. On the CSID team of the 56
employees 44 are sole employees, 12 are shared and from the contract employees
[STS, your attorney, CH2M-Hill] 18 to 20 individuals are actively involved. From 1996 to today some of these
responsibilities have shifted between STS and CSID. We have taken on some responsibilities and
lost others which evolved over time. In
1996 we handled everything except operations.
As we move forward, accounting is a shared responsibility; utility
billing was a shared responsibility and Mr. Daly moved in 1998 from STS to
CSID/NSID/other employee; human resources, Mr. Zilmer, moved from STS to
CSID/NSID/other employee. Records
management is still STS, the physical operations is CSID and we provide
operational consulting advice; budget fiscal management is STS
responsibility.
Mr. Fennell asked who is the
Director of Operations?
Mr. Goscicki responded Mr.
Mr. Eissler asked is it also true
that the $221,000 does not include Mr. Moore?
We get billed directly for Mr. Moore’s salary.
Mr. Goscicki responded that includes
his salary.
Mr. Fennell stated we have two
positions that are key, District Manager and Operations Manager, and
accounting.
Mr. Hanks stated Mr. Moore is also
involved in NSID and Sunshine.
Mr. Fennell stated there is roughly
$221,000 in management fees; how much is accounting?
Mr. Goscicki responded that is the
sum total for all management. Our fee
has remained flat. The increase in cost
and services has been picked up by the District by taking these employees on
and moving forward that way. We need to
look at reconciling the services being provided to the District by shared
employees and by STS. I am not sure the
fees reflect the services you are expecting from us, what we are doing, and if
the fee is appropriate.
Mr. Fennell stated we asked what
percentage of time people worked for us.
It was 10% for the District Manager.
That can be an issue if we are paying half of his salary. Obviously, that varies from time to
time.
Mr. Goscicki stated it does and that
is why I listed the individuals you do not see that are spending time and
effort on District projects on a regular basis.
This is the behind the scenes work you hire a management company to do
for you.
Mr. Fennell stated we can cooperate
with other districts around us, but we cannot become the super district.
Mr. Lyles stated you can enter into
Interlocal Agreements to jointly exercise power and discharge responsibilities
with other government entities such as other improvement districts. As part and parcel of that there could be a
donor relationship to a smaller district that does not have the ability to meet
you half way to borrow or purchase some of your services.
Mr. Fennell stated I am not sure
from a legal standpoint how much we can take on. Mr. Zilmer is working as the personnel
manager here, but also for NSID and could be for someone else in the middle of
the state. I do not know if I have
exceeded by mandate from the state. I
did exceed where I want his loyalties to lie, which is CSID as opposed to other
areas.
Mr. Lyles stated as I look at your
newly adopted special act [2004-469] it uses another word besides Interlocal
Agreement or contract, it also says to cooperate with. As long as you stay within the four corners
of the duties you have to own and operate drainage systems and water
management, you can cooperate with or contract with other government agencies
to jointly discharge some of those responsibilities.
Mr. Hanks stated NSID provides
water, we can work something out with NSID to share operators to cut back
expenses and overtime, etc.
Mr. Moyer stated the mode of
operation for the initial three districts in Coral Springs was to recognize
where we can provide those types of efficiencies, and gauge the amount of time
available to the employee to serve each of the entities without overburdening
the employee.
Mr. Hanks stated balancing that with
the broad range of experience for the particular job at hand.
Mr. Goscicki stated as Mr. Fennell
pointed out, these employees are shared among a number of districts and who is
looking out for which district. These
employees are multiple District employees and I am sure is some of the
confusion that is out there.
Mr. Hanks stated STS contract reads
that you are responsible for the hiring, firing and supervising of these
employees. We write the checks and you
tell them what to do.
Mr. Fennell stated we could also be
in competition with you because CSID can contract to manage other groups if we
wanted to. We have other people doing
jobs for other districts. The path of
the money is a little mysterious.
Mr. Goscicki stated they are doing
it on your behalf. They are not working
as CSID employees on behalf of NSID.
They are working as NSID employees.
They get three paychecks.
Mr. Eissler asked how do I get a job
like that?
Mr. Goscicki responded now you see
our apprehension is trying to bring some understanding to the issue to make
sure we have an understanding of the roles and responsibilities.
Mr. Fennell stated I want them to be
loyal to CSID.
Mr. Moyer stated as it relates to
the field operations, generally if you ask any of the employees who they work
for, they will tell you they get three paychecks, but they work for the
districts in Coral Springs. If there is
a problem in CSID, we will pull who we need to from NSID or Sunshine to solve
the problem, and vice-versa. They are
interchangeable and we have been able to leverage a lot of expertise without
hiring redundant staff in three districts.
Mr. Hanks stated it is a pot of
employees and STS is operating as management.
Mr. Goscicki stated STS as
management, was the facilitator of that to make sure the allocations were
there. Mr. Moyer moved to Orlando a
number of years ago, Ms. Archer moved to Tennessee two years ago, and we had a
couple of other employees leave recently.
You are seeing new faces and getting nervous. The common denominator that linked them
together is the management company and they are seeing these changes. We understand that and appreciate the
anxiety. We think it is a valid goal for
the Board and STS to go through this process to get clarification to make this
work affectively where everyone understands the level of service they are
getting and what our roll is in making that happen for you. The shared employees are Ms. Susan Walker,
accounting; Mr. Dan Daly, utility billing and 1 shared and the meter readers;
Mr. Jan Zilmer, human resources.
Mr. Fennell stated I understand the
viewpoint we had before and even more how we got here. What kind of agreements do we have with
NSID? Do we have any? Are we just cooperating? Is anything written down?
Mr. Lyles responded there are no
specific agreements with NSID.
Mr. Fennell stated this is more
confusing than I knew we were getting into.
Mr. Lyles stated the reason you do
not have any agreements with NSID is because you have your employees and some
of them are only working part of their time for CSID and they get paid on a
prorate basis by CSID for what they do, and NSID pays them for what they do for
NSID. If they were your full time
employees and you leased them on an intermittent basis to NSID there would be a
necessity for an agreement between the two districts. That is not the breakdown or situation you
currently have.
Mr. Fennell asked does Mr. Zilmer
get three paychecks?
Mr. Goscicki responded at least two.
Mr. Fennell asked who does he think
he works for and how do you fund such things as retirement and benefits? Does his paycheck vary from week to week?
Mr. Goscicki responded he is on
salary.
Mr. Daly stated if an employee is
making $70,000, has been here for 20 years and works for one District that is
$70,000; if he works for two it is $35,000 for each District.
Mr. Fennell asked where does he know
where is job is each week?
Mr. Daly responded it depends on how
muddy the water is.
Mr. Goscicki stated that shows you
the challenge on the management side.
Mr. Eissler stated salary and
benefits are all allocated between the districts.
Mr. Moyer stated the budget will
give you those figures.
Mr. Eissler stated if you look at
the budget, you say, “This doesn’t make sense.”
I am sure STS would like to change all that.
Mr. Goscicki stated we want to make
sure the Board understands and the employees understand and we understand the
expectations. NSID can change their
retirement plan, benefit plan, etc.
Right now they are the same, same personnel policies, benefit package,
etc. You can change; they can
change. Are these full time employees,
or two sets of part time employees? Do
they get full time benefits or part time benefits from both districts? There are human resource management issues
that need to be put to rest and resolved.
Mr. Fennell stated it can get more
complicated if they are working for STS, the districts or jumping back and
forth.
Mr. Goscicki stated STS is not
giving the shared employees a paycheck, but we pay the District $20,000 for a
little of Mr. Daly’s time and Mr. Zilmer’s time.
Mr. Fennell stated STS also pays us
rent for use in this building. We are
also in a service business to ourselves and other groups. This is a question we need to think
about. How much do we want to be in the
service business for other groups?
Mr. Lyles stated you are not in the
management service business. There are a
pool of employees here and you are getting part of their services and paying
for part of their total employment costs and other districts are paying their
part on a pro-rate service incurred basis, but you are not paying anyone to
work in some other district. That is my
understanding of how the accounting has been, how the employees are set up and
whom they are working for. You are not
in the management business.
Mr. Fennell stated this comes down
to what business are we in and the issue of the need to share what employees.
Mr. Eissler stated you cannot afford
to have all full time employees in this operation. It will be too expensive. This is where the management service comes in
and what it does for us.
Mr. Goscicki stated we need to come
back with some structured options as to how to clarify this. These are all good options. What you are doing now, there is nothing
wrong with it. We need to tidy it up and
make sure we all have the same understanding.
We also can present to you other options.
Mr. Eissler stated I think we have
25 miles of canals, not 85 miles. Can
you check that? I would be curious.
Mr. Fennell stated we pay roughly
$240,000 a year and you will re-evaluate how you bill us. Engineering bills us on an hourly basis. I don’t know how I am getting billed here.
Mr. Goscicki stated it is a lump sum
basis 1/12th each month. I am
proposing to look at the $240,000. We
need to come to an understanding of the shared employees, how they work, and
what our role is? I have concerns as
your manager where you have a full time accountant and we still have fiscal
management responsibilities. I would
like to clarify that because I don’t want to be responsible for what your
accountant does unless I can devote enough of our management time to oversee
and manage that employee. If that is not
the desire of the District we can reduce our fee and provide general oversight
and budget preparations.
Mr. Fennell asked who is deciding
who shares an employee? It has mostly
been management services.
Mr. Moyer responded that is
correct. The evolution of shared
employees has reduced over the years. At
one time CSID had 2,000 people and NSID had 500 people, that type of talent
build you could not afford. CSID has
some charged employees, but is it half of what it used to be. As each District grew we were able to add
those individuals. Those shared
employees are skilled positions than operating positions.
Mr. Hanks asked are we trying to
identify the key services and key positions?
Are we looking to identify areas of cost savings? Are we looking at all of the above?
Mr. Fennell responded we are
reviewing the services for a couple of different reasons. How policies affect our employees? Also understand the old guard is gone.
Mr. Eissler stated when Mr. Moyer
was here, I was comfortable and what he said was fine with me. Now we are going through a change. Mr. Moyer is not with us full time. Some employees are upset. Are we doing the right things? Can we do something else? Prior to this, I don’t think it would have
ever come up.
Mr. Fennell stated we just
grandfathered everything in.
Mr. Moyer stated I request the
Board, as you go through this analysis, to keep it in the perspective of
reality, and identify the options [is it STS or another manager]. A lot of the issues you will wrestle with are
the same. I frankly think STS because of
the extensive utility background is a nice fit for a utility operation. They may not be the greatest from a District
management perspective, but they do have that expertise. They brought on Mr. Keller who has a more
impressive background than I have. You
need to give Mr. Keller the opportunity to tell you what his credentials are
and marry those credentials, his governmental service credentials, with STS
utility operating credentials. I think
it is a pretty good team, but that doesn’t mean you cannot look at other
options. All those options come through
the front door with the same type of problems or opportunities. That is where you are at where I see it.
Mr. Fennell stated we had a
management change, and we have to re-evaluate it periodically. We want to look at what we get from STS. How much are they costing us? Where are those funds? Is there someone else better? Will we be better off doing it ourselves? Should we hire our own District Manager? Hire our own operations manager? Should we have an agreement with NSID sharing
certain positions and we will pay half the salaries? We need to formally have that to move
forward. We need to have viability. We need to have another management group come
in. You brought up a good idea about the
finances. We need to know what those
services are going to be. In the
corporate sector we did our own finances, but every six months someone came in
from headquarters and did an internal audit, and there was an external audit
beyond that. We need to structure those
things. We need to decide how we want to
move forward. There are other issues,
such as engineering records being on hand.
As a Board, our job is to hire and review management.
Mr. Eissler stated STS might be the
best company we can have. We need to go
through the exercise to be sure.
Mr. Goscicki stated we suggested
holding a workshop with the Board. One
of the things you are grappling with is, “Who do I have to manage the District,
and qualify and quantify what that management means.” As your current management company we can
facilitate the definition of what the management of the District entails, what
you want to do internally, what through consultants, what through contract
management, internal staff, shared staff.
That is an important first step so you are comfortable with moving
forward. Once the map is drawn and you
want to test the waters, we are happy to compete with anyone. We think we are the best.
Mr. Fennell stated you may well
be. I would like to see us have an open
contest every two to three years. There
is also a strong case to hire two employees with NSID and we are done. If we are getting these other kinds of
resources that a large company brings, we need to see that a little bit
more.
Mr. Goscicki stated that is part of
the conversation we want to have with you.
As Mr. Moyer mentioned, one of the strengths we bring is utility
management and operating expertise. Our
contract was written in 1996 with Gary Moyer, PA and there is one line about
oversight of operations. We would like
to talk about how we can help on the oversight of the utility side of the
operation, and formally bring these services to light. There is nothing in our contract that says we
have this technical service support group and we will bring them in to do
evaluations. We do it because we have
that level of expertise. Those are the
things through a workshop we would like to bring forth. What are you looking for in a manager? If you are looking for a management firm to
bring utility expertise to the table that is an important differentia.
Mr. Fennell stated we need the
workshop to decide what we want to do.
We need to reconfigure where we are going with management services and
how we review all our contract services.
We also have an employee issue and we need more feed back from
them. We need to understand their concerns. Mr. Eissler has been doing that. What have you found out?
Mr. Eissler responded there are
concerns. Anytime you go through a
transition people have to know whom they work for. It is very hard to serve two masters. They get nervous. In the middle of your career the thought of
not having employment is scary, whether it is real or imagined it doesn’t
matter. I am concerned about that. I am concerned about people and without
people you have zip. Before we do any
changes in our contracts, we should have a workshop, as you suggested, and go
over these issues. I believe it will
iron itself out and things will be fine.
We need a better understanding of who does what, how we want to move
forward and what STS would like to do.
Maybe there is more you can do for us.
Maybe the price is right.
Mr. Fennell stated at the workshop I
would like to have some of our basic CSID employees.
Mr. Goscicki stated the senior
decision makers of CSID, Mr. Zilmer, Mr. Daly, etc. It is appropriate and in a workshop format
you want to bring all these ideas to the table.
Mr. Fennell stated they should be a
part of the concept of how we want to move forward or if we stay the same. In the end, those are the people I am
counting on to turn the pump on at the right time, and they need the feeling
they are working for a good organization.
Mr. Daly stated it is a good
idea. In the past we knew whom we were
working for and the integrity of people.
With the changes, there is no foundation for integrity, trust, etc. Between Mr. Moyer and Ms. Archer we knew
where we stood and what was expected and how to get there.
Mr. Fennell stated you are working
for an organization where management could change. We need to look into that and probably have
more of an institutional structure as opposed to charismatic.
Mr. Goscicki stated we would like to
bring in a facilitator who does this professionally. We can poll the Board individually to see
what dates work.
Mr. Fennell stated I have spring
break the middle of March. Who is going
to set this up?
Mr. Goscicki responded we will. I’ll have Mr. Keller get with each of you to
come up with a date that works for everyone.
I’ll get with the facilitator and we will get it scheduled as soon as
possible.
Mr. Fennell stated this will be a
good four hours or longer.
Mr. Eissler stated I would like to
have counsel present.
Mr. Lyles stated my pleasure.
Mr. Hanks asked will you be able to
get back to us by the end of the week with a date?
Mr. Goscicki responded sure.
SIXTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Supervisor’s
Requests and Audience Comments
There not being any, the next item
followed.
EIGHTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Adjournment
There being no
further business,
On MOTION by Mr. Eissler seconded by Mr.
Hanks with all in favor the meeting was adjourned at 6:03 p.m.
Glen Hanks Robert
Fennell
Secretary Chairman