MINUTES
OF MEETING
PINE
TREE WATER CONTROL DISTRICT
A
meeting of the Board of Supervisors of the Pine Tree Water Control District was
held on Thursday, November 5, 2009 at 6:00 p.m. at the Parkland City Hall, 6600
North University Drive, Parkland, Florida.
Present and constituting a quorum were:
Paul Brewer Vice President
Donna McCann Benckenstein Assistant Secretary
Neil Study Supervisor
Mark Weissman Supervisor
Also present were:
Kenneth Cassel Manager
Warren Craven Engineer
Warren Craven, Jr. Engineer
Randy Frederick Drainage
Supervisor
FIRST ORDER OF
BUSINESS Roll
Call
Mr. Cassel called the meeting to order and called
the roll.
SECOND
ORDER OF BUSINESS Approval
of the Minutes of the August 5, 2009 Meeting
Mr.
Brewer stated each Board member received a copy of the minutes of the August 5,
2009 meeting and requested any corrections, additions or deletions.
There
not being any,
On MOTION by Mr. Weissman seconded by Ms.
Benckenstein with all in favor the minutes of the August 5, 2009 meeting were
approved.
THIRD
ORDER OF BUSINESS Consideration
of Bids for the Purchase of Chemicals for Aquatic Weed Control
Mr. Cassel
stated this is our annual bid for chemicals.
We are recommending we use Helena Chemical and Pro-Source One. I believe these are the same two companies
which were the lowest bidders last year.
Is this correct Mr. Frederick?
Mr.
Frederick responded no. Pro-Source One
was not, but I think they were the year before that. We have dealt with both of them over the
years.
On MOTION by Mr. Weissman seconded by Ms.
Benckenstein with all in favor the bids for aquatic weed control chemicals were
awarded to Helena Chemical and Pro-Source One as recommended by staff.
FOURTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Manager’s Report
Mr. Cassel
stated I have the final documentation for Tract K. It came back from the city. I will send a copy to Mr. Doody for his files
and it is in the District’s records. Tract
K has been officially transferred to the District. The other item I have is we approved the
Interlocal Agreement between CSID and PTWCD for services five or six months
ago. It circulated through everything, it
was finally executed by CSID and is ready to be executed by you tonight. It was already approved by the Board. These are the only two items I have.
Mr.
Craven, Sr. asked in the discussion regarding the acquirement of Tract K, was
there any reference made to the parcel that is so overgrown?
Mr.
Cassel responded they mowed Tract K before we picked it up from them. Mr. Frederick was out there with them. The city did go through and mowed the
area.
Mr.
Frederick stated there was only one issue left and I had someone from the city
out there. A homeowner was complaining
about the canal bank where there is a little jog at the north end. He said he mows it and it is not
maintainable. He wanted something done
about it. There were some trees from
Hurricane Wilma which were taken out and when they took them out they left the
stubs there. He wanted something done about
it. The city was supposed to look into
doing something about it. I have not
seen that they have done anything yet. We
have been going there so this man does not have to do it. It is our property and not his property so I
do not think he has an issue with it. I
might still work with the city on it. It
is not a major issue.
Mr.
Brewer asked is there any reason we should think about letting the residents
know it is not their property, but we appreciate their maintenance there?
Mr.
Frederick responded no. They know it is
not theirs.
Mr.
Weissman stated I think we should make it a point of going out there and doing
maintenance on there regardless.
Mr.
Cassel stated I agree.
Mr.
Frederick stated basically they are mowing the flat areas and my guys are going
up there to weed eat the banks.
Mr.
Weissman stated I think we should make sure we are doing something along the
perimeter of all of our property.
Mr.
Frederick stated I agree.
Mr.
Weissman stated let us not do any assumptions because those homeowners change
and the next homeowner could assume it is theirs.
Mr.
Frederick stated there are certain areas we check every month. This one we took over is going to be our
biggest area.
FIFTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Attorney’s
Report
There not being any, the next item followed.
SIXTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Engineer’s
Report
A. Executive
Summary
Mr.
Craven, Sr. stated we provided in the agenda package a short report of where we
are and what we have done.
Mr.
Craven, Jr. stated this is a list of items we still need to do to complete the
project and this is where we are cost wise through the end of last fiscal
year. The executive summary summarizes
what are findings are so far and it points out the items we put on the “to do”
list. We gave a draft copy of the books
to Mr. Doody about a month and a half ago.
We are waiting for some feedback from him. We would also like to get any input from you
if there is anything in addition to what we have outlined here that you think
needs to be included in the project.
Mr.
Brewer asked what is your estimation to complete the project?
Mr.
Craven, Jr. responded I think we can wrap it up in about three months or maybe
less. When you look at the breakdown our
costs have been under $30,000 so far. A
good portion of it will be eaten up by the survey and we are going to have some
additional surveys for the property easements.
I think it may cost $25,000 total to finish the project and more than half
of that will be for surveys and drafting time.
We definitely need to get Mr. Doody’s opinion on whether he can stand
behind what we provided or if we need to get some kind of title commitment to
back it up.
Mr.
Weissman asked do we expect any problems with any of the easements?
Mr.
Craven, Jr. responded I do not know. Two
of them we are looking for are easements that were already negotiated, but they
were never recorded. I think that is a
follow up matter. The flowage easements
are all across public roadways so it is dealing with your city, Coral Springs
or possibly the county. I do not think
there is an issue there. We have a clean
title to the north/south canal. The
biggest thing is still the Sawgrass Expressway canal. That is the question mark and whether Mr.
Doody can stand behind it. The other
major issue is maintenance and access to the Sawgrass Expressway canal with the
construction of the sound wall and the fact that people are assuming more of
the property is theirs than it really is.
We have some maintenance issues there and we will probably need some help
from the city to be able to go in and maintain.
We all went out in the field about two months ago. Everything else is being maintained pretty
well, but it is difficult to get to that canal to maintain it.
Mr.
Cassel asked how do we stand on ironing out all the issues with accesses?
Mr.
Craven, Sr. responded we need to get Mr. Doody on board with regard to the
agreement we worked on in 2006 and decide what direction we are going to
take. We think the original draft put
too much potential liability on the District for maintaining the culverts
underneath the Sawgrass Expressway. We
need to address this and get this agreement in place before we can really go
further with the acquisition of all those easements and transfer of properties.
Mr.
Craven, Jr. stated the original agreement was started when the Sawgrass
Expressway was still under construction.
It is too broad for what we need right now. I agree with my father that it puts too much
burden on the District. It is their
culvert and all we need is flowage across it; so as part of maintenance of
those culverts, that should be their issue.
Mr.
Brewer asked how many culverts do you have?
Mr.
Craven, Jr. responded seven.
Mr.
Frederick stated I believe there are five.
Mr.
Craven, Sr. stated we just never counted them.
Mr.
Brewer stated I was just curious. It is
somewhere between five and seven.
Mr.
Craven, Jr. stated if you all want to move forward with this and wrap this
thing up, we can give you a not to exceed cost once I talk to the surveyor.
Mr.
Cassel stated this finishes wrapping up all the loose ends to make sure we have
everything as we originally began to make sure we know exactly what the
District owned and make sure we actually had documentation for it.
Mr.
Craven, Jr. stated the only outstanding issue is making sure the attorney is
comfortable with what we have.
Mr.
Craven, Sr. stated we only had one initial meeting with Mr. Doody and he seemed
very pleased with the format.
Mr.
Weissman asked do we need to wait until we have another meeting to authorize
this expenditure?
Mr.
Cassel responded it is a budgeted item out of the engineering fee. Based upon prior discussions that this was an
additional fund put in the engineering fees to take care of this issue, we can
go ahead without having a special authorization. Because it is a budgeted item we can continue
to make it happen and bring the information back to you at the next meeting. I will follow up with Mr. Doody and Mr.
Craven.
Mr.
Brewer asked so by the time we have another meeting we should be able to bring
this thing to closure?
Mr.
Cassel responded we should be able to report back to you that we are squared
away and we are down to the final negotiations with FDOT. This way we are good before we hit the next
hurricane season.
Mr.
Study asked what is happening with the problem with BJ’s? It says there was interference on flow.
Mr.
Craven, Sr. responded when they originally constructed BJ’s there was an open
ditch on the north property line that carried irrigation water for us and the FDOT
outfall. It was ultimately piped. Then they modified the buildings out in front
and they had to provide retention in the back.
They changed the piping where it went into the lake crossed it and went
into our canal. They were going to
abandon the easement that was on the north property line and give us an
easement across the two lakes. That is
where the thing died. They did not
execute the documents providing the easement.
Mr.
Study asked are we pursuing them or is somebody pursuing them?
Mr.
Craven, Sr. responded since you told us to go ahead we wrote them a letter.
Mr.
Craven, Jr. stated on this subject we are working with Cocomar Water Control
District and FDOT. It is more of an
issue for FDOT.
Mr.
Study asked with FDOT and the Sawgrass Expressway, are they maintaining those
culverts at this time?
Mr.
Craven, Sr. responded no. I am really
not concerned about “maintenance” as far as keeping them clean. I am concerned about ultimate collapse at
some time. That would be a cost I do not
think the District could digest.
Mr.
Study asked are we going to pursue this item also?
Mr.
Craven, Sr. responded we are going to talk to Mr. Doody about it. There is no sign of an imminent
collapse.
Mr.
Study stated I would hope not.
SEVENTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Supervisors’
Requests
There not being any, the next item followed.
EIGHTH
ORDER OF BUSINESS Approval
of Financials and Check Registers
There
being no questions or comments,
On MOTION by Mr. Weissman seconded by Mr. Study with
all in favor the financials and check registers were approved.
NINTH ORDER OF
BUSINESS Adjournment
There being no further business,
On MOTION by Mr. Weissman seconded by Ms.
Benckenstein with all in favor the meeting was adjourned.
Kenneth
Cassel Paul
Brewer
Assistant
Secretary Vice
President