well the regular meeting of the water resources committee please come to order today is wednesday august seventeenth two thousand and sixteen and it's approximately seven minutes after nine in the morning as a reminder would everyone please check your cell phones to make sure that they're on the silent mode i would appreciate that so we won't have any disruptions like to introduce the members that are here this morning i'm glad it's bison and i'm the come out hard to monitor good morning and stay secret velo and i good morning aloha and ellie cochran is a member of the committee but she will be a little late she had an emergency meeting she had to take care of but she'll be here as soon as possible from the administration we have our water director dave taylor and also with him this morning is paul meyer the deputy water director bernard manager good morning and we also have we'll be checking in with you lady shortly members we have two important items on our agenda today our first item relates to the recent changes made to the water fund budget about water fixture units and how this may affect people on the up country water meter list and throughout the county and our second item today relates to the upcountry water system expansion capital improvement fund this fund was established during the twenty fifteen budget session we will begin our day this morning by taking public testimony testimony will be limited to the items on our agenda if you wish to testify please sign up at the desk located in the lobby or at one of the district offices listed on the agenda testimony is limited to three minutes in upon request up to one minute to conclude at three minutes the light will turn yellow and for minutes the li blink read if you are still talking at the four minute mark i will kindly ask you if you could conclude when testifying please state your name and who you are representing if you represented anyone else we have established a thank you denise molokai office do you have anyone wishing to testify thank you madam chair we have one person signed up in the chamber to testify and that is rosemary robinson members without objection will proceed with testimony thank you come on down water related issues being examined by multiple committees within our government and certainly loads of people whole in our community i'd like to just set those up for us so that we know where you ban and some of us were able to see that and co and others were able to be here for it on the third of august there were a number of concerned citizens that came to this microphone i just would like to remind us of what they said there is a thirty three year waiting list is firing as the  list gets any longer i've got another nineteen years on my way to list somebody else this is not i speaking again it was asked by a death different person change the law originally dated in one nine we need to have caught up with the reality of the numbers that we have and they quit and the steps that we do and don't have so i thank you for piggybacking on that that was on the third and then on the fifth this month the committee of the hall so again people got a chance to see that the county came and asked us to have yet more money put out for a legal address thousand dollars where we heard that not to exceed time and time and time and time again and that one is now over two million dollars that we're paying for injection while abuse perhaps up on the other side and now we're talking about different areas same problem work not being done on time with the bread the fish and it goes back  s the current for what it really is and to be looking forward down the line if the planet continues to exist we're going to be facing down the line and anything that we are doing insurance having  in terms of having people bear the financial burden for that most of them haven't been born yet we keep getting bonds remember another four letter word football and is debt so the children that don't even born yet coming meeting that's talking about the fact that we have funders who are willing to set up money to do the stuff that needs to be done but when they need to make sure that it needs to be done and thank you for your caution about that let's not give a whole number of the debt and talk about it as being just first increment we've been through all that we can tonight so there we are the just a moment given at this microphone about how we can recruit people who are saying that broader picture because they've been educated to do that to be able to find out what the institutions are that are providing folks coming out with current technology recognition willingness to do the work happy to share we need to bring our kids and let them follow with them  shadow your parent at work day with all of us as parents and the community have an opportunity to do that so i just ask you to make sure that we don't just get stuck in the past it's costing us a fortune and that's only talking about money where is the well being of the community and the guests to our community we're not hearing anything about that something's terribly wrong and we saw some of that result maybe if you could wrap it up please that's it it's all out there so we need to move on while thank you and thank you very much for the recap it kind of brought us all back to where we were a couple weeks ago thank you need to clarify the testimony saying no thank you you're welcome this weather bank any other test madam chair there is no one else in the chamber wishing to testify if there's anyone in the district break offices that has  a chance to turn off the mike here ok thank you very much members i don't one on the agenda today is the department of water supply presentation on water fixture units members you have in front of you the county water fund that was approved by the council earlier this year the fee for new fixtures is on the last page you also have a response i received from the department of water supply relating to the process of notifying those on the priority list of this new opportunity right now there are applicants on the list that just want to add a bathroom but prior to this new provision had reached a fixture count limit and needed to upgrade to a new meter with that being said we're going to ask mr taylor if he would please provide some opening remarks and he's got mr meyer to how big a bypass to be it's in the code about how big that bypass to be to support you know x number of shower head sinks whatever we use the same fixture unit numbers that are in the plumbing code to appropriately sized water meters so your water meter isn't too big or too small and it's sized correctly so there has been ongoing concern raised that we're being sort of too stingy with how many fixture units we allow for a meter people saying well you know i just want another bathroom i'm not going to use any more water why do i need a bigger meter why is it stopping me so in this year's budget we are doing a small experiment we've allowed the council by passing a budget essentially a twenty five percent increase on each five eighth's inch meter for some extra fixture units if you pay for them so it allows people who otherwise would need to either  upsize their meter or people on the upcountry list who were just waiting for a bigger meter for just a small number of fixtures an opportunity to come in pay the appropriate portion of the water system development fee and get a few extra fixture example is designed to handle twenty gallons per minute and not break if you just hook it up to a pipe and let it flow free about thirty gallons per minute will come out and that overflow will turn it too fast and will eventually break it so our concern from the department side of sizing our crackly is we're trying not to allow too much peak usage so it breaks the meters so that's why we have this concern so we're trying to allow analysis about what our rate structure would look like if we got rid of fixed units completely mcconnell lulu counts fixed units but then the department decides what size meter should we give and their whole rate structure isn't built on what size meters just water usage so are going to work on that as a proposal to council saying here's what it would look like if we completely get rid of fixture units this is a middle step to allow us some overload without because we need to such a thorough analysis to go all the way  any more details of how we do it isn't what the processes are the deputy director can brief you on those but that's how we got here that's why we're doing this and that's why some of the constraints are and what to expect in the future from what the  procedures may look like if we completely get rid of fixed units we'll be ready to talk about that probably next year budget mr meyer any comm  explaining this the program has been a success i would judge to date we received the first application only four days after the program was  date we received twenty seven applications for purchase of the units the geographical dispersion is nine came from the center of district and eighteen as you would expect from the up country area that's wonderful do you think that has any effect on that what meter list it was that worried about it's hard to say nobody resigned their meter or their meter this positions as a result of their application for fixed units and i could say that i would expect most people would keep their meter list position as a matter of course just to preserve that option in terms of the twenty  we suspect that most of those twenty pending applications are pending completion of building plans and building permits when people add a bathroom in addition to their home or in ohana or something like that of course it needs regular building permits and you need architectural plans etc so may take a little while to get those done so we suspect that's why there's only five that have actually purchased the fixed units and twenty there so when we did this change in the budget and they did stand out a memo a press release i didn't know if everybody became aware of it and i thought that this would be a very good opportunity to use some time of this meeting to talk about it so the folks missed it and didn't read the paper that now they know about it and hopefully they'll see it and take advantage of it because it will make a difference miscount think thank you madam chair and thank you for bringing that up my my question would be and it was really interesting that you know nobody remove themselves from the list would it be prudent to send a letter to anybody on the list and say if you were just waiting for you know to upgrade some fixture unit here's what you can do and please be if that's all you were waiting for you know some sort of letter to let them know that it's available a and b of gently prod them to remove themselves from the list that is all that they were waiting for i mean that way they can nobody can say we weren't notified because you sent it either in their bill or a separate letter to them  i would just say your key question would it be prudent if the if the priority is to get moving through the meter list then it wouldn't be prudent because every minute that staff is spending processing these fixture units they're not working on the meter the most if the issue is to get people building permits you know by sort of putting the meter just off to the side and having the same people work on these fixture things so that people can get you know building permits for on as and things will then the time we go into that it's really the same people working on both so the question is do we want to advertise this a lot and have everyone come in instead of sixteen you know have  hundred sixty and for the next six months all we're doing is these and the guy who's number two on the list you know we just don't get to him because we're processing everyone who's asking for extra fixtures so i don't know the answer to would it be prudent it would certainly the more we advertise the more it's going to change the demographics of our workload and this might be a question for mr coo she wouldn't be wouldn't that be something that it's a one time temporary surge in work load that we could do professional services to andle just for ninety days or whatever we're allowed to do or temporary some sort of temporary thing to allow the engineer to continue to do his or her work but also clear off that list question they further on we're going to ask the personnel director mr underwood to come down as we discuss item the second item today and he's here to help us and then we can ask him that question then if you don't mind ok thank you very much any further questions about this but wait before i take questions i want to ask you guys if you don't mind explaining what a fixture unit is you know you do out to you folks it's your everyday language but to people in t v land what is a fixture unit and how do you count them that's an interesting question a fixture unit is a measurement device that was developed by  the folks that prepare the uniform plumbing code started i believe in one nine hundred thirty two as a mechanism for gauging the flow requirements for and standardizing the flow requirements for various devices that you attach to the water system whether it's a laboratory toilet or and all the host of whatever each type of device rated by manufacturer has a fixture unit measure associated with it that goes hand in hand with the flow requirements or the back smoke local path city of that particular fixture in terms of gallons per minute that you're probably most familiar with  irrigation had those are rated by how much water they allow to give in a standard measure a pressure like forty pounds of ambient pressure it would allow three gallons per minute or five gallons per minute or one and a half gallons per minute that translates to fixture units it's a measure that allows plumbers and water companies and architects and engineers to measure the size of dave was explaining earlier the meter size the size of pipes the size of valves and other devices in the plumbing system to accommodate the flow requirements of the various fixtures it also takes into account interesting way every three years a revision to accomodate current standards for example when i grew up most three bedroom homes only had one bathroom and needless to say that bathroom was always in use now three bedroom home will have probably two and a half or three bathrooms and that doesn't mean people use the bathroom anymore it means the flow requirements for those fixtures in a modern house are much different than the flow requirements of a house that was built forty years ago fifty years ago so the code is revised every three years to take account of not only the improvements and fixtures in terms of flow capacity and water usage but also people's habits in terms of the way people live i don't know if that's helpful no thank you very much  the president i'm not cut and thank you very much sir and i understand you had a very important meeting thank you thank you for that i think you are going on mr white you had a hand up yes thank you try to recall what my question oh i'm sorry i had that at the same question that mr couch and whether we should notify people on the water meter waiting list but it is a little concerning that if this is a solution in a way you can move  bit kind of hard to hear thank you but i was i thought it was too close know if this is a solution for some of the people that are on the water meter waiting list is it appropriate for us to say this is an either or proposition i would agree with you it doesn't make sense to focus on processing the expense of moving people along on the water meter waiting list is there any way that we can make this an either or proposition gentleman dividing me just by if you just look at the list this would not help anyone who wants a subdivision right ok so th called half the list or more so people who are asking for a meter upgrade so they can do an ohana or an extra bathroom or something if if they just need a couple fixed units it will help them but if they're  if they're maxed out on their five essential meter and they want to you know hannah you know with two bathrooms and washer dryer there's no way that a few fixtures is going to help and they're still going to wait so if you look at the whole list it's probably going to be a pretty small subgrouping people who want to meter upgrade who just need a few fixer units to make it they're the only ones who would get you would really be helped by this so the question is you know how do we target them how do we know because we don't know what anyone what he wants and the your next part of your question was a legal question i think for mr coo she really of could we make it so if they take advantage of this they're bumped from the list and that's a question i i don't know how to answer i'd have to give that to mr c as i recall this legislation that you recently passed it was not to whittle down the list i believe was to write some sort of relief not only to the people of country but i in white to get  new meter upgrade my meter so i don't know where everybody's going with this but it's really focused on this will help those who actually want one or two more features and not have to be to upgrade the meter and that was not the intent of this was so i don't know where this is all going but i think we better focus on what it was intended the public should understand that this is not to upgrade your meter it is just to give you more features if you are at that limit or ready and twenty five percent was a nice round number you recall correctly mr victory no but at the last meeting i don't know were you here no i wasn't and i i read i reviewed the minutes i heard the testimony but it came up that you know we were trying to find ways to cut that list and we're thinking well if anybody is on that list only because they won a few fixtures then maybe it would take them off and we just saw that is incidental but not the reason for doing the fixture when the way the discussion has gone is like this is part of the reason and that's why i'm trying to see if that how some people get off don't want to read english that be great but i would be very odd be very surprised like questions seeing nine members if there is no more discussion on the fixture units again the intent of this was to notify the public that it is a be a liberal and if anybody does know it now they know and we're hoping that you know the people know about it maybe to save them some money and help them get their whatever it is they need done ok well members being that this is concluded and there is no further discussion i will defer th can't we take your question up later could you please take it out take it back and write it down someplace and bring it up again well i was going to ask d p s and i'm fine with asking d p s if the items already deferred but if it's  don't know what the sunshine law says about us going back to well i'm not the expert on the sunshine law let's ask our legal person to the upcountry water system expansion capital improvement reserve fund as i mentioned earlier this fund was established during the twenty fifteen budget session at our last meeting there were a number of suggestions to speed up the process of getting meters to everyone on the country water meter list in a timely manner i schedule this today to see if this fun can be used to assist this effort in any way i confirm with budget staff that there is five million in this fund currently i also couldn't for the two point four million has been set aside for infrastructure improvements i have asked mr underwood  director of personnel services if you would join us down here please if you could be here with us today to discuss the possibility of outsourcing some of the workload during the reserve mean using the reserve fund mr taylor do you have any opening remarks just just in general i think there's really two issues about the reserve fund that the committee had from last time we could we talked about how to use the reserve fund possibly paying people to help us and that was one of the questions that i think you had for mr underwood how would we tied into what we talked about two weeks ago into our workload problems the second was could we use the reserve fund to help pay for distribution line improvements meaning that if there's five people on the same road and we could use these funds to put in that line so they didn't have to the improvements but those people aren't in order number one two three they're scattered through the list is there some way to modify the ordinance to allow us to use this fund to do that and i mine are saying it's really those sort of those two question and that wanted to be discussed today and it was at the last meeting that i suggested we maybe mr underwood and or mr cushy for these two items because it gets into some legal issues that i'm not qualified to respond to mr underwood and would you like to make some remarks here and let's see where this bill if no i'll just be happy to answer any questions that you have ok well mr co well same question is for a situation where was just a an increase a temporary increase in workload a significant temporary increase in workload can we hire somebody to handle that workload and then you know hire an outside service to handle just that workload so that we can continue on with our regular flow by statute all personal services performed by the county are supposed to be done by civil service employees that's what the statute says there's been two major supreme court high supreme court decisions which kind of lay out the framework of when you can contract out versus having civil service employees do it one was the kono decision which was the case on the big island the county of hawaii was opening a new landfill and it contracted with an outside provider to provide those services that was challenged legally and it went to the why state supreme court and the supreme court ruled that you could not outsource work that had been customarily and historically performed by civil service employees earlier this year there was another decision rendered by this state supreme court against the city and county of honolulu regarding refuse collection sit in county of honolulu had been had had a practice of collecting refuse at no charge from a certain number of multifamily units apartments and condos it was specialized equipment that was used front loader trucks and the city council had decided they were no longer going to procure those trucks and get out of that business that was also a challenge in court you know into the state supreme court and the state supreme court said that that also was unlawful privatisation of public work so that's kind of sets the landscape so in general if work has been customarily and historically performed by civil service employees we cannot contracted out sixteen seventeen of them so we have to find is there a specific exemption that would allow us to outsource based on workload i'm not aware of one that allows specifically based on the workload hire consultants to do things that that we maybe could do in house eventually a couple years later so i'm not sure how this couldn't be similar what i think the court has looked at is does that service continue that was the analysis they made in the most recent decision which was even though the city and county basically got out of the business even quit doing it they were no longer performing that service at all because that service continued and was picked up by private contractors they ruled that that was privatization so if there's a case where there truly is a short term demand for a service we're going to build a treatment plant or something like that and that service ends and goes away then i think we're in pretty safe ground contracting out but if it's if it's service it's going to be ongoing such as reviewing meter applications maybe there's a spike in the volume but that service keeps going i think you might be subject to challenge on  so even if we narrowed it down to we only need help to finish the upcountry meter list and then that's it because the list that wouldn't couldn't sl yeah there is an end to it the court has used the nature of services test so if they make sure of services type of work that's being done so as long as it's the same type of work that's being done and that work continues i think that's going to fall within the court's an in here don't you know i'm i really understand this about the two ends yeah we live in the end of the world not from any of my question to you is i understand this president's because of certain court cases that have been ruled on by the supreme court however would it behoove us to at least attempt to make this change and to see if there's any legal ramifications in other words we talk about what you've mentioned about the cornal case and the other but i believe this may fall out of the realm of that case but unless we do it we'll never know whether it can or cannot happen and i guess that's what i'm asking madam sherry's we have a specific challenge right now and the upcountry modern reader list and having a dish will help to expedite whatever can be expedited i mean we reduce it by one hundred two hundred three hundred four hundred metres that's three four hundred people take it meters get going in whatever they've been waiting to get going welcome i'm ok with that and let me talk calmly said many of cases sometimes we've got to challenge the system we've got to challenge the state and or our system to see how effective we can be and sometimes maybe lead in the courts tell us that it can or cannot happen but at this point in time could we if we wanted to do this allow the department to do it and see if there's any ramification obviously you want to check with the unions and whatever else you may want to check with but again temporarily like you said manager for six months whatever you could put a definitive time frame if you want to and that we lessen the opportunity of for ever in this or continuing more on the fact that boom we're to for six months and then it's over we should get caught up and if we're not caught up well that's our fault but this could consult in all of this additional help comes in and gets the job done for us and those constituents and those people have been waiting out of benefactors not us they are the benefactors responder would what would your comments be to that we keep forgetting these these lights ok we have outsourced engineering contacts for various things we have had internal closed door meetings with both of these two gentlemen the mayor managing director other department heads that have discussed where the line is and without mr coo she's expressed concern about what is allowed to be said in open session about how we draw those lines i'm uncomfortable talking about what exactly we do and why because it may cross that line of legal risk sort of thing so i will just have to situation and i know the issues about probert they say sure but this is not a privatisation issue as i understand the situation this department has a lot of because these were engineers filled the workload increases and their life goes on i believe this this may be a ripe situation ripe for a temporary hire outside of any civil service  list for a temporary temporary term not to exceed ninety days these would be at will employees there will not be private contractors they will be hard by the county at will no civil service status talking about waterless review picture unit review maybe it's tool it engineer might be too overqualified what about an engineering aide or a high level  mounted i think this is what we're looking for possible solutions you know we know the problem exists and we know there's reasons why certain things cannot occur but these are possible solutions we need to look into because you know offense to your your department if every time you come in and kind of get the job done because you're five three four or five short engineers that doesn't solve the problem and i think we've got to be here proactive and i like this idea i like i would like to you before you you continue on this is an administrative issue right you guys are let's leave it right so it's really up to them to do what to get with what they can do thank you for drawing the line in the sand and wasn't trying to go to somebody else's job but i direction mr victory no headed off and i have a couple of questions one it's my understanding that the landfill is managed by the waste management by the county  so the question i would have is how how did that come about and we also have in my county parks police and possibly some other departments that are using a rehab services for you know people to clean bathrooms clean parks and so forth and i'm sure that those those responsibilities may have at one point been park responsibilities it's my understanding that the union is ok with this because it serves a group of individuals that i think all of us would want to support i don't know about the waste management situation on the law but it seems to me that it might be appropriate for us to engage the union and you may have already done that mr taylor or mr underwood  and ask for their thoughts on what we may need to do to solve this problem for a whole bunch of citizens in a short time frame i can't help but think that the union would be somewhat accepting of us having to go out and and get people because this is not i understand the workload issue but we're in a situation where we can't get the we can't fill the positions so we're unable to fill the positions  would they be willing to allow us to go and outsource for a while and give us a certain length of time that way if we get it and if we get there concurrence ahead of time then there's not going to you mr white you know this was brought up at our last meeting i thought was really important that we follow up i promised everybody that all the ideas that we got would be followed up on because we're at the point where we all know we've got to do something that we i keep saying we cannot because we just got to do something and so we're looking for possibilities and we're going to track down every one of them and i think that you know what i'm hearing with the advice of mr is probably that we should we could maybe the director could this committee could write a letter to the mare asking him where mr taylor to look into this so that we can see where this can go it like it's not for us to do because it's administrative but we could provide the suggestion in the comments members yes miss carmelo thank you and i appreciate direct administration as to but we have a problem and it's a heavy back load of work that cannot be accomplished with your skeleton crew that that you have i i hope and would you consider this suggestion to engage with our union leaders and employees  to further the discussion as to how we can resolve this with with their partnership and collaboration that's not to take this nobody's job to take  respond to the needs of our our our public so i'd just like to just add that message that perhaps we can engage dialogue in your taylor any comments or missed a crucial if not i'd like to move on to another issue that was brought up another question that is part of this and that was we had a couple ideas that came up last time and one was the idea of sourcing and the second was the idea of how can we make it possible or can we make it possible that people could partner on the list like number two and number fifty in number i have no comments it's out that's a question about what is allowed within the ordinance or change of the ordinance which is more a legal question ok mr coo see your manager i kind of concur with direct director taylor but just one comment if you know position is that partnering for infrastructure purposes and i guess the situation would be a number and my number comes up means of people getting their water meter while i waited for my water meter so this upcountry list was developed back in that league eighty's early ninety's to take care of that not realising that what the profound would be is years later you've got this list now how do you deal with it i mean that wasn't thought about it was just let's get them all out of this and get them off our back and that was what the department of water supply and the board of water supply at that time was thinking the body not to make anybody feel bad so here we come to today we have this list by ordinance it's a list there and any time you start jumping that limits you open yourself up for legal action because if i'm  that's what mr coo she's trying to say so how do we work cohesively i don't know on this we were able to change the system but i think then you could be opening yourself up for more legal action also because if i'm waiting and i'm like ten away or thirty or we'll fifty a week and somebody that's one hundred fifty away jumps to me do you not believe i might take offense and take some legal ramifications to justify my stance i don't know i think so so i now want to try to get to madam chair i don't know if there's an answer to that question because we've been discussing that since i was one of one of water supply which is over fifteen years ago in total and it no one has ever been able to come up with an answer you can give us a definitive answer which way we can go i don't think there is that's the million dollar question right there that's the million dollars and thank you very much for asking it because that is the million dollar question can we mess that the list can we change white i would like to have that discussion because i think it's you know we've changed some of the rules but we were allowed more flexibility for two lots of divisions i would like to know if there are things that we can do to change the rules that would allow certain combinations as we've discussed with people who are on the same street and have different different  places on the list are we able to do what is sensible and combine them and if so how can we do it in order to keep somebody from suing us or you know there are certain risks that we're going to we're taking no matter what we do here and the current policy is simply not working and it's going to take us a lifetime to work through this list and i'm i'm more than more than happy to go into executive session and see if there are ways that make sense for us to move forward and i'm a more sensible and expeditious fashion thank you chair will entertain a motion to go into executive session idea that i we will recess for executive session and take our morning break so let's try to be back in fifteen minutes meeting is now in recess will the meeting please come back to order that we'd like to i'd like to think all of you for the executive session and thank you for the folks who came to assist us with the discussion it was very productive to keep to a specific number so that we understand what is needed i think that's what i'd like to see done i know mr white has a few other suggestions to add to that but somehow we can start prioritizing instead of this mare go first come first serve i think that's what maybe the public's looking for that's maybe what we need to be working towards so that we can finally work on this lease and get it done somehow someway in the and doing things similar to what we did with the two lot subdivision by adding three lots subdivisions by adding the ability to move forward if you have a single house lot as opposed to a large subdivision  having the ability to move forward if you are in a specific part of the system that has already has the infrastructure and the capacity to  provide water i believe mr taylor passed last meeting mentioned elevation has a lot to do with availability or readily available source and and infrastructure i'd i'd like to you know give them some some of the ideas but i'm sure they're going to have other ideas as well that i would like their thoughts on with respect to both workability and like to i think we have the meat of what we are going to talk about we have excellent notes and we always have good minutes to help us in drafting the letter and i'd like to thank all of my committee for working so hard today and i'd like to think the folks who came to be with us and we will definitely be following up this is a very important matter for this committee we want to solve the questions of how do we do with the upcountry meter list and i think we're all devoted to that so without any further discussions today or any questions any comments members before we had during seeing none i'd like to again thank everybody and this meeting is