Published: April 08, 2009 10:24 pm      

Meadow Bridge to keep utility control, for now

MEADOW BRIDGE— The Town of Meadow Bridge will maintain control of its water and sewer systems, according to an agreement submitted to Administrative Law Judge Deborah Yost VanDervort during a public hearing Wednesday.

The agreement — a joint stipulation between the town and staff members for the state Public Service Commission — outlines the steps town officials must take to keep control of both systems.

VanDervort is expected to issue a ruling by June 29.

PSC staff had first intended to ask a Fayette County circuit judge to order that the Meadow Bridge systems be placed under the control of another municipality, PSC staff attorney Wendy Braswell said.

But after town officials obtained a $15,000 emergency grant in July and worked with PSC staff to make improvements to its utilities, Braswell decided not to proceed to Fayette Circuit Court.

The town was represented by Charleston attorney H. Wyatt Hanna III.

Around 60 townspeople showed up in the morning, but many did not return after a one-hour break in the proceedings.

All local speakers, including former Meadow Bridge Mayor Angela Gilkerson and former clerk Hilda Smith, opposed the decision to leave the water system under the control of town officials.

Smith said she quit after 10 years as clerk because she was unable to “work with the current mayor and council.”

“Our opinion is that it would be a serious mistake to permit the current administration to have any probationary period of time to correct current problems,” Gilkerson said. “These problems were, for the most part, avoidable.”

Braswell reported Meadow Bridge came to the attention of PSC staff in February.

“The complaint alleged the town was cutting off water supply on a nightly basis for months to large numbers of customers,” she said. “The PSC determined it was accurate.”

Service to around one-third of the customers was being interrupted because the well had not been cleaned in years and couldn’t fill, even though it was pumping 23 hours a day, Braswell said.

Around 50 percent of the water was being lost, she added.

“So the town’s water utility basically cut off the water so that water would be available for school children in the morning when school started,” she said. “Water was unavailable to the sick and elderly, and a fire would’ve been catastrophic to people where water was unavailable.”

PSC engineer James Weimer testified he discovered massive problems with both the water and sewer utilities.

Many problems were caused by conflicts between the field labor force and town council members, he said. Utilities operators were not employed long enough to gain a knowledge of the system for maintenance, repair and emergencies.

“Continuity of employment is important,” he explained. “It’s something the town had been having an issue with.”

Weimer testified town officials had worked with PSC by making repairs, applying for grants and implementing strategies for maintenance.

He said he was satisfied that the town can now provide water to all customers day and night and that renovations to the sewer system are proceeding in a satisfactory way.

PSC utility analyst supervisor David Hatten testified that financial records for the sewer and water systems were co-mingled, that delinquent accounts were not being collected, that no electronic or paper records were available for the last three months of 2007, that bank deposits were not being made frequently, cash ledgers did not have a beginning balance, no monthly totals for written checks were entered on the ledger, balance sheet accounts of the general ledger had not been updated since June 2006, sewer upgrades were paid from the water account and that some of the physical financial records were kept by an individual at a location away from the office.

According to the agreement, the town must take steps to maintain control of the water and sewer utilities. Among them:

It must immediately return possession of all utility records to utility offices at Town Hall and turn control of its sewer accounts over to the sanitary board. Until a water board or combined utility board is established, all water records must be turned over to the sanitary board.

The sanitary board must prepare a two-year operation budget by July 1. It must show the revenue needed to make both systems fully operational.

The sanitary board and any newly established utility board must present to PSC a quarterly progress that reports on physical operations, financial conditions and operational status of the sewer and water systems.

The utilities must begin collecting on delinquent accounts and offer deferred payment agreements to delinquent customers in a non-discriminatory manner.