The meeting will be a hybrid format, both in person at the DWA building and online via Zoom. All shareholders are invited to attend.
Link https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5160276420 Meeting ID 516 027 6420.
Call To Order: 10:03 AM
Welcome everyone present
Present/Quorum: Darton, Susan, Patrick, Sam, Paul, Dave, April, Todd.
Consent Items:
Approve: Contents and order of this Agenda
Approve: Minutes of previous meeting with edits: add dollar amount of 30% fees to previous minutes and change GNO to G&O.
Information Items:
Guest Speakers comments (if any): Tony – grateful for DWA!
Board Member comments (if any):
- Sam – Concerns about online payment fee.
- Dave – Credit Card payment is $2.99 until it reaches total amount reaches $85, and then fee is3% of total bill goes above the $85 amount.
- Susan – REMINDER: People can still write checks and mail in or deliver to DWA office without any additional costs.
- April – Can we ask billing company to process bills twice monthly to avoid payment scheduling issues.
- Susan – Neighbor spoke to me about water safety assessment.
- Dave – People who have old pipes got a copper and lead notice with last month’s billing.
President’s Report:
- Update on King Co. Parks & Recreation’s offer to purchase a conservation easement on DWA’s property on SW 268th St, near Hake Rd SW, adjacent to the recently designated Manzanita Natural Area.
- Offer amount for conservation easement is $590,000
- Offer expiration date extended to June 30, 2025
- Appraisal by CBRE values property at $689,360; value after easement (if granted) is $100,000; offer covers difference
Site size: 24.62 acres (1,072,477 sq. ft.) - Conservation easement would transfer all residential development rights to King Co., who will sell to a developer for new residences in a different location. Therefore, no future development would be permitted on the property, if the offer is accepted as is.
- Representative from King Co. Parks & Recreation will attend the next Board meeting in person on Jan. 25, 2025 to answer questions from the Board and Shareholders.
- Survey for Shareholders will open next week to ask for initial comments, input and questions. As appropriate, these comments and questions will be shared with King Co. in advance of the meeting on Jan. 25.
- Possible timeline of next steps:
- Survey to Shareholders available 12/13/2024 to 1/20/2025
- King Co. (KC) representative attend DWA Board meeting on 1/25/2025
- Second-round survey to Shareholders available 1/31/2025 to 2/17/2025
- Board to determine how to proceed at meeting on 2/22/2025, including whether to ask Shareholders for a formal vote to sell the conservation easement, to propose a different arrangement, to further investigate, or to reject the offer outright.
- Tony – What piece of property? Separate from Todd Larsen’s?
- April – Yes, separate from Tod Larsen’s old property.
- Tony – Could KC sell to developer?
- April – KC cannot sell property, but KC could give permission to build someplace else in the county.
- Tony – No building on that property?
- Darton – No, with the exception of DWA putting in a well.
- Tony – Suggest clarification on survey info about KC conservation easement proposal. Reference to a visual for shareholders to access. There’s been confusion in the community about that area of land. Visuals would and more information would be helpful to inform community members.
- Dave – add map to back of letter.
- Todd – This is a sensitive issue with our shareholders. We do not need the money. This property was a gift to DWA. This property is an asset and it is appreciating. We are in a good bargaining position because we are not financially stressed. I think the offer is low. We should get our own private appraiser to appraise the property. We should get a water expert out there to see if there is water at this location and if we need 24 acres in order to have a well? We don’t need that much acreage. We may end up with liability and maintenance of 24 acres when we only need one acre to access a well.
- Dave – I agree 100% (regarding liability). Noxious weed issue is an issue on that property and it’s a huge maintenance issue. Tree work, slide issues, noxious weeds – some serious issues there.
- Todd – KC is playing a property tax money making game. We care about 5 wells that KC is irrationally blocking us from using.
- April – It’s not KC that’s telling us no, it’s the DOH.
- Todd – What we do care about is these 5 wells and KC is our best leverage to open up access to those wells. Franchise fee – Can we get perpetuity of franchise fee? This is a moment for us to think about what we want from KC. If they think we’re asking for too much and making things messy and they decide to walk away, then they walk away.
- Todd – This property is a safe, appreciating asset and I’m really protective of this asset. Whatever we get net from this sale, we could build a trust for the property. Could create an endowment for this property. Would love to have members benefit from income and use toward fee payment or could be used as an emergency fund. We could have a set of rules around it that help preserve the principal and keep capital gain available.
- April – What would the return on $590K be vs. $1M – if the principle isn’t large enough, then the return is not worth it. Todd, can we get some example numbers on these endowment ideas? Are we getting enough return on endowment to pay franchise fees? Selling or subdividing could net us more money. The property that was purchased from Todd Larsen was priced higher per square foot compared to the offer KC gave us on this offer.
- April – Darton, can we ask your dad to do appraisal for DWA?
- Darton – I will ask him.
Manager/Operator Report:
- Dave – The tree that broke the water main last March was taken down and the bill was $1800
- Dave – Billing – we have 29 people who went paperless, $6000 being paid online through online payment services. It’s been a challenge, and we’ve received many calls. Many questions about fees. A lot of extra work for Angie. Payments are not going through as promised and the date of payment received is later than expected.
- Susan – Could put FAQ on website re: online payments for all shareholders.
- Dave – Could add that to the website. These could just be start-up hiccups and would wait at least a year to see how things unfold.
- Susan & April – Angie can ask if funds can go through twice a month or weekly to help with accounting issues.
- Dave – Water coming out of PRV on 99th – PRV needs to be rebuilt. A PRV at springs also needs to be rebuilt. Will be rebuilt next Wednesday and will be $3K to rebuild.
- Dave – One of the springs pumps needs to be replaced. Already have new pump and have a guy coming out to pull old pump and replace with new pump. He will take old pumps and rebuild them, which will save money going forward. The cost around $6K for parts and labor.
- Dave – Lead and copper letter – Lead and Copper survey – 38 houses identified – If you have a galvanized water line from meter to house, I don’t know what the water line and connections were in the past. May have had lead fittings that contaminate galvanized pipe. Need to dig up water line right after meter and then find out what it is coming into the house to see what’s going on. Water lines are less than 2ft in the ground. The notice has lots of information and is designed for you to call me so I can describe this to you. I have contractors that people can call to do the digging work. I explain to them why they got the water, what they should do, and give them options for water testing if they would like. I tell people to let me know when they find out what they have so that I can update my own survey. I take those updates and supply them to the DOH. Every Class A water system in the entire US must do this survey.
- Dave – Met with G&O this week. First part of meeting, met with Frank Z and Carrie (G&O) on Hake Road and talked about replacing water line out there. We need to have a survey done on that road and see if we run into anyone’s property and need to get easements. I need to contact DOH re: Hake waterline replacement project. The projected timeline is 6 years (because of monetary restrictions) and will be done in phases of 500ft per year. I need to talk to KC about needing to cut into the road and go under the road.
- Dave – Possible filtration plant at Springs – I didn’t get a whole lot of clarity form G&O. It would be nothing like what we did at Sandy Shores. We’re still going to be a CT6 water disinfection down at the Springs and will need to figure out how that effects contact basin construction.
- Paul – this is not a cost-prohibitive construction.
- Dave – We would get rid of roof, put floor system, and build filtration system keeping footprint the same as it currently is.
- Paul – met with Duncan about where KC was coming down on those wells. Ducan things we should go after adverse possession. He would like to reach out to KC and are willing to pursue it this way and have a DWA board member meet with KC to advocate for the wells and filtration system and get to a mutual agreement and avoid the court path.
- Susan – I think strategically that is the way to go.
- Patrick – No comment and will abstain from the vote.
- General agreement of board (without Patrick) to move forward with talking with Duncan.
Water Production Committee:
- None.
CIP Planning Committee:
- None.
Finance Committee:
- Costs higher, water sales lower, revenue is fine.
- Office costs good, insurance costs increased.
- Running a bit behind on budget, but not worried about it. Will check in during January meeting.
- Over budget about $10K over the past few months.
Community Outreach Committee:
- None
Old Business / Carryover Items:
- Susan –
- DWA building use – I did a sketch of building and Darton is doing a CAD drawing. I went through files to see history. It was a school and was acquired by Dockton Community Club and then that sort of became the Dockton Water Association. I found interesting records and photos; the building is more radically changed than I thought.
- Community member, Sue, and I thought it would be interesting to do a Show & Tell about the DWA building history. Sue and I will work on a slide show presentation.
- I looked at the insurance policy for building and it is insured for office and storage and asked the agency what that means. We can’t have things that are not associated with DWA in the building space. All events need to be related to DWA. One option available is that a community group could buy a spot insurance policy.
New Business / Discussion Items:
- None
Other Business:
- None
Follow-up for Next Meeting
- Darton: None.
- Dave: Have Angie check in about increasing payment updates to weekly or twice per month. Talk to DOH, KC, etc.
- Patrick: Work with April on survey letter.
- Paul: Talk with Duncan about pursuing adverse possession.
- Sam: Make changes to minutes of previous meeting.
- Susan: None.
- Todd: None.
- April: Write survey letter and send to Dave.
Meeting End: 11:51AM
Next Board Meeting: Saturday, January 25th, 2025 @10AM
Board meetings are usually held on the fourth Saturday of the month at 10:00 AM.