Department of Water Resources
A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment
May 6, 2009
5. Agencies, Programs, People –
'Emergency' at dam today is just a training drill
Flood agency shelves plan giving raises to employees
County,
Nevada Irrigation District 2008 Final Audit
Are NID Rates Really High Enough?
Yubanet
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'Emergency' at dam today is just a training drill
By Matt Weiser
An emergency drill will be held today to train for the unlikely possibility that Oroville Dam could fail.
The drill will be led by the state Department of Water Resources from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., in coordination with local authorities in several neighboring counties.
The drill is expected to go largely unnoticed by the public as it will primarily test communications. But there will be three state vehicles stationed at Oroville Dam, and a California Highway Patrol aircraft will make several passes near the dam between 9:40 and 10 a.m.
Such a drill has not been held at Oroville Dam in five years.
http://www.sacbee.com/ourregion/story/1837258.html
Flood agency shelves plan giving raises to employees
By Charles Piller
The Sacramento Area Flood Control Agency has postponed indefinitely a board decision on pay raises for its professional employees and changes in staff structure.
Stein Buer, SAFCA's executive director, had proposed changes last month that would have boosted employee salaries, sharply in some cases. The agency's board previously had approved raising Buer's salary to $210,000 – $56,746 above his current $153,254, a 36 percent increase.
Following a Bee report that detailed the plan, SAFCA's board, primarily members of the Sacramento City Council and Sacramento County Board of Supervisors, asked Buer to modify the proposal. They cited dire financial circumstances facing local governments.
The SAFCA board directed Buer to bring a fresh plan to its Thursday meeting, but he has decided to hold off for an undetermined period.
Developing alternatives to the initial plan will take time, said Barbara Gualco, a spokeswoman for SAFCA, which oversees dam and levee projects using local, state and federal funding.#
http://www.sacbee.com/ourregion/story/1833936.html
County,
By ROGER H. AYLWORTH - Staff Writer
OROVILLE -- Whether Chicoans can be spared from having to buy flood insurance for land that has never seen a flood, may depend on discussions between city and county officials.
Tuesday, the city of
PAL refers to "provisionally accredited levee," and it ties into FEMA's current effort to map all potential flood plains in the nation.
By the end of this month FEMA is supposed to have preliminary flood maps for
In areas protected by levees, such as the levees along the Sycamore and Mud creek drainages north and east of
People with property in these newly anointed flood plains may well have to buy costly flood insurance. Significant restrictions are imposed on what sort of development can take place in these areas.
An option between acceptance of the levee and ignoring the structure is the PAL agreement.
In essence, the government agency that signs a PAL agreement is saying it believes the levee is safe. FEMA then grants a grace period to provide the proof the levee meets the necessary standard.
Tuesday, Mike Crump, county director of public works, said his staff and city staff have met several times on this issue, but he said there are questions that need to be cleared up before he could advise the supervisors what action to take.
Crump said while the maps are scheduled to come out at the end of May, a FEMA representative told him if the county joined with the city to sign a PAL by the June 9 supervisors meeting, the agency would grant the grace period that would keep the Chico area officially out of the flood plain until December 2010.
By then the levee studies could be completed.
The board voted to appoint Chico Supervisors Jane Dolan and Maureen Kirk to an ad hoc committee to meet with city and county staff, and to prepare a recommendation on the proposal by the June meeting.
Kirk said she would be willing to endorse signing a PAL agreement if concerns about liability can be worked out.
Dolan said the levee was built by the Army Corps of Engineers and she could not understand why the corps and FEMA, which are both federal agencies, couldn't consult with each other about the construction of the levee and just agree that it is sound. #
http://www.chicoer.com/news/ci_12305793?source=rss
Nevada Irrigation District 2008 Final Audit
Are NID Rates Really High Enough?
Yubanet – 5/4/09
GRASS VALLEY,
He did observe, however, that NID relies heavily on property tax revenues to keep the district financially afloat - and that it may not be charging its customers enough in rates. "Currently, there is $25 million committed to projects underway," Pon reminded the board. "The district will need to plan more carefully for future projects so it won't spend all its unrestricted reserve funds," Pon warned.
NID's reserves hover around $84 million. Of that figure, roughly $58 million falls under the category of "Unrestricted Net Assets." The category title is misleading, because nearly all of these assets are reserve funds for specifically designated or restricted uses, such as dam failure, maintenance, and hydro relicensing. Individual reserve funds for treated water and raw water system expansion represented over half of the district's unrestricted assets at roughly $34 million as of January 1, 2009.
But with current rates covering less than 45 percent of what it costs the district to service its raw water customers - and roughly 58 percent of the cost of service to treated water customers - the district will need to dig deep into its reserves this year to remain operating. Add to this lower-than-expected tax revenues due to a sagging real estate market and NID's reserves could face serious shortfalls in the near future. According to NID's Finance Manager Marie Owens, the district will likely need to start borrowing money by 2010 or 2011 to fund ongoing and future projects.
More on the Subject of Reserves
To understand how NID balances its budget, one needs to visit, for instance, the newly-renamed "Operating, Repair/Replacement and Rate Stabilization Reserve" fund. This reserve, according to NID, "may be used along with rate increases to fund anticipated deficits in the operations and maintenance portion of the water division." Finance Manager Owens says that roughly $1,925,000 out of approximately $11 million in property tax revenues will be put into this account to also fund major non-recurring repairs and replacement of existing facilities. "These funds can be used for raw water or treated water projects," Owens says. "It's whoever comes first, but these are usually small projects."
But perhaps most importantly, this fund provides rate stability to the district's customers through subsidies. NID serves 18,500 treated water connections. However, a majority of the water supplied by the district goes to its 6000 raw water users. Even more significant, a mere 129 irrigation customers receive 40 percent of the district's total raw water deliveries. This is according to Division V Director Nick Wilcox.
And most of these customers are in
Yet the majority of property tax revenues - which go to subsidize rates - come from
This bothers Division I Director Nancy Weber who has asked repeatedly for exact numbers on where property tax dollars go among NID's various reserve funds. "I want to know how we are subsidizing raw water," Weber told YubaNet. "I want to know what percentage of property taxes goes to raw water users and what percentage goes to treated."
Board Vacancy for Division IV
While the district has known for several months that Director R. Paul Williams would be retiring in April, formal announcement of the vacancy appeared April 23 on NID's website: http://www.nid.dst.ca.us/documents/general/notice-of-vacancy.pdf
With nearly two years remaining in the current term, NID board members will likely appoint a replacement. The term officially ends in December 2010.
Interested parties are encouraged to submit letters of interest and resumes to Lisa Francis Tassone at NID's offices in
The next regularly scheduled NID board meeting will be held May 13 at 9 a.m. at the
http://yubanet.com/regional/Nevada-Irrigation-District-2008-Final-Audit.php
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