Amador County – The Amador Water Agency board of directors voted 4-1 Thursday to look at new funding avenues to fund its Gravity Supply Line project, including forming an assessment district in the Central Amador Water Project service area, or consolidating the agency’s rates.
Those potential changes may require delays in the GSL project, and the board will first seek an approval from Amador County and will also ask the USDA if it can get an extension on its potential $5 million grant for the project.
AWA General Manager Gene Mancebo said Thursday that staff and an ad hoc committee on the Gravity Supply Line discussed new funding alternatives. The committee of Chairman Don Cooper and Director Robert Manassero discussed the ideas with Mancebo and agency counsel Stephen Kronick, and made a presentation of the idea for a “new conceptual revenue plan” for the Agency water systems.
Kronick said the committee had discussed rate structures and options, and asked him about the legal feasibility of different options. One is “consolidating the agency’s rates,” and the other is “creating an assessment type of district in the Central Amador Water Project service area,” with the purpose of creating revenue so that water rates do not pay for the GSL, but instead that it would be financed through the new district. He said the idea was to capture participation charges at an earlier date for new development.
Kronick said they need more time to look at the potential options. Staff felt they needed some direction because it might take a delay of some of the project’s work, including the bidding period, “to fully develop these concepts.” He said the assessment district are formed by a regular election.
The delay would require a letter of extension from the USDA Rural Utility Service, Kronick said, and if they go forward with the exploration, it would not be proper to go forward with construction bidding on the GSL. Mancebo recommended getting a private construction estimate by hiring a licensed contractor, which could be used by the AWA board as a way to see the building cost in today’s market. He said the problem was maintaining a bid over a long period.
Cooper asked if they could also get an estimate for a rebuild of the CAWP pump system. Mancebo said they did not have bid-able plans and documents for that work.
Director Art Toy said he did not like the way this was going, and later voted against the action, in which the board had staff look at the cost to get a construction estimate. Toy preferred going forward with the bidding.
Staff will also approach RUS about an extension, after first getting Amador County’s agreement that a delay would also delay the repayment of the Water Development Fund loan.
Story by Jim Reece
