Amador County – The Plymouth City Council hired a water and wastewater engineer to help meet state standards Thursday. City Manager Dixon Flynn recommended hiring consultant and engineer Richard C. Prima Jr., and making him Deputy City Manager for Development. The council decided to approve a contract with Prima minus the title of deputy city manager, and made other minor changes. Flynn said Prima was helping the city by training city personnel to handle water and wastewater plant operations on the way to helping the city meet stringent state standards. Flynn said he needed “continued assistance and support” for “complicated engineering and planning issues to come together” – though Flynn said that was not to diminish the work done by the city planner and engineer. Councilman Mike O’Meara asked how the city would pay Prima’s $92 an hour rate. Flynn said the city was due to be reimbursed between $400,000 and $600,000 for work already done on the Plymouth Pipeline Project. He said the USDA was now working on paperwork for the city’s grant funding on the pipeline. Flynn said the city expected a reimbursement check by the end of February, saying “whenever we get the money related to the sewer treatment plant, we will be reimbursed.” Councilwoman Patricia Fordyce said she was against the hiring, calling it fiscally irresponsible, and voted no in a 4-1 passing of the contract to hire Prima. Vice Mayor Greg Baldwin asked how much money the city had paid the Amador Water Agency last year and this year in trying to stay up to state standards, but City Finance Director Jeffry Gardner was unable to find the numbers before the vote. Baldwin said he looked “forward to Richard Prima coming on board” and he asked if developers could be asked to help in paying Prima, as they had offered such help in the past. Baldwin asked if developers could be “hard pressed” to help. Flynn said that could be “part of the reimbursement agreement,” used with developers, in bringing the plant up to state standards. Story by Jim Reece