Amador County – The Amador Water Agency Board of Directors discussed its Strategic Plan in a brief workshop Thursday, and set about to study it, in more depth on their own, with a return to another workshop on the issue, possibly in early February.

They discussed some of the issues, and General Manager Gene Mancebo went through a top priorities list, for the various water and wastewater systems.

Director Art Toy asked about the Strategic Plan to “Develop a Replacement Reserves Program,” and why it was listed under a “target date” of 2013-2014.

General Manager Gene Mancebo said it was an analysis of the systems, and their pipelines, tanks, and pump stations, to see the life left in them, and the time left before they had to be replaced. It would set up financial plans, and funds to make replacements.

Mancebo said the original plan was to do the Replacement Reserve Program study internally, but because of limited staff time, and other priorities, it has been deferred. He said it was an inventory of all the infrastructure of the systems, and was a “huge undertaking.” It would determine “what we’re going to do and when we are going to do it.”

Mancebo thought the term “Reserves” was misleading, and Finance Manager Mike Lee suggested they call it “Capital Assets.” Director Gary Thomas said the action should be to “Develop Capital Assets.”

Chairman Don Cooper said the goal was to start to develop the program in 2013. Mancebo said “it will probably take multiple staff people, a couple of years” to complete.

On Cooper’s suggestion, the board agreed to make a deeper individual study of the Strategic Plan, and come back to discuss it with staff, possibly at the Feb. 8 meeting.

Mancebo went over a list of big issues, with potential financial impacts, which staff thinks are important. Engineer Erik Christesen said “it’s not a wish list, it’s things that will come back and bite us a lot more catastrophically.” One was an estimated $900,000 cost, to increase storage for the Buckhorn treatment plant’s backwash, known for a long time but never funded.

Cooper said they have had criticism from the public in the last two years for not assessing equipment or collecting money to replace it. Mancebo said some of the Strategic Plan items had funding, while others would not be funded until they were placed in a financial plan.

The list of top priorities by system included, the Ione and Tanner treatment plant capacities in the Amador Water System; the Gravity Supply Line in Central Amador Water Project Wholesale; CAWP Retail’s distribution pressure and fire flow capacity; Camanche Well 14 rehabilitation and wastewater storage; and wastewater treatment capacity in Martell.

Story by Jim Reece This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.