MINUTES OF MEETING
NORTH SPRINGS IMPROVEMENT DISTRICT
 
            The regular meeting of the Board of Supervisors of the North Springs Improvement District was held Wednesday, March 3, 2010 at 5:00 p.m. in the district office, 10300 N. W. 11 Manor, Coral Springs, Florida.
 
            Present and constituting a quorum were:
 
            Steve Mendelson                                       President
            David Gray                                               Secretary
            Vincent Morretti                                       Assistant Secretary
 
            Also present were:
 
            Doug Hyche                                              District Manager
            Dennis Lyles                                             District Counsel
            Jane Early                                                  District Engineer
            Brenda Schurz                                           District Administrator
            Rod Colon                                                 Director of Operations

            Cory Johnson                                            CH2M Hill

            Louis Munoz                                             CH2M Hill
            Walt Stewart                                             CH2M Hill
            Dave Green                                               CH2M Hill

            Nick Schooley                                           Drainage Supervisor

            Kay Woodward                                        Accountant
            Dan Daly                                                   CSID Director of Operations
            Joe Sabino                                                 HBC Clubhouse Manager

            Barbara Brewin                                         United Community Management

            Donna Holiday                                          GMS-South Florida, LLC
 
 
FIRST ORDER OF BUSINESS                       Roll Call
            Mr. Hyche called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m.
 
SECOND ORDER OF BUSINESS                  Approval of the Minutes of the February 3, and February 16, 2010 Meetings
            Mr. Hyche the first item is approval of the minutes of the February 3, and February 16, 2010 meetings. 
 
On MOTION by Mr. Gray seconded by Mr. Mendelson with all in favor the minutes of the February 3, and February 16, 2010 meetings were approved as presented.
 
THIRD ORDER OF BUSINESS                      Audience Comments/Board Requests
            There not being any, the next item followed.
 
FOURTH ORDER OF BUSINESS                  Continued Discussion of Rate Study
            Mr. Green stated when we were here a month or so ago we made a presentation that was oriented for a worse case scenario of what could happen to your rates if we did at the time what we were looking at which had a number of improvements.  Since then we have gone back and updated our analysis in accordance with some of the suggestions that you made at that meeting.  Some of the changes we have come up with in the analysis I am presenting today include eliminating any of the improvements for serving the wedge area with one exception and that is the acquisition of the land that is currently being considered.  That cost is still in the analysis.  We also revised the cost estimates for a lot of the capital improvement program, eliminated some of the improvements based upon further analysis.  We also revised what we were looking at in terms of debt funding of the land improvements and one of those changes is that we are looking at refinancing your existing debt which is about $20 million in outstanding principal at this point and we would finance only the improvements between now and 2012 in this first bond issue.  We likely will need a second bond issue to finance the improvements in 2013 and 2014 but we have assumed that we would have the principal payments on both bonds not start until 2015. 
            The next slide gives you a quick summary of what we are now looking at in terms of planned capital improvement expenditures over the time period.  Again, only the parts that we are funding are out through 2012 through this initial bond issue and they include some of the design for the reverse osmosis treatment plant, the land acquisition for the wedge area, a sound barrier wall at the main plant, some slaker replacements and some major main reimbursements and subdivision line reimbursements to the developers that are required under your existing outstanding developer agreements. 
            In terms of refinancing of the bonds the total bond proceeds are about $31 million we are assuming a 4.44% interest rate based upon some advice we received from Prager Sealy and a 30 year bond.  The average payment over the entire 30 years is about $1.6 million but for the portion of these bonds that is refunding the old bonds we didn’t extend the term of that refunding so we have out through 2023 payments of about $2.6 million per year for the bonds and then it drops down to about $800,000 a year from there until 2040 when all the bonds are retired.  The net proceeds for the construction fund for new improvements is about $11 million.
            You can see that your existing debt service payments are about $2.4 million because we are refunding the existing bond in the current fiscal year your debt payment in this fiscal year drops down quite a bit but jumps back up to about the $2.6 million level.  The real increase is about $200,000 to help you fund that $11 million of improvements per year. 
            What happens to your total revenue requirements I will compare 2009 with 2011 and we have revenue requirements of about $8.1 million last year and when the whole debt service, etc. kicks in that jumps up to about $9.7 million and it climbs a little bit per year from there based upon the assumption that your operating expenses are going to increase by about 5% per year over this period.  Then you have the $1 million in R&R that you haven’t been doing in the past that we are proposing that you do in the future.  It has a little bit of a jump at first then climbs slowly from there. 
            To get sufficient revenues to cover those costs we are proposing that for the second half of the current fiscal year that we have about a 15% rate increase followed in the following year by about a 12% increase and after that it would be about 5% per year.  Currently the minimum fee on your water is about $13.86 and it would go up to about $15.94 for the remainder of the year then up to $17.85 in 2011.  On the wastewater side it will go from $8.65 up to about $9.95 and irrigation would go from $13.86 to $15.94. 
            On the volume side it is similar 15% and 12% increases so that the volume rates would increase from $1.34 to $1.54 for the zero to 12,000 gallons and over 12,000 gallons to 25,000 gallons it would go up to $3.08.
            On the sewer side the volume rate would increase from $1.34 to $1.54 in the latter half of the year and to $1.73 for 2011. 
            Mr. Mendelson stated if a person right now is paying $30 a month for their water that means it is going to go up to $45.
            Mr. Green stated it is about a 15% increase from $30 it would be about a $4.50 increase.  The next chart tries to answer that question and this is for a customer consuming 7,000 gallons of water.  There may have been some question earlier about whether 7,000 gallons is a typical customer’s bill and Mr. Daly has provided us with some consumption information for about four periods throughout the year stretched out over the course of 2009 and your average consumption per account is about 8,700 gallons per month.  But your average consumption is highly influenced by the fact that you have about 3% of your customers that are using in excess of 24,000 gallons per month and 13% of your customers are using about 17,000 gallons per month.  If you look at the real distribution of your customers about 83% of your customers fall into that first rate block of using between zero and 12,000 gallons per month.  Their average consumption is right around 6,000 gallons per month.  That is a fairly typical pattern where you have a large number of customers that are small users but the average is much higher than the typical customer.  For a customer using 7,000 gallons per month right now they are paying around $41.27 for water and sewer service with the proposed increase for the second half of 2010 their bill would go up about $6.19.
            Mr. Gray stated I looked at the chart on the rate increase you showed 15% then 12% and then 5% and 5%.  It is a total 35% but it is cumulative meaning that you are doing 12% on the 15%.  When you do that math what is the total increase including the cumulative from start to finish?
            Mr. Green stated we are going from $41 up to $58.60 it is close to 40%. 
            Mr. Gray stated which over 6 years if you took the 40% and broke it evenly your shift per year would be just under 7% per year if you were to average it but we are front loading it. 
            Mr. Green stated yes.
            Mr. Gray asked are we front loading it because of the way we need to show for the bond funds or are you just front loading it because of the way the payments have to go out?
            Mr. Green responded we were trying to front load it because of the bonds.
            Mr. Mendelson stated it is going to cost the consumer another $15 a month.
            Mr. Green stated the increase for the second half is $6.19 and the following period it would be about $5.60 additional on top of that for 2011. 
            Mr. Gray asked did your rate study include what would have been the normal cost because this is on top of it because we are doing extra stuff but every year we normally would have an increase so does this include that or is this on top of that?
            Mr. Green stated we have allowed for your operating expenses to increase.
            Mr. Mendelson asked is there any way that the district can defray part of that cost to the consumer?
            Mr. Gray stated meaning do we have money in our accounts.
            Mr. Mendelson stated we have $18 million.
            Mr. Colon stated we have $12 million and out of that $12 million some of that has to go back to WCI.
            Mr. Mendelson asked what happened to the $18 million we discussed at the last meeting?
            Mr. Gray stated I think there is a breakdown in the book.
            Mr. Mendelson asked if it is $12 million is there anything the district can do to defray some of that cost to the consumer?
            Mr. Gray asked do we have money in an account that is set up for infrastructure, for building future stuff?
            Mr. Colon responded what we are going to be proposing later is to go ahead and start some of these projects with the money we have in our account then propose a resolution to reimburse once the bond is issued back to water and sewer.  Ms. Woodward and Ms. Schurz have been working very hard to come up with a final number with WCI so we will know how much the district actually has.  The first year will be the 15% but the year after that might not necessarily be what he is talking about it could possibly be lower. 
            Mr. Mendelson asked before we start something new can we take part of that money that we have to defray the cost to the consumer and eventually or now put it out as a bond issue so we can retrieve a lot of that revenue to do the new projects? 
            Mr. Hyche stated that will be in the coming agenda as part of the agenda package that we have a resolution in there for this board to approve to repay some of this cost out of a future bond.
            Mr. Mendelson asked when you say repay out of a future bond what year are we talking about?  Are we talking about 5, 8, 20 years?  Half the people that are paying it are not going to be here by then.  We should be able to do something now. 
            Mr. Gray stated if I’m reading this correctly the unrestricted is $14 million.  Is that what we have available?  The rest of it is shown as restricted for debt service, restricted for renewal and replacement. 
            Ms. Woodward stated the $14 million figure you are looking at is a little bit deceptive because while it is true that it is unrestricted it does not necessarily mean that it is uncommitted.  For example any current work authorizations that have not been completed or any contractors whom you owe future payments on an existing contract, those numbers are not captured in here any payments to finish up that work comes from that $14 million figure. 
            Mr. Mendelson stated basically what you are saying is if you keep a checking account you have a check register and you write the amount as you spend your money but if you go online and check your account they are telling you that you have more money in the account because the bank has not received the checks from those people who have been paid.
            Ms. Woodward stated we haven’t written the checks yet because the work has not been done. 
            Mr. Colon stated realistically we have somewhere around $12 million out of which maybe $3 million, $4 million or $5 million has to go back to WCI.
            Mr. Gray stated so we really have $9 million is what you are saying.
            Mr. Colon stated or $7 million or $6 million.
            Mr. Hyche stated we have to nail that down and Ms. Woodward and Ms. Schurz are close to doing that.  We haven’t quite resolved those numbers yet but we are close.
            Mr. Colon stated we haven’t changed the rates in 12 years.  We had a workshop and talked about what needed to be done and we are all in agreement that we have to raise rates at least 15% the first year.  The second year we are not going to come back and say it is going to be more than what we presented it will hopefully be lower based on the amount of money we have in the bank. 
            Mr. Gray stated the second year the only thing I would say is I would like to see it a year apart.  Six months apart is a little close because what you really hit them with is 25% over a six month period.
            Mr. Daly stated we participated in a rate study for CSID and CSID has not raised their rates for probably 15 to 16 years very much like NSID but you actually decreased your rates by putting a cap on your sewer.  They went out and did a 14% three years in a row, one year apart starting July 1st and we just finished this last July with the last one.  We do have a 5% hanging out there for 2012 that we are looking at because through better management through some programs and things like that we may not have to implement that.  When you look at that it is cumulative so it is not really 14%, 14%, 14% it is about 49%.  I know it was a shock last month but I looked at what some of the other places charge and I looked at the City of Coconut Creek for 8,000 gallons in 2007 they raised their rates and it became $51.55 for 8,000 gallons then they raised it April 2009 a 26.5% increase to $65.25 for 8,000 gallons.  They can say our base charge really didn’t go up that much but they put in a customer charge of $1.06 per water and per sewer.  The point is it went up 26.5% in 18 months.  The City of Coral Springs was at $50.24 for 8,000 gallons and their sewer is based on 85% of the water so 8,000 gallons of water and 6,400 gallons of sewer at the prevailing rate and they went up 16% between January 2007 and July 2008 and then had another 5% increase so their 8,000 gallons is $61.18.  Your 8,000 gallons right now is $43.95, CSID is $58.30.  Take CSID at $58.30 because we have done our increases is still less than Coconut Creek currently which is $65.25 and $61.18 with the City of Coral Springs, yours is at $43 the 15% will bring it to about $50.54 and a 30% increase would bring it to $57 which is still less than those other two entities.  I know it is shocking to say we are going to hit you with 30% and it is good that you have that conscience but if you have an aging system that you have to keep up to date for the rest of it then you have to do something about it.
            Mr. Mendelson stated up to date is fine we have to redo certain piping and all this other stuff but to create new projects.
            Mr. Colon stated other than the land acquisition these projects are a necessity.
            Mr. Mendelson stated I understand that but the basic consumer doesn’t want to know about this yet they are going to be paying for it.
            Mr. Gray stated I agree with what he is saying but the average consumer, which is what we are talking about here, and today’s market is not doing well.
            Mr. Hyche stated the district is part of that currently we are not doing well. 
            Mr. Gray stated I agree that right now you have a different situation for the people.  All I’m saying is if they are a year apart I think people understand a lot better.  If you were doing it late you would have to make up a little but so what if you did especially if you are saying it might not be 12% next year anyway?  If you started it late and did 15% and 14% if that is a year apart I think that still sounds better than doing 6 months apart with a 15% and 12% in that timeframe because people remember in that short of a timeframe.  Is that a possible scenario to run them a year apart?
            Mr. Green stated it is certainly a scenario but I would advise you that having a full year of the 12% increase gets us just enough money to cover all of your projected costs for 2011.  If you shorten that to only having the larger percent increase for six months you are probably talking about quite a bit larger percentage hit at that point in order to get to the same level of revenue. 
            Mr. Gray asked let’s say we committed to the 15% now for the half year, wouldn’t we review it by the end of the year anyway?  If at that time if it were looking good then we could knock it down.  The only commitment we are talking about right now really is the 15%.
            Mr. Colon stated that is right.  This is the worse case scenario so we don’t come back to you and say we miscalculated it has to go up from the 12%.  He is looking at worse case scenario, no money in the bank, nothing coming in.
            Mr. Hyche stated you can always drop your rates. 
            Mr. Colon stated the rates are based on these capital improvements. 
            Mr. Mendelson stated but the average consumer doesn’t know anything about that stuff they just know they write a check every month.
            Mr. Gray stated there will be a public hearing.  When would that be?
            Mr. Hyche stated you have to advertise it so it could be next month.
            Mr. Daly stated that is the earliest you could do it.
            Mr. Morretti asked if we were to lift the cap on the sewer how would that affect the revenues that we can generate?  Has that been calculated?
            Mr. Green responded yes, we calculated that when we looked at just removing it on the commercial users it was $26,000.  If we removed it from both residential and commercial it was closer to $220,000. 
            Mr. Morretti stated that would be a start.  Is there any cap on commercial water use?
            Mr. Gray asked how is that different from a rate increase?
            Mr. Green stated it is very unusual to have a cap on commercial at all.  The whole concept of the cap is to say that the water that is being used isn’t going back into the sewer.  The water in excess of this cap level the assumption is that it is being used for irrigation or car washing or something and not going back into the sewer and they don’t want to charge the customers for water that is not really going into the sewer.  I think you are the only utility that I know of in this area that has a cap on commercial usage.  Everybody else just has a cap on residential usage.
            Mr. Gray stated I would be fine with that change.
            Mr. Hyche stated you could also reduce your conservation rate which is currently 12,600 gallons.
            Mr. Mendelson asked if we take all of these figures into account what is the ballpark figure it is going to reduce for the average consumer?
            Mr. Green asked are you talking about removing the cap on sewer for residential as well?
            Mr. Gray responded no, just on commercial.
            Mr. Green stated $26,000.  If you change the conservation rate and how much you change that and where that takes place that is going to determine how much impact you have.
            Mr. Gray asked will you explain the conservation rate?
            Mr. Green responded you have an increasing block rate structure so that if you use more than 12,600 gallons the rate per thousand gallons goes up.
            Mr. Gray stated I am not a big fan of penalizing people because they use more.  I do agree that it is fine to take the sewer cap off the commercial.  One of the things that was mentioned earlier is if we had the meeting earlier I think that is better and separates the time that they hear about it.  Have the meeting as soon as possible and you are saying you would have enough time to do it next month.
            Mr. Hyche responded yes, we would have to advertise it.
            Mr. Mendelson asked it would be after our regular meeting next month?
            Mr. Lyles responded during your regular meeting.
            Mr. Gray stated I think that is fine and we don’t have to vote on it at that time or we could vote on it and have it out of the way. 
            Mr. Mendelson asked do we have to approve it at that particular time?
            Mr. Hyche stated if you would like I can have Rhonda Mossing from Prager Sealy who does our bonds come in and do a little workshop a couple of weeks prior to the meeting and explain more how the bonds would work.
            Mr. Gray stated I understand about the bonds.  I know why you have to have the money.  Let’s do it next month and we will do the 15% increase and the removal of the sewer cap on the commercial users.
            Mr. Lyles stated just to be sure we are going to advertise this and publish the proposed rates, the changes you are considering making, so it is not just that we are going to have a discussion and a public hearing, we are also going to publish in the newspaper at least 10 days before the public hearing what these proposed rates are going to look like.  One thing I have heard but I don’t have clear in my own mind so I will bring it up.  You are talking about the first year doing that and that alone and then make the decision at a later time for subsequent years.  What CSID did was the whole nine yards, one public heating, one discussion, they can always back off on it later but if they want to go to the second year and there is going to be another increase it is another notice to the public, it is another advertisement.
            Mr. Gray stated we will do it all in one shot.
            Mr. Lyles stated I think what they are recommending is to advertise the whole thing and in case anyone is concerned I will tell you what the public hearing was like in CSID when they did three years worth of changes.  A couple showed up in response to the advertisement and they were environmentalists and they were actually encouraging raising the rates more than what was proposed.  Nobody showed up to complain about reducing the rates the only complaint was that it should be higher so we would have more preservation efforts and they wanted to talk about deep well injection.  They wanted us to close our ocean outfall but we didn’t have one. 
 
On MOTION by Mr. Mendelson seconded by Mr. Gray with all in favor staff was authorized to notice a public hearing for a multi-year rate increase for the April 7, 2010 meeting and to remove the cap on the sewer on the commercial users.
 
FIFTH ORDER OF BUSINESS                       Award of Contract
            Mr. Hyche stated we are going to pull this item with an explanation.  We had a bid and there was some confusion in the time of the opening of that bid and some people weren’t able to get their bid in.  Staff recommends that the board reject all bids and instruct us to re-advertise. 
 
On MOTION by Mr. Mendelson seconded by Mr. Gray with all in favor all bids were rejected and staff authorized to re-notice the bid for the construction of the chemical building.
 
SIXTH ORDER OF BUSINESS                       Staff Reports
            A.     Manager
            Mr. Hyche stated the next item is Resolution 2010-02.
            Mr. Gray stated this is the one we just discussed.
            Mr. Hyche responded yes. 
 
On MOTION by Mr. Gray seconded by Mr. Mendelson with all in favor Resolution 2010-02 indicating the intent of the district to issue tax exempt bonds was approved.
 
                     Upcoming Projects
            Mr. Colon stated next month we are going to present the results of the bid for chemical building improvements which involves building a new chemical building with a vacuum system.  Other than that I don’t see any upcoming projects except for some engineering work authorizations for design. 
 
                     Utility Billing Work Orders
            Mr. Hyche stated the utility billing work orders are enclosed in the booklet. 
 
            B.      Attorney
            Mr. Lyles stated I don’t have any particular legal matters to bring to the board’s attention this month. 
            Mr. Mendelson stated I want to thank Brenda for running the last meeting.  Everything was laid out for us and she did a yeoman’s job. 
 
            C.     Engineer
                     Consideration of Work Authorization No. 197 Parkland Golf and Country Club Buffer and Bond Completion Work for an Estimated Amount of $30,000 Per Month for a 24 Month Period for a total of $720,000
            Ms. Early stated the first item is the work authorization that we pulled from the last agenda.  This was work on the Parkland Golf and Country Club bond issue.  This is a summary of the bond.  The first items, lakes, major culverts, roadways, all those have been complete other than the roadway being turned over which I have been working with Mr. Colon and the City of Parkland and Broward County trying to get that accomplished for University Drive and Trails End.  Mr. Colon and I went to Broward County to meet with Richard Tornese and he didn’t show up so I’m trying to reschedule that. 
            Mr. Gray asked do we have a meeting with the state at some point?
            Mr. Colon stated FDOT sent me an email stating that at this time they are not interested.  The City of Parkland also doesn’t want it so we are stuck with it at this point. 
            Ms. Early stated the intent was that the city was going to take University and Trails End.  County Line and Nob Hill were taken by Broward County but when these two roads were planned and the bond was sold Parkland wanted control of those roads.  We even went so far as to prepare median maintenance agreements and all that.  This has been going on for a year and a half and Andy Maroudis, the city attorney, was involved working with it and everyone knew that was the intent and all of a sudden we have hit a wall that they don’t want to take the roads. 
            Mr. Colon stated our next step is to have a meeting with Mayor Udine that is really our last step with the City of Parkland.  I have had several meetings with two of the commissioners and pleaded with them so I think if we get the mayor on our side they might be willing to take the roads over but at this time no one wants them.
            Mr. Gray asked out of curiosity because there are political or financial reasons why they don’t want it but since we are about to do this deal in the north I know we needed them and they need us, without them following through on commitments this doesn’t show good faith for how we would deal with them in the future because we can’t trust them.  Do they recognize that?  I would make that very clear to them, to the commissioner or to Mayor Udine that not showing follow-up on something that was totally committed, they even charged us fees to inspect it doesn’t give me any faith in any deal I ever do with them again. 
            Mr. Colon stated we tried to historically get something valid to show that there was a commitment.  All that we have are some words.  We even brought in a consultant who used to work with WCI, Tara Patton, to see if she had any documents or something we could go to the city and say we are not making this up, we know there has been conversation but they basically want to see the proof.
            Mr. Gray asked are the permit fees proof?
            Mr. Colon responded they are stating that we would have had to pay the fees anyway but we disagree on that.  That is the challenge we are going to plead to the mayor, saying this isn’t just in our heads we know there has been some type of arrangement whether verbal or not.  The documents say that it will be turned over to the proper governmental authority.  We think that is the City of Parkland. 
            Mr. Lyles stated I was able to acquire verbatim transcripts of the hearings on the land use issues related to Parkland Golf and Country Club where this would have been discussed if at all and there is no specific statement by anybody on the commission that, yes we are going to take that road when it is built.  We looked in every corner to see if there was something binding so we are back to your issue really, everybody knew how this was being done and it was required to be built in connection with that project.  If the developer had done it then it clearly would have gone to the city and that is how it is often done. 
            Mr. Gray stated it certainly means that anything we do in the future would have to be heavily documented prior to us proceeding with anything.
            Mr. Colon stated I’m glad you said that and that brings us to the County Line Road project and we went ahead and spoke with Broward County and told them we are in the process of paving County Line Road during phase 1 and phase 2 we don’t want to be stuck by them saying they don’t want the road now.  There were agreements in place for the other part of County Line Road and the county did agree to take that over but there as no agreement in place for University Drive or Trails End. 
            Ms. Early stated we even opened County Line Road for Parkland.  We didn’t want to open it. 
            Mr. Colon stated someone has already crashed into the guardrail and it cost a couple thousand to fix.  These are repairs that we are going to be stuck with in the future.
            Mr. Gray asked how did that affect our insurance?
            Mr. Colon responded we are paying it out of the general fund.
            Mr. Gray asked if we currently have an open road we have liability issues so did that affect our insurance?
            Mr. Colon responded no, we were already insured for all assets in the district anyway and we didn’t make an insurance claim on it. 
            Ms. Early stated the landscape buffers is the remaining item that needs to be completed.  Trails End and University Drive have been completed and we need to finish County Line and Nob Hill that is what the work authorization is for. 
            Mr. Mendelson asked who is the landscaper that is going to do it?
            Ms. Early responded that is all going to go out to bid as we get a set of plans done and approved by the City of Parkland.  There are probably going to be seven or eight separate bids as we get each item approved.
            Mr. Mendelson asked what is the ballpark figure on that?
            Ms. Early responded the total for all the landscape buffers was roughly $13 million.  We reimbursed WCI for Trails End which was around $3.2 million.  They were in for another reimbursement of $3.1 million but I reduced that working with Ms. Woodward, there were some items that they shouldn’t be paid for so I think it is down to $2.7 million and that will be reimbursed.  We have remaining $10 million in the bank and when we pay them this roughly $3 million we will have $7 million left.  I don’t have a cost estimate but I’m very confident that we are going to have quite a bit of money remaining to pay down the bond once these two items are done. 
            Mr. Mendelson stated I would like the board to be made aware of what the ballpark figure is.
            Ms. Early stated as we do cost estimates, I’m trying to get some more information on the design and I will bring whatever information as I get it to the board.  I will try to have it at the next meeting. 
            Mr. Gray stated I did have a couple of questions about the water features.  You are building the water features?
            Ms. Early stated that is what was in the original bond issue, the water features, lighting, sidewalks, entrance features only on the perimeter buffers which NSID will own but Parkland Golf and Country Club will do the maintenance.  Before we reimburse them there are agreements that Dennis Lyles’ office has currently for University.  Trails End we already have the agreement.  We are also going to try to work with the city and maybe scale back on the lighting because that was a maintenance issue. We are going to try to reduce some of the costs. 
            Mr. Gray stated some of these pods aren’t developed with homes yet.
            Ms. Early stated they are moving forward I can send you an email of the lots that were sold.  I know they are going to start building in Heron Bay I met with WCI today and they have a building permit from the City of Parkland so they are trying to move forward and finish these.  They are trying to finish the interior lots, all the features that were supposed to go there so they are moving forward. 
            Mr. Lyles stated we should point out on the issue of the maintenance of the water features we are going to have an agreement which we have had in other settings and lots of places that provides that the property owners association or HOA will be responsible for the maintenance of this facility we are going to build.  Ultimately we are going to own it and if they don’t have the funds to maintain it, it will come right back to us but it will be part of our assessment program within that community not district-wide.  It is not an arms length transaction where we turn it over to them and they are stuck with it forever.  We could in fact end up with that having to assess and handle it through the district if the HOA doesn’t do what it is supposed to do but again, it won’t be our general funds it will be assessed through that assessment area. 
            Mr. Hyche stated we are asking the board to approve work authorization no. 197 for the Parkland Golf and Country Club.
            Mr. Mendelson asked are we going to get those figures later on?
            Ms. Early responded as I get plans done and cost estimates I will bring the cost estimates to the board so we know how much each one of these features is going to cost.  I will try to keep you apprised at every meeting of what is going on. 
 
On MOTION by Mr. Gray seconded by Mr. Mendelson with all in favor work authorization no. 197 was approved.
 
            Ms. Early stated another item as Doug mentioned on his bid I too have a problem with my bid.  I bid County Line Road which we had discussed the last couple of meetings.  We advertised it for 30 days and I had 26 bidders pick up documents.  Quite a few of these bidders I have never heard of.  It was advertised twice, 26 people picked up and we had a discussion that maybe we should have a prebid because I don’t know some of these people.  My mistake was I didn’t advertise the prebid in the paper I put out an addendum saying mandatory prebid and 20 people showed up for the prebid.  The person with the low bid was one of the first people to pick up on the job had the addendum didn’t show up for the prebid.  Unfortunately, I think if we approve it at this meeting we are going to have a protest so I’m recommending that we rebid it.
 
On MOTION by Mr. Mendelson seconded by Mr. Gray with all in favor all bids were rejected and staff authorized to re-notice the bid for County Line Road West Phase 1 and Phase 2.
 
                     Consideration of Right of Way Permit for Construction of Roundabout at Parkland Reserve
            Ms. Early stated I think this was on the agenda a couple of months ago and we withheld the permit because of that agreement that was going on we wanted to finalize that.  This is a permit for them to construct their round about, some features on the round about on the road right of way which they are going to ultimately own the road but it was still in NSID’s ownership so we did a review and are recommending approval of the permit. 
 
On MOTION by Mr. Mendelson seconded by Mr. Gray with all in favor the right of way permit for the construction of the round about at Parkland Reserve was approved subject to the conditions listed in the engineer’s review letter.
 
                     Project(s) Status Report
            Ms. Early stated we have done the landscape plans for the booster station and the district will be bidding that shortly.  I’m just waiting on an answer from the City of Parkland on the existing fence.  We want to replace the existing north property line fence and I’m waiting for them to make a decision on if I need to re-permit that or not but other than that we are ready to go and may be able to bring that back to the next meeting.
 
SEVENTH ORDER OF BUSINESS                Approval of Financials and Check Registers
            Mr. Hyche stated the next item is approval of the financials and check registers.
 
On MOTION by Mr. Gray seconded by Mr. Mendelson with all in favor the check registers were approved.
 
On MOTION by Mr. Mendelson seconded by Mr. Gray with all in favor the meeting adjourned at 5:59 p.m.
 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                                                                          

David Gray                                                                    Steve Mendelson

Secretary                                                                        President