Council discusses water issues

Three water-related issues surfaced at the July 11 Crestview City Council meeting as the members discussed an ordinance establishing cycle billing, began negotiations with a construction company to drill a new water well, and proposed making it easier for new customers to establish water service.

The cycle billing ordinance passed unanimously and formalized a process approved last fall by the council and recommended last month during a forensic audit of the city's Utilities Billing Department by accounting firm O’Sullivan Creel.

“Billing will be conducted on two cycles (A&B), which will effectively split the customer database in half,” the ordinance reads. Customers billed on cycle A will pay their bills by the first Tuesday of the month; bills for customers on the B cycle will fall due on the third Tuesday.

The ordinance will help alleviate the monthly frenzy currently experienced when bills are tabulated, mailed, and payments are applied all within a short time period, city officials said.

Following a workshop to receive bids for drilling the city’s newest water well, Public Works Director Wayne Steele asked to appear before the council to seek approval to begin negotiations with winning bidder Tetra Tech. Representatives of the company, however, failed to appear at Monday’s meeting.

“I recommend we look at the second company and try to negotiate with them,” Councilman Ben Iannucci suggested.

David Stejskal, project manager and engineer for CH2M Hill was in attendance and briefly explained his company’s $240,000 bid included design and construction of the well.

Councilwoman Robyn Helt reminded the council that following a consultant’s estimate, “We were thinking it was going to be in the $180,000 range.”

“Once we spell the scope out to him in even greater detail, I think he’ll come back to us with an even lower price,” Steele said, adding he will have a revised bid on the next council agenda.

During individual council member reports, Helt observed that, “The process for establishing water service can be cumbersome.”

Although customers can fax their application and driver’s license to the water department to establish their new service, “They need to physically walk in with a deposit,” she said.

Helt proposed revising the procedure so new customers could start up their service and pay their deposit by phoning in a credit card number or providing it through the city’s website, possibly setting up automatic bill payments at the same time.

“We need to be a little more automated and a little more user friendly, but right now our ordinance is precluding that,” Helt said.

Finance Director Patti Beebe said the city is actually moving in that direction as it completes the process of changing the bank the city uses.

“That was the first thing we had asked our new bank to achieve,” Beebe said.

Helt also suggested that city officials reevaluate the Friday closure of the water department, saying it poses a hardship on families moving over the weekend and hoping to have their water turned on as they move in. She acknowledged that after working longer weekdays, having Fridays off is a perk for city employees.

“But maybe if we could stagger and give some of the personnel off Fridays, and others off Monday, or maybe they could work other days,” Helt said. “I do think with the growth that our city is experiencing, we don’t really need to eliminate that extra business day to do business with our city.

“For people relocating to Crestview, I don’t want to give them the impression that Crestview is backwards and hard to do business with.”