Village Business

It was a busy week for village officials and those of us that like to follow and keep up with what is going on with our place we call home. Monday morning there was this weeks first Sewage Committee meeting followed Thursday morning with a second one. Also Thursday morning there was a Special Council meeting right after the Sewage Committee. The regular Council Meeting this past Tuesday was cancelled for what I think was a lack of a quorum. In addition to work schedules and medical leaves Councilman Joe Soldano is an assistant coach for the WHS Baseball team. They played an away game on Tuesday.

Monday morning's meeting was mainly to discuss the old reservoir and the findings of the ODNR inspection. The meeting was chaired by Councilman Randy Allmon with Tony Cataldo, Village Administrator Jim Saracco, GG& J Engineer Bill Boyle and Buckeye Water District Manager Al DeAngelis in attendence.

Mia Kannik, an engineer for ODNR, expressed concerns about the earthen structure of the dam and spillways if we were to have a 100 Year Storm Event. She estimates there would be a five foot breech of the dam in such an event. A 100 Year Storm Event is criteria required for dam safety. It is determined from getting an extremely heavy rain in a 24 hour period estimated to be the level of flood water expected to be equaled or exceeded every 100 years on average. For example the New Fowl River along the Alabama coast had three such events in recent times in an 11 month period. It came first from a heavy rain storm followed by rain from Hurricane Katrina and lastly from Hurricane Ivin.n It is also known as the 1% flood since it is a flood that has a 1% chance of being equaled or exceeded in any single year. Ms. Kannik also expressed concerns that there wasn't an Emergency Action Plan (EAP) in place should such an event occur. An EAP is a written plan on what steps to take for such an event to warn people down stream and prepare them for possible castastrophe.

BWD Manager Al DeAngelis quickly refuted both points. First off there is not all that great amount of water in the old reservoir. It has needed dredging for years but you can't pump water and dredge at the same time. Then there are three valves up there that can be opened to slowly drain the whole reservoir to the point there is no water being held behind the dam should such an event occur. What water is held up there can be slowly drained into Little Yellow Creek down to the river. Now with the new pump station and water treatment plant it would be possible to dredge the bottom of the old reservoir without causing a problem with our water quality. Currently the integrity of the dam is in good shape with no apparent danger factor present in the opinion of the BWD.

DeAngelis also related that having an EAP plan was required by law. There are such plans on file for both the old and the new reservoir. The folks from ODNR did not check with the water district for the plans.

Engineer Bill Boyle advised that presently there is no grant money available to convert the old reservoir property into a recreational area due to ODNR budget cutbacks. However there are grant funds available for dredging and spillway rehabilitation from Ohio Public Works Issue 1. As a result BWD will keep control of the old reservoir as a back-up. They will basically mothball the place and pump water once a week from there to maintain it. This will give village officials time to apply for the grants to make renovations that would enable it to handle a 100 Year Storm.

At the same meeting an old mystery that has been bugging the County Engineer, BWD, United Water, GG&J and village officials for some time now was solved thanks to the heads up observation of Village Clerk Nancy Murray. BWD reports supplying 81 million gallons of water annually to the village while United Water reports treating only 69 million gallons per year. According to Bill Boyle the 12 million gallon difference would average out to a lost of $120,000 a year for the village. Our sewage bills are based on the amount of our water usage. The mystery that concerned everyone was why there was such a difference. It was determined there were no leaks anywhere to cause that amount of lost water and that the homes in Russell Hts. and the surrounding area up there were not included in those figures. DeAngelis advised there are even meters on sewage customers that are using wells to determine their sewage bill.

Mrs. Murray mentioned that one thing that has bothered her was the fact that Quality Liquid Feeds downtown only gets billed for an average of 5,000 gallons of sewage a month. DeAngelis said that couldn't be correct. QLF is using much more water than that. In checking with the water district office it was learned that QLF has three different water accounts and are supplied on monthly average of anywhere from 175,000 - 307,000 gallons of water. Two of those accounts go into the production of mostly molasses and does not have any discharge into the sewage system. You can't bill sewage for that. So, it was good news/bad news for some village officials. The good news being that the village was not actually losing that amount of money. The bad news was those officials had plans for that money!

While there Bill Boyle advised that plans for the Highland Avenue project are moving along. They found a large storm drain that is feeding into the sewage system that will be corrected. The stream water that seeps out onto Route 45 will be corralled into a drain system and be eliminate. That hazard will be eliminated. Also, he told us that for two way traffic a minimum of 22 feet is required. When the drains are redone up there they will be widening the street to meet that requirement. Right now the street is only 18 feet wide.

The second meeting of the week was also chaired by Allmon with committee members Cataldo & Don Brown along with Saracco, Fiscal Officer Dale Davis, United Water's Greg Stewart, the mayor, Rick Williams and Joe Soldano present. Brown said he is still doing out-patient rehabilitation as a result of his surgery but is able to get out and about a little now & then.

The purpose of the meeting was to go over correspondence received from GG&J Bill Boyle between him and the Ohio EPA concerning sewage over flows and back flows. The result being that flow monitors will be placed at 18th & 20th Streets in the sewer system at a cost not to exceed $3,900 a month to check the situation. Since this is under the $25,000 limit it doesn't have to approved by the full council according to Tony Cataldo. As soon as Greg Stewart gets re certified for confined space work the meters will be installed and remain in place for a period of two months.

Fiscal Officer Dale Davis reported they have been fighting with BWD for some time now over exorbitant water bills for the sewage treatment plant that were caused by a malfunctioning meter. At a cost of $1,400 the meter has been replaced and that problem should go away. One month they were billed for 93,000 gallons of water. Also, at a cost of $407, a back flow meter will be installed at the plant. Since there is no one locally certified to install back flow meters they will have to go outside the community to find one.

Also, Davis related that GG&J have said the Highland Ave. project bills can get paid by them or the village can pay the bills and get reimbursed by GG&J from the grant. It was decided that to be sure to have records of all bills the village will go for the reimbursement option. They want to make sure they don't fall into a situation like they had with the STAG fund records.

Allmon also advised that the contract with United Water has been finalized with Village Solicitor Andy Beech having a conference with their lawyers. The items they were concerned about were standard items that were just stated in a different way. Everything has been worked out to the satisfaction of all and the village is only waiting for UA to provide a copy of the contract.

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