Lake Wenatchee Water District
Commissioners’ Meeting Minutes
July 13, 2023
Location: Fire Station #91
21696 Lake Wenatchee Hwy
Commissioners Present: Fred Guimond, John Colvard, Erin Colwell (quorum established)
Staff Present: Bruce Harris – Clerk, Charlie Cruickshank – district water operator
Guests Present: Barbara Harris
Commissioner Colvard called the meeting to order at 9:30 am.
Commissioner Colwell moved to accept the minutes for Jun 08, 2023, as written. Commissioner Colvard seconded; motion passed.
Public comments: none
Administrative
Clerk Report
Water Availability Requests (WAR) and Certificates (WAC):
No new water availability requests have been received since the last commissioners meeting. Activity on the existing new water service installations have not been completed.
Leak Status:
The leak at parcel 271718330300 at Brown Road and Lake Wenatchee Highway has been determined upon inspection to be inside the owner’s residence and will be repaired as soon as possible. Other property owners were discussed that had excessive use but were not flagged as a leak.
LWWD Small Works Roster:
The annual submission of the small works roster ad to request to be on the Lake Wenatchee Water District list of available small works candidates was approved by the commissioners and will run in the Leavenworth Echo/Cashmere Record newspapers on July 19 and 26th, 2023.
LWWD email issues:
The email environment has become difficult to manage for the district because of constant email bounce back returns due to new protocols administered by the received service providers to catch scams and spams by other users on the ipage platform not associated with the district and out of our control. A decision to switch a new internet service provider (ISP) for email service only was made by the commissioners. This will be an ongoing process over the next month. Every effort will be made to minimize impact with outgoing communications to our customers. The LWWD website should not be impacted.
O&M and Payroll Warrants
Monthly financial reports: As of June 30, 2023, Treasurer’s balance sheet shows $48,812.09 in the general operating fund and $100,757.41 in the reserve fund. Imprest balance is $922.20.
Customer aging status as of July 7, 2023 was:
60 days – 10 customers @ 60 days ($ 1557.98)
90 days – 0 customers @ 90 days ($ 0.0)
Commissioner Colvard motioned to approve the financial reports as presented, Commissioner Colwell seconded, motion passed.
Commissioner Colvard motioned to approve the O&M warrant for $4,776.88, Commissioner Guimond seconded, motion passed.
Commissioner Colvard motioned to approve payroll warrant for $1,707.00, Commissioner Guimond seconded, motion passed.
Operations
Generator update:
Commissioner Colvard provided an overview of the electrical inspection provided by Jim Kabrich of Yakima Generators on July 11, 2023. The preliminary finding concluded that the exciter circuit board was in a failed state and would need to be replaced. This board is one of the last components in the circuitry before the 277/480 volt output can be transferred to the pump house input electrical transfer panel. Yakima Generator will be replacing the board and reinitiating the startup procedure for the Kohler 38kw backup generator which will trigger the 5yr warrantee as well as registering the district as the owner and operator.
LWWD water usage:
The LWWD operator, Charlie Cruickshank, reported to the commissioners that the water available from the aquifers is lower earlier in the summer this year and the system is having a hard time keeping up, requiring constant intervention on well monitoring to keep the reservoirs adequately full.
The commissioners brought up the topic of adding a new well to the system and agreed to explore well logs for existing potential well sources as a first step. The shortage of available water in the aquifers at this time of year combined with excessive customer irrigation is taking a toll on the system. It was agreed to email the customers to conserve water and voluntarily cut back on irrigation as well as monitor for leaks. The district wants to raise their awareness of the potentially critical situation we could be in if the dry summer continues.
Meeting adjourned at 10:55 am.
Next meeting – Aug 10, 2023 9:30 – 11:30 am