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SSLGC 05-20-1999 ~ MINUTES OF THE SCHERTZ/SEGUIN LOCAL GOVERNMENT CORPORATION THE STATE OF TEXAS t COUNTY OF GUADALUPE t SCHERTZ/SEGUIN LOCAL t GOVERNMENT CORPORATION t On this, the 20th day of May, 1999, the Schertz/Seguin Local Government Corporation convened at 1 :30 p.m. in the Schertz Ubrary Meeting Room located at 608 Schertz Parkway, Schertz, Texas with the following members being present and in attendance: Robin Dwyer Ramon Cook Jim Wolverton Sidney Bauer Gloria Rivera President Vice-President Secretary Director Director constituting a majority of the persons appointed to the Board and a quorum for the transaction of business, and notice of such meeting having been duly given in accordance with the provisions of Texas law. Also in attendance were Ken Greenwald, Kerry Sweatt and Jack Hamlett. Absent: Eric Vordenbaum. The meeting was called to order by President Robin Dwyer, noting that Eric Vordenbaum and Secretary Jim Wolverton were absent. The second order of business was approval of minutes for the meeting of April 15, 1999. Mr. Sweatt distributed a corrected set of minutes and then announced Mr. Wolverton would be here, but is running late. Director Bauer noted there was a typing error on page 2, paragraph 2, second sentence where it says other entities did no. That should be changed to read other entities did not. Director Rivera moved to approve the minutes, as presented, with the change suggested by Mr. Bauer, for the meeting of April 15, 1999. Vice- President Cook seconded the motion, which carried by unanimous vote of all Directors present. The third order of business was a report from the consultant regarding the status of the study and engineering design. Mr. Crockett Camp stated he first wanted to catch everybody up on the Guadalupe County Underground Water District. When we met last time, it was coming up shortly on the House Natural Resources Committee. It has passed through the House, is out of the Senate Natural Resources Committee and is set for the ... uncontested calendar of the Senate. He expects it will probably go on the calendar sometime next week. Everything has gone very well, especially considering how late it is. They took all the other bills creating districts and put them in one bill. The good news is those districts will be created, but the bad news is they won't have any power to do anything for more than two years. We didn't want to be (and are not) included in those. President Dwyer wondered if that puts the power in the hands of the municipalities and Mr. Camp remarked or in the hands of the large water users. Mr. Camp commented it hasn't put any power in our hands, but has probably put some power in the hands of San Antonio, Houston and Dallas. President Dwyer asked how that impacts the. Bastrop Plan. Mr. Camp replied they were worried that District would be created and interrupt what they were planning to do with Bastr~p. They will try to control that District now through the Plan. One of the ways they will do that, because all. of these districts have to have a conservation plan approved by the State.. is to say they can't have their plan approved by the State until they finish the Senate Bill 1 plans. They will be subject to the Senate Bill 1 plans. Vice-President Cook noted he who has the biggest pump could get the most water, for the time being. Mr. Camp agreed. Mr. Camp then went on to say the Supreme Court spoke to the Ozarka case this month and he feels the overall results for the Colporation are very beneficial. They have said, once again, the State has the right to regulate groundwater. He doesn't feel it's as simple as some people think it is. The next big test will be the election. There was a brief discussion about when such an election would be held and other options available such as going through TNRCC and the landowner petition process. President Dwyer commented the Supreme Court says the right of capture exists subject to the rights of the utility districts and the underground water districts to regulate. Is that correct? Mr. Camp replied he thinks what they're saying, in a nutshell, is that the 1917 Conservation Amendment gave the State the ri.Qht to regulate and the legislature has chosen the means to regulate. The flip side of that amendment is to conserve the resource. What they said was they would not insert themselves at this time in order to give Senate Bill 1 a chance to work. Mr. Pat Lindner commented this is the second time in recent years the legislature has had the opportunity to address the capture issue and chosen not to do so. Vice-President Cook, saying he was taking the other side, noted an engineer started working on a State water plan on April 1, 1955 and he still hasn't seen a plan come out of any committee. President Dwyer then asked Mr. Clay Roming if he had anything to add. Mr. Roming stated he thought they had reached the point where they can now make more meaningful progress as far as beginning and ending. They have done some preliminary work on iron removal and have a very brief report on what they can expect in the way of treatment for that The American Water Works Association meets in June at Chicago and he will probably attend that conference. Mr. Roming went on to say that next week he will have the final water volumes they will be dealing with and review those with both cities to make sure they concur with it and how they wish to handle it. Also, next week he will have some infonnation on the pipeline. President Dwyer asked Mr. Roming if he, as an engineer, had made a detennination on the best technology to use for iron removal and Mr. Roming replied filtration is the best way. Things appear to be in pretty good shape now. They have bigger motors and hopefully more electricity. Director Bauer asked if he's talking about three-phase electricity and Mr. Roming replied thafs correct. Mr. Camp added there's a line that runs through where they think they will be starting. They questioned the property owner and he is using Central Power and Ught for his feed mill because they have three-phase power available at that sight There are a couple of good things besides water at this site. One is a big Central Power and Ught transmission line going right through it Also, they had talked once before about possibly following' the right-of-way of a gas transmission line coming out of Gonzales County and that line just misses the comer of this property. These two things facilitate what we've got there. Mr. Roming commented it makes the job easier and the cost of the project less. Mr. Sweatt wondered if we could get service from the transmission line. Mr. Camp said he didn't know about off the transmission line, but he knows there's plenty of power there. President Dwyer mentioned he has worked with Central Power and Ught in the past and they have always been very helpful. Mr. Camp reported they had talked with GVEC already and in that general area, there is no problem getting service from them. They are just not going to have the capacity to do some of the things we need. We actually have service from both utilities. Director Rivera asked Mr. Roming if he had received her letter regarding regional planning. What they need is the total amount of our needs to the year 2000. They need some kind of projection on the number of acre feet. Mr. Roming replied he would provide that. Every region seems to be on the same time schedule and he will have that by the 1 st of June. Mr. Roming offered to present it to this Board if Director Rivera wants, and she thought that would be a good idea. She also told Mr. Roming they need a provision in case of drought. There was some discussion about this and Mr. Roming admitted it worries him they will come up with something with which regional planning doesn't agree. Mr. Roming then asked if the water demands have to be turned in by the first part of August and Director Rivera answered they have already turned in the water demands. Right now they are doing a study on options. We need to be assertive about the water we need. Mr. Camp said, from what he understands, probably what they will have available to them from Gonzales County is about 20,000 acre feet and in the area of Wilson County they have looked at, probably another 40,000 acre feet. Our beginning will probably be about 10,000 acre feet. Mr. Camp felt it would be a good idea for the Board to look at that as well as projections. There will be that much water there to develop. If you take 10,000 or 15,000 acre feet out of the center of this, and then someone else comes in and develops in the same area, they will overdraw that particular part of the aquifer. Some of ttlis is protective in the sense we will have a large stake in this section of the aquifer. You ought to put your name on as much of it as they will let you. Mr. Roming related he thinks they have somewhere around 15,000 to 17000 acre feet identified for both cities for the year 2050. It occurs to him that once you start doing this, other people will show an interest in it. There may be a need to show unidentified future users. That way we could add - on to our identified needs. He's thinking another 5,000 acre feet would not be an unreasonable amount to add to the identified 2050 needs of the cities. Selling that lowers the cost to the two participants. There's a great deal of thought that goes into the reasoning of what we can reasonably justify. Mr. Roming said he has a personal basic philosophy that says you never want to be caught asking for and providing too little water; you don't want to underestimate; and, if you overestimate, the water won't disappear. Mr. Roming then spoke briefly about projections and community assets. Vice-President Cook stated he had several items to mention before those assembled at the meeting. First, there is a map published by SAWS showing all the places they can go to get water. He distributed copies of the map. Second, Mr. Borgfeld and Mr. Pridgeon of GVEC have spoken with him and asked him about the Corporation's plans. They indicated they want the business of pumping water to our cities and they want it very badly. Director Rivera related her conviction is that we need separate sources of water for our two cities so we can be an independent source and can control our own destinies. Mr. Camp said he has every reason to believe that SAWS has stated their purpose is not to harm or hurt our project in any way. He expects they will be cooperative, perhaps supportive. Director Bauer asked him why he is being so altruistic and he replied because this project is taking some of the burden off SAWS. The fourth order of business was an Executive Session called under Chapter 551 Local Government Code, Subsection 551.072, deliberation regarding real property. An Executive Session was held from 2:24 p.m. until 3:05 p.m. (Secretary Wolverton had arrived in time for the Executive Session.) The fifth order of business was to consider and take action as a result of Item #3 and President Dwyer noted that should be Item #4 instead. President Dwyer moved the Board accept and ratify the earnest money contract, to purchase land, dated May 17, 1999. Director Rivera seconded the motion, which was carried by unanimous vote of all Directors present. The sixth order of business was a report by staff and there was nothing to report. There being no further business offered, it was moved and seconded that the meeting be adjourned. Upon a vote being taken, the motion carried by a unanimous vote of all Directors present and the meeting was adjourned at 3:08 p.m. MINUTES APPROVED this the day of . 1999. Signatures of all Directors Robin Dwyer, President Ramon J. Cook, Vice-President Jim Wolverton, Secretary Sidney Bauer, Director Gloria Rivera, Director