BY ROGER SMITH
MOUNTAIN CITIZEN

INEZ — Martin County Water District has paid off all its outstanding debts, including those that led to the Kentucky Public Service Commission adding a monthly $4.19 debt service surcharge to customer bills in March 2018.

Alliance Resources Manager Craig Miller announced in the June 28 water board meeting that the $1.13 million loan the district secured in April was used to pay all debts, old and new.

The PSC reduced the initial $4.19 DSS to $2.63 in November 2019 and said the district would use it solely for paying off specific old vendor debts. “Martin District will then apply those funds to its depreciation reserve account until further order of the Commission. At that time, the debt service surcharge will be terminated, and Martin District would continue to build its depreciation reserve account based on collections from its base rates.”

In a March 2022 water meeting, Miller said the DSS “is going straight into an account” for the next 22 months while the district makes interest payments on the $1.13 million loan. Miller noted the district would accrue “an estimated $250,000 in an account ready to go.”

Not as usual

Last week’s meeting began as usual with water board chairman Jimmy Don Kerr asking for approval of the minutes from last month’s meeting but didn’t go straight to the usual “yay.”

Board member Nina McCoy noted that she requested in the May meeting that the April minutes be corrected. However, the May minutes did not reflect her request.

“I think that should be in the minutes – that we asked to correct the minutes,” McCoy said.

Clerk Cassie Moore told McCoy she corrected the minutes by adding a number.

“Well, there was a little bit more,” said McCoy.

Alliance Water Resources Manager Craig Miller said, “Yeah, there was some verbiage wrong as far as how the money was going to be paid – like how the $411,000 was going to go to cover the cost of the roof and that we had to cut from previous projects. And then anything left over would pay for 215 meters. FEMA money is separate.”

Leaks in Inez

Inez Mayor Ed Daniels informed the board that there is “what appears to be a leak” in the former Inez IGA parking lot.

“It’s been there forever,” Daniels said. “How could it be there forever, and you’re not doing anything about it?”

Miller said his company could not find anything to indicate a leak. He said the water was coming from a drain behind the IGA.

The mayor also expressed concern about a possible leak between Route 40 and the Inez Walking Trail.

“It’s been there forever,” said Daniels.

Miller agreed and said there was more than one leak in that area.

“We have one that we’ve tracked for a year between here and the business center,” said Miller. “We’ve had Kentucky Rural Water come out and leak detect it. We’ve tried to leak detect it. You know as well as I that the last thing we want to do is to dig up a street in town until we’re certain where the leak is. We traced it as far back as the drain in front of the business center. That water could be coming from anywhere. It is most certainly a leak, but I’m not ready yet to dig up the middle of town.”

“It never did stop you before, Craig,” said Daniels.

Negative balance for May

Miller presented the treasury report. Total billing charges for May were $265,279.77 for 13,364,340 gallons of water and 3,408 customers.

The district received $228,491 in May and spent $274,200 to arrive at a cash basis net income of -$45,709.

“I really anticipate us starting to see that even out as we move forward with the income from the increase that we’ve seen,” said Miller.

The June 28 bill list contained vendor bills of $256,399, operations account debt service funding of $17,800, and debt service surcharge/management infrastructure surcharge of $198,594.

Art and potential legal action

Miller told the board that improvements at the water plant included painting the outside of the tanks. He hopes to get with a local artist to get the Martin County logo painted on the outside of the tanks.

“Perception is everything,” said Miller.

“Maybe there will be some money or something in the project leftover, and we can have that done as well.”

Miller also said there are issues with the raw water intake pump.

“Frankly, I’m getting to the point with Xylem that we may need to have a legal discussion,” said Miller. “We have all the documentation, we have all the information, and we have paid them in full. We don’t owe them a dime, and all they have done is handed us a piece of junk. It has not operated properly.

Miller said it’s the same pump Xylem dropped off a truck when they delivered it. “It has never operated right since, not once. … We don’t have to put up with it, and we’re not going to.”

Board chairman Jimmy Don Kerr said the district should go ahead and start an action.

“They didn’t hesitate to sue us,” said Kerr. “So, I don’t know why we would hesitate.”

In the meantime, Xylem is repairing the district’s smaller pump and is contracted to build the cart that will pull the pumps up and down the riverbank.

Clarifier rehab ‘shoddy’

Miller said he found an issue with the recently rebuilt clarifier at the water plant as the contractor left a 2-inch gap on a skirt, then widened the plate and filled the center with a thicker rubber.

“Instead of one well, they did two wells inside,” said Miller. “I personally felt like it was kind of shoddy. I didn’t like the way it was done. I wanted reassurance from the engineering firm that it was going to be just as solid as the rest of the seams around the clarifier.”

Engineers are recommending to the contractors to correct it by welding a piece of metal on the front side.

Water loss down 8 percent

Water loss in May was 64.79 percent, down 8 percent from April.

The district pumped 3.2 million gallons to the federal prison in May and received a $12,800 check.

Miller said about 50 percent of the water loss is in Inez between the 40 East booster station near Giovanni’s, the 40 West booster station at the ballpark and the Country Market on New Route 3.

“We’re losing about 4 million gallons a month on Turkey,” added Miller.

The district will do leak detection on Turkey Creek Road during July. Customers may experience brief outages.

Public notice late

McCoy asked Miller if Alliance had done the legal notice in the newspaper to let the public know where to find the district’s 2021 annual financial statement, 2022 budget and the latest audit.

State law requires public notice in the newspaper within 60 days after the close of the fiscal year ending Dec. 31, 2021.

Miller said he had delivered the financial statement to the newspaper office earlier in the day but did not include the legal notice.

“Thank you for reminding me,” said Miller. “I’ll make sure that’s done, but they have a copy – they have a hard copy.”

McCoy advised Miller the legal notice is “for the public.”

“We’ll put something together,” said Miller. “We can also share it on Facebook. We’ll get something done.”

New rules, regulations

Miller presented the board with five pages titled “Martin County Water District Rules and Regulations.” He told board members the five pages are part of 25 pages he is currently writing. He did not say if the Public Service Commission approved the new regulations or if the new regulations differ from those contained in the water district’s tariff.

No one mentioned any plans to notify the public of the new regulations.

The board voted unanimously to adopt them.