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HomeMy WebLinkAbout11-20-2007 CHA MINUTESCaldwell Housing Authority Minutes of a "Special" Meeting November 20, 2007 Board Members Present: Estella Zamora, Andy Rodriguez, Dana Schuck, Patricia Benedict, Sid Freeman Staff Present: Mike Dittenber Absent: Rick Well Quests: None In order of business: Roll call and call to order Estella Zamora arrived at approximately 12:05pm. Andy Rodriguez called the meeting to order at 12:00pm. There were no minutes from the previous meeting to review so Board proceeded with business as follows: 2 Review 2008 proposed budget Mike provided the Board with a copy of RD Form #3506 -7, Multiple Family Housing project Budget. Mike explained the budget had been prepared with consultation from Rural Development and was tentatively approved by RD, awaiting approval from the Board of Directors. Mike explained that much of the budget was the same, and that he only planned on discussing those budget line items that had substantial changes from the previous year. Mike first explained that CHA would collect approximately $43,000 more in rent in 2008 than in 2007 because of the proposed rent increase. Mike then explained that the vacancy/contingency for 2008 dropped to $43,000 in 2008, down from $48,000 in 2007. He explained the vacancy/contingency represented how much money CHA expected to lose because of vacancies. Mike then explained the 2008 M &O budget jumped from $706,000 in 2007 to $760,000 in 2008. The vast majority of that increase was accounted for in staff salaries +$14,000; waste water treatment +$16,000; insurance benefits +$17,000; +$2,000 in payroll taxes and other miscellaneous expenses. Sid reminded the Board that Rick Wells, at the previous meeting, suggested the City of Caldwell may do the waste water testing free for CHA. Although Sid expressed no opposition to the budget, he directed Mike to follow through with that discussion with the City of Caldwell as it might save CHA $30,000. SEE ADENDUM TO MINUTES Prior to the approval of the budget, Mike provided the Board of Directors with a copy of the 2005 wage study and the current wages of CHA staff. After some discussion, Andy pointed out that several employees were making less than the minimum pay and suggested CHA be more aggressive about bring wages to the market minimum, explaining that if someone quit, we would have to hire them back at a greater hourly rate. Sid asked why CHA wages were so far under market wages. Because much of this issue was addressed prior to his employment, Mike suggested that CHA likely could not have afforded to make such a drastic increase in wages in 2005, but could now because of increased rents and salary savings because of attrition and few employees. Estella recalled reviewing the salary and wage study, but never really voting or taking any official action. Mike noted the last year the salary increases were 3% across the board. Andy also suggested looking at other possible classification for some of the lesser qualified employees and that lumping them all in the same Maintenance /Mechanic classification might not be appropriate. Mike spoke of the need to hire a part -time Lease Compliance Officer. He explained that the job description has not been fully developed, but there was a need for someone who could enforce the terms of the lease agreements and recoup some of the lost maintenance charges that are tenant - caused damages. Estella commented that it would be like a code enforcement officer. Mike agreed but thought lease compliance officer was softer and much more appropriate. At 12:47pm, Estella asked if there was a motion to approve the budget including salary recommendations. Sid made the motion; seconded by Patricia; and unanimously approved. Policy Review Mike provided the Board of Directors with a sick leave and vacation policy. After reviewing the policy, Andy suggested changing any reference to personal leave to vacation leave. The Board suggested other changes and asked Mike to make them and send it out for review. Absent any policy manual, Mike thought it was appropriate to have each Board Member sign the policy. In the absence of time, e-mail approval would be sufficient until the next meeting. Mike also explained that in order to implement the new sick leave and vacation policy, CHA would have to buy down Ayde and Efren's personal leave time. The total buy -down would be approximately $4,000, of which CHA had the money in the budget to afford. At 1:00pm, Estella asked if there was a motion to approve the leave policy and buy down the personal leave time of Ayde and Efren to bring their leave consistent with the new leave policy. Motion made by Andy; seconded by Dana; and unanimously approved. 4 Adjourn:1:06pm Lunch provided by the housing Addendum to Minutes During this last meeting, Sid suggested I follow up on the conversation that occurred at the regular meeting about the City testing our waste water and saving CHA $30,000. After reviewing the audio tape and contacting the City of Caldwell, I must clarify the issue and tell you the City of Caldwell cannot test our waste water and cannot save CHA $30,000. Below is the transcript of the original conversation: Mike: The next line item is down under #13 and #14 [on the proposed budget], water and sewer, #14 particularly, we had $14,400 before [in 2007's budget] in the sewer and that was because we had Juan collecting water samples and taking them to Southwest District Health who would then do the testing. Now we use a lab company that comes out, does the testing with certified testers, and they have the whole chain of custody stuff and that is $30,000. And that's 1 think .... Also, that freed Juan up to do [other] work. Rick: Question on that? We [the city of Caldwell] have done this before with other places and the City of Caldwell where we would make an agreement and take care of not only the lab work, and the City people would have all those certifications to take care of business. I guess if we [the housing authority] are talking of sometime down the line of transferring and working together with the City on sewer and water issues, don't you think the logical sense would not to have to pay somebody to come from Boise to sample. We can just send the regular [Caldwell City] staff that we have here [to CHA] and that would save you a bunch. We did that with the Middleton School, where the agreement was we took care of all that type of stuff with the agreement that if they ever decided to get rid of the well that we would be first in line ...... we would have first right of refusal. They decided to sell it, so now we own it. That was the agreement we had. Mike: Then you guys did the testing. Rick: Yes. Sid: We have talked about his before Rick. Estella: But what if we didn't do that, and then we got someone on staff certified. And they actually took the samples. Could we still do that by giving the City the sample to take if we delivered them? Mike: I think we are talking about two different issues with regard to sampling. We have a waste water system which is what I was talking about, and Juan is the certified operator there, not because he took the test to do the certification, but he was grandfathered in. That was where I had the hard part before, was having someone who was grandfathered into certification actually doing the testing and they hadn't gone through all the classes and the training. That is why I contracted with Analytical Labs out of Boise to come over and do that stuff. END OF TRANSCRIPT On November 26, 2007 I called the Mayor's Office to further explore this type of arrangement. I was directed to talk with Gordon Law, the City Engineer. I spoke with Gordon that afternoon for several minutes regarding this issue. He explained the contract they had with the Middleton School District was to test their drinking water once a month of coliforms and maximum contamination levels (MCL's). Middleton School District is on Middleton City sewer and was not part of the agreement. He also said that the City of Caldwell contracts with Veolia Water Company to do all of their waste water treatment and sampling, and that the City of Caldwell would have no authority to ask Veolia Water to test our waste water because it would be outside the scope of the contract the City of Caldwell has with them. Gordon indicated CHA would have to contract with Veolia separately for waste water testing. Earlier this year (in March and April), I contacted Veolia Water and asked them if they were interested in sampling and testing CHA waste water. They were not very interested and the quote they gave for those services who similar to the quote from Analytical Labs. That is why I chose Analytical Labs to do our waste water sampling. Rick Wells was clearly referring to an agreement regarding drinking water. CHA staff, including me, and under my direction and supervision, conduct daily drinking water testing at a cost of $26.60 a month. That $26.60 includes $¢ a day for chlorine residual tablets and $25.00 once a month for DEQ required coliform bacteria testing. The $30,000 budgetary impact was for waste water testing that the City of Caldwell cannot help us with.