Meetings watch — Aug. 22

Water Utility Authority

At the Eastern New Mexico Water Utility Authority meeting held Thursday in the Memorial Building in Portales, board members took the following action:

• Approved AON Insurance for the ENMWUA insurance company.

• Approved a budget change for debt service for the Water Trust Board award.

ENMWUA Executive Director Justin Howalt said the first year’s payment will be $4,000. Payments will be made for the next 20 years.

• Approved a budget change for match requirement for Water Trust Board.

Howalt said ENMWUA is required by the WTB to provide a 20 percent allocation to match to the award given, which is $308,000. He proposed ENMWUA create a new fund for this and transfer the money out of cash reserves into this new fund to show the WTB that the water authority has the 20 percent match. Once the funds are allocated, said Howalt, the loan and grant portion of the money would also go into the account.

• Agreed to remove a budget item regarding the Elida pump station due to Portales working on easement issues with the project.

• Approved obtaining office space for the ENMWUA executive director.

Howalt said he had provided different locations to board members at the last meeting as office location possibilities.

After negotiations with the owner of 809 Parkland in Clovis, the owner agreed to lower monthly rent for the first year from $1,400 to $1,000. The contract for the property will be for three years with the rent amount increasing to $1,030 for the second year and $1,060 for the third year.

Howalt also told board members that flying to Dallas to haul back used furniture would be cheaper than buying brand new furniture for the office.

He said he will be submitting a request for $10,000 to furnish the office with supplies, equipment and furniture.

• Heard reports from project officials.

— State Consultant Joe Thompson told board members in the last month, he has had a lot of conversations with legislators, policy makers and committee chairs.

“We met with folks in the governor’s office .. We talked to people, and I think they too understand we’re in the middle of kind of a seat change,” Thompson said. “The thing I want to report to you is I think our project stands above almost any other project ... Our project is the standard which other projects are trying to follow.”

— Federal Consultant John Ryan reported that he met with the Bureau of Reclamation in Albuquerque, whose officials have made no commitments but have shown genuine interest in helping with the project. He said he would recommend meeting with the regional bureau again before trying to meet with them at the federal level.

— Chairman Gayla Brumfield agreed with Ryan that the bureau seems supportive of the project.

Brumfield also pointed out that the project had a letter of support from Cannon Air Force Base officials reach the Pentagon, which is big news.

— Howalt said he was able to express to a WTB member the policies currently in place that ENMWUA officials have issues with.

“The other part of the ranking system that we can increase and improve ourselves on is the percent complete. That’s where finishing the Elida pump station, starting to push on the interim ground water pipeline project (is important),” Howalt said. “Starting to get pipe in the ground is such an important part and piece of this puzzle to keep this project moving forward and to start moving us up those rankings. Because if we can start getting ourselves moved up those rankings, we can start receiving more of those federal dollars since they’ll start allocating them to us since we are ranked higher than some other projects.”

“Though the overall package may be $25 million, but if we can get $2 million worth of pipe in the ground, we can say we’re moving forward,” he added. “Up to this point, everything we’ve been doing is extremely important but not as important as going to construction, so we’ve got to get that going.”

• Brumfield announced the next ENMWUA meeting will be 10 a.m. Sept. 17 in Melrose.

— Compiled by Managing Editor Alisa Boswell