VVWD looks for ways to give golf courses guaranteed water supply

Delivering a guaranteed water supply for local golf courses may not be as complicated as previously thought, thanks to a recent discussion between the water district general manager and two water board members.

Ken Rock, Virgin Valley Water District general manager, and water board members Ted Miller and Sandra Ramaker were hashing out how to give a guaranteed water supply to golf courses without hastily making a 20- to 30-year contract for secondary water. They came up with a solution Rock will introduce during today’s regular VVWD board meeting that begins at 5 p.m.

“Regular water customers have a covenant from us that they’ll get water service from us,” Rock said. “That’s our business. Why not put meters at the golf courses and have similar arrangements that we have with our regular customers for the secondary water we have available?

“We can put in the meter, charge for the meter and infrastructure costs and treat golf courses the way we treat any other customer.”

Rock said he and board members were trying to make the acre-feet measurements used by farmers and irrigation companies fit golf courses.

“We talked about measuring water for golf courses per 1,000 gallons instead of acre-feet,” Rock said. “We’ll be better able to compare costs and let golf courses be regular customers like everyone else. They’ll have water service through the meter.”

Water board members will consider today whether they will authorize the general manager to further research and propose possible means to enact secondary water service similar to that for regular culinary water service. Further discussion is expected during the board’s Feb. 15 regular meeting.

In other business, board members will consider approval of contracts secured by Aaron Bunker, district hydrologist, and signed by Rock, the competitive bids received by the district for emergency rehabilitation of Well No. 31.

“The pump in Well No. 31 wouldn’t pump anymore,” Rock said. “The pump basically fried itself. We won’t know if it’s repairable until we pull it out. We were afraid of the cost because of previous costs. But we were astounded with the breadth and range of the bids that we got; how cheap it actually could be.

“We put together a contract. It will have the repair cost by the driller to pull and replace the pump. Well pre-order the pump and have it ready when the driller pulls the old pump out. We’ll know for sure that we’ll have a workable pump. And we may be able to use the old pump.”

Three other agenda items relate to the district’s accounting services.

Board members will consider whether to continue the existing accounting services of Draper & Gleave, LLC, with or without adding to the firm’s scope of services.

They’ll also consider possible approval of a senior accountant as a regular VVWD employee, with the board examining whether it wants to hire the senior accountant at half or full time, depending upon perceived needs, cost and value.

If the board approves recruitment of a new accountant, it will consider a request to continue Draper & Gleave’s accounting services for approximately three months after the new VVWD accountant is hired or until those services are no longer required for transition or backup.

David Stratton Waite of Draper & Gleave will present the board with a scope of accounting services based upon accounting functions board members detailed during a Jan. 18 district work session. Board members wanted more detailed budget reports delivered each quarter, additional categories in the accounting report that break expenditure and revenue items into funds and a breakdown of general operation revenues and costs to gauge if the district is operating within budgeted or funded amounts.

Board members also wanted graphs for easier comprehension of how money is being spent in various district funds and how much money is remaining, plus historical accounting information that could help guide board members during the budgetary process.

The board meeting is held in the VVWD boardroom, 500 Riverside Rd.

Source: www.thespectrum.com