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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCity Council Committees - Public Works/Planning - 02/27/1995 of these rates. He said that our concern is, we have been working on this Lagoon project for some time and the Corps permit we will secure typically has a three year window we have to complete the project. If we get the.permit next month, we will have used up one year of waiting before we actually start and we have to complete the project in the latter two years. Wickstrom noted that we are trying to appease the business community and still meet our flood protection requirements. At this time, Wickstrom went over the'no action' scenario. He said we have a lot of issues that are not particularly related to flood control. The control of our drainage is predicated upon these regional projects that are identified in this Capital Improvement Program (control our existing flooding and our future flooding problems) plus on-site detention measures which we have already implemented; we have a stricter standard for on-site detention for new developments. Those two combinations together was to resolve both our existing problems and our long term problems. If we do nothing on these regional projects, we will have more frequency of flooding and a higher magnitude of flooding primarily thru the lower valley area. Renton will become our storage pond because our drainage, at least for that property east and north of the river all drains north to Renton. The fact that our FEMA maps outline the 100 year floodplain for the valley is really based on some engineering done in '79 and at that time and today, the Feds only look at the existing level of development. They don't plan for future development in establishing their flood plain. Sinoe'79 we have had slot of additional development which has meant more impervious surface, more runoff, that means those flood plain elevations can very well be low. The County has done some evaluation of floodplain elevation on the Soos Creek area and found it to be 5' low in particular areas. If we do nothing, all buildings being built to those lower floodplain elevations could be Inundated in the future which has impacts on their financing. Wickstrom noted we are building a detention project, on Garrison which is relatively small 50-60 acre feet of storage(1 foot of water stared per acre); and the valley project is about 425 - together it is about 500 acre feet of Storage. If we do nothing,that water would be moving down the valley. Kent has business that store hazardous material on site and if that flood moves down, it could impact those hazardous storage Sites. He said an environmental problem could be associated With that. If we take the'do nothing' approach, it would mean we are not going to proceed with our capital improvement program therefore, in certain areas like the Lagoon; all the property to the south has always anticipated there would be the regional detention basin so they haven't had to construct on-site storage. If we do not go ahead with'the capital improvement program, we would be requiring them to build on-set detention 6p their site which means they would be using the'precious, available, usable land' in'creat on-site detention, instead of building more buildings -similarly with biofiltration; the downtown core is a perfect example. We haven't required biofiltration because in the capital improvement program; there's a regional facility; we want to put a treatment facility at the north end of the outlet that services the downtown area off of 4th Avenue about S 222nd. Now, under our regulations, we would 2 �. r require biofiltration - that would mean useable property would heel-olbe set aside for development in the downtown area to accommodate biofiltration. EA ` g developments - were they to come in for a permit they would be required to rely it storm drainage system to meet our standards. That would be extremely expensive. Wickstrom explained that our standards cannot be arbitrarily changed because they'�hV6 to comply with the D.O.E. standards for drainage and State Fisheries has taken jurisdiction within this drainage basin because of all the concerns about the endangered species act and the salmon population. They are telling us that our standards have to t theirs, which ours do now and we are getting them to certify that. If they don't; thio*ey will take permit review responsibility over,all drainage. a Wickstrom explained that the Lagoon is going to give us excelient.rport with EPA and the Corps -all the agencies have been very excited about this pr4ci and very willing to work with us to get it implemented. Wickstrom stated that he i9WIhOptried that if we just drop the project at this point, they may not be favorable towards us th*next time we apply for a permit - 64th Ave needs a 4014 permit to finish it off. It' is *I*o impacted by our regulations on unique and fragile areas. Wickstrom stated thOlEkth cannot be built without the Lagoon project being built. That shifts the unique and*901p area away from 64th and the Lagoon project gives us the 404 permit to build 64th w 04th is important because it is part of our Transportation Plan; it is part of the elernt that we need to implement to meet our concurrency requirement. Under grq� management, if concurrency is not met, building permits cannot be issued. We h e'a similar issue with the 272nd corridor - we need that project for concurrency on grow0*1 11 nagement. There are 8 acres of wetland we need to mitigate and work with the Colt. We would like to show what we did on the lagoon project - build the rapport so we.h get that necessary permit to build that project within that`six year period. Similarly �t our water source project; right now we only have two future sources to meet our#t M'Jerms needs; one is Tacoma Pipeline #5 which has been,in the works for 20 years Ond,the Impoundment Project, which is our other only source. It has 37 acres of wetland that needs to be mitigated and we need a rapport with these agencies so we can get that permit. Wickstrom said that regarding the Water Rights issue -there is stich 6joacklog on issuing water right certificates there is a moratorium on new permits. The lav just completed a Green/Duwamish Watershed Study which one of its two recomlldtions is that no more surface water rights and no more shallow groundwater right i:v 'II be issued. Wickstrom stated that there are many,implications tied to this pro Jod and that is why he is trying to come up with various financing scenarios to help ease ft,,financial burden on the business community. He asked for a little more time to look of,# ,three year scenario and correlate that to our cash flow needs and see what that would'4o in satisfying their needs in terms of trying to stretch it out. This is as far as we could gQ and keep a valid 404 permit on the lagoon. If we implemented the rate effective JaO ry 1 st, that would guarantee that we could implement that project, which would hope�ui'l satisfy the Corps. It would also allow people time to budget and plan for the rate increase. 3 0 In response to Paul Mann, Wickstrom stated that we have been forecasting this all thru 1994; we didn't know the magnitude of It until the latter part of December when our Consultant started to firm up the costs of these projects. He said that just prior to bringing it to the first Public Works Committee, we started to see what the numbers would actually be. Wickstrom noted that he felt it was important that Council should be informed first before we went public with that information. Tim Clark asked for clarification on the permit for the lagoon project and ,how long we have to complete this project. Wickstrom stated ftt typically you have three years to complete a project once a permit is issued. He said that's why he was looking at a three year window to levy these rates on - it will take us two years, for sure, to construct the project. If we implement the rate in'96 we lose one year-there would only be two remaining years to finish the project. In response again to Clark, Wickstrom stated that this is all part of the capital improvement program. The lagoon project is one of the bigger projects driving the rate increase. Wickstrom said that particular project amounts to about$12 million which is the bulk of the capital improvement program for the three year period. The problem is, in the three year period, the three projects that we're really doing is the Lagoon Conversion project, Upper Garrison Creek Detention project and the reconstruction of the culverts along Mill Creek from Earthworks Park past Bowen Scarff, under the freeway and north to 4th Avenue. All those are undersized and they need to be upgraded now because it is causing our immediate flooding and they need to be upgraded for future conditions. To remove the flooding problem along Central Ave from the Senior Center downstream, we need to redo all the culverts. We can't do that without the Lagoon project -we would just be pushing the water down and flooding somebody else. We need the storage facility so we can push the water down; divert it into the storage facility and control it from there. Last summer we constructed a trunk system at Garrison Creek to relieve the flooding we had at the Benson Shopping Center and at the apartments to the south of S.240th St. We need the detention basin to control that relief down the canyon otherwise, there will be flooding in the valley. He stated that those are the three projects which are driving the rate increase. Clark noted that he did not recall the figures on the councilmanic bonds. Wickstrom explained that this was something we,came W with based on how can we can cut the rate impact down - one of the problems is that if we sell strictly revenue bonds, we need a significant coverage factor over and above what is necessary to retire that debt and by selling councilmanic bonds, we don't need that significant coverage factor. Therefore, we can reduce the rate down. That is the premise of the councilmanic bond issue -to allow us to reduce the coverage factor, thereby reducing the rate and easing the financial burden. We are still paying the debt off in a 20 year period Clark asked what this does to our indebtedness in the councilmanic bonds. Wickstrom explained that there would be $54.milllon at the end of this year - over a three year period there is about $16 million in councilrnanid-bonds that we would be seeking to sell. That 4 i . would have no affect because we are financing that with rates. Genic pledges the entire City's revenue source to pay them off. Instead, we are pay* 9 it off out of rate increases in utilities. In response to Bennett, Wickstrom stated that we were including SIR487 in increasing the culvert sizes. Wickstrom also stated that these projects are not rx !we started with the SCS project which was constructing major drainage channels fronh Manton, north of 405 to where it presently outlets, all the way thru the valley. When it get(O' Am to who pays and how to implement it, everyone disappeared. In 1985 we came 'up with the option of utilizing the existing system we have and where the channels dor*lh*e the capacity, we built storage. At that point in time, all we did was preserve those projects by buying the right of way necessary. Wlckstrom noted that in'92 we implemented-6 rate increase which was to do the design study on Mill Creek, to find out what's the ISA$t cost approach to solve the flooding problem along Mill Creek Kent Memorial Park are'aM 060' im'plete the design on Garrison Creek; complete the design and implement the Lagoonproject. Those are done and now we are at the point of wanting to proceed in the conib �otion stage. In '92 we were going to implement a rate every year. We didn't implei rtt 'a '93 or 94 rate increase. Paul Mann expressed appreciation for everything that is being dorms'an this problem. ,.A Carol Stoner complimented staff on being so creative in finding mor v from, other sources to add to this project. She noted that this project has a lot of advantages for several people in the valley and encouraged the Committee to move forwar*iarith this. In response to Mrs. Rust, Wickstrom stated that there is a general rate increase plus an additional rate increase for those areas that need specific impro4o-Mei it's. The primary basins that are getting impacted with the most significant rate increase are those east and north of the river. Gary Young of Polygon stated that Polygon is in full support of st ff )n,this issue and is in support of these rate increases.' Young stated that Polygon is Wlding homes at the Lakes Development and their focus is to'build affordable homes for: pole; He noted that they proceeded on the basis that this project would go ahead. Youoti#nplimented staff on their creativity in coming up with a solution. Paul Mann stated that while the proposal is not final at this point, e'will come back with a final proposal at the next Committee meeting. Josh Hatley of the State Dept of Licensing stated that the agency c1lo not have any way to increase their rates without legislation. He asked where the money wili+go while we are waiting for the projects to get underway. Wickstrom stated that all;e nlues from utilities are kept separate and can only be spent on utility needs. He noted that,were Council to 5 0 approve this, we will also have them establish the budget for these projects. Michel Gadbois of Flow International stated that Flow has a concern with the speed with which this proposal came forth and having to put the rates in their budget for this coming year and the second concern is, this seems like a large, aggressive move and they feel that Kent is a city with modest needs. They feel we would be almost doubling the operating expense for utilities. They feel we should be able to tailor our expenditures to meet our needs. Wickstrom explained thattthe program is both a cash flow program and a bonding program. He said that under the S year proposal we were looking at $25 million with about$7 million actual cash -cash is generated from that additional revenue to cover the bond coverage debt and is fed back into the capital improvement program. He said that under the councilmanic issue, the total revenue stream would not go up to the $5.5 million per year - in the first year we would only go up to approximately $500,000 - $700,000. Therefore, the councilmanic issue has a significant reduction in the rates. Paul Seely of Boeing, complimented staff on their efforts in trying to find other ways to figure out this increase. He requested an updated packet on figures, when it is available. Dean Porter of Heath Techna asked if this particular funding option has any downside to it. Wickstrom said it does cut into councilmanic capacity; other than that, utility projects are funded strictly thru revenue bonds. There would be a change here and we can justify that because of the rate impact. He said ftwe really isn't a downside. Committee concurred that this item will be brough back at the next Public Works meeting on March 13th. Renton Emergengy Water Agreement Wickstrom explained that last summer, because of the dry spell, we had some concerns about the ability of our system to supply our needs -we had some wells dropping so we used everyone else's water before we used,4urs. He said we have an intertie that we built with Renton in the 70s. Renton had a concern with this and therefore established an agreement with us. This sets up a means"ich recognizes that intertle and allows us, if they have water available, to buy from them: We can in turn, sell water to them if we have it available. This agreement sets the rate which is our standard consumer rate. Committee unanimously recommended thatq=concurrence of the Public Works Director and the City attorney, authorize the Mayor to execute an agreement with Renton for the emergency sale of water. Speed Humps along SE 2Nth P Wickstrom stated that after studies were taken by staff and various attempts were made 6 i to try to reduce the speed thru this area, the neighborhood gotlpoftr and signed a petition with enough signatures to meet the guidelines of the next step,, at being installing speed humps. We are asking for concurrence of that and authorization to install the speed humps. Committee unanimously recommended that speed humps be instaped,along SE 236th PI between 104th Ave SE & 108th Ave SE. Added Item: Quality of Kent's Water Mann stated that he has received concerns from citizens regarding possible parasites (cryptosporidium) in Kent s,water. He asked what we can do with regard to addressing that issue and asked how well our filtration system is working. Wickstrorp, stated that he will have the Water Superintendent look into this. He suggested sending out a flyer stating that Kent does not have a problem of this kind. Mann requested that his.water be tested at his home. Added Item: Bennett noted that motorists are using,the Lakes Condo area near Russell Road as a new by-pass (228th to Russell Rd) Wickstrom said that he would have theArafFic staff look into this. Discussion: Regarding the Capital Improvement Fund, Tim Clark said there are times obviously when old bonds simply"go away"so the potential indebtedness is increased at other points. But there is that collision point where things are layered which can cause a significant jump up. He asked where we are in that whole process and asked Wickstrom if this could be addressed at the next Committee meeting. In response to Clark, Wickstrom stated that there has not been a utility increase within the past 12 months. Clalrlt,hoo that there was a utility rate that went up in terms of the expansion of the Lighthouss froiect. Wickstrom stated that all our city utilities, water, sir drainage pays the Cityrsutiiity tax directly. It's paid as an expense. Anytime the utility tax is raised this becomes an expense to the utility and it is paid out of the existing revenue. It is not automatically passed on. Wickstrom explained that the utility tax used to be an 'add on'. When we Implemented the street utility, the utility tax was switched to be paid soley out of the utility,. In order for the City utilities to pass an increase in the utility tax a rate increase is necessary. So when Council increased that utility tax last time, it came out of the existing revenues of,the utilities. Meeting adjourned: 5:45 P.M. 7