Transcripts For SFGTV Government Access Programming 20171224

SFGTV Government Access Programming December 24, 2017

For those that have seen the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir its severe but it got worse the next year theres just not a good picture of that compared to this one. Those are conditions we hope not to see again. Our objectives for water supply adopted in 2008 by the commission is to survive a specific eight and a half year plan scenario from 1987 to 1992 followed by 197677 backtoback with no more than 20 rationing. Theres a lot in that and that means at the end of the drought were down to zero water. Thats survival. Thats not being able to do anything else in the future. Thats a whole other question but thats the basic scenario. And its shown graphically here we start out with 1. 68 million acre feet and then you see along the bottom line theres a series of fiscal years with 86 to 76, 77 following that. The blue line shows the decreasing level of storage through the end of the year. As we got to Different Levels of storage available to us because ours say storagebased system, you end up with a new level of rationing as it gets worse and worse. Interest in the middle of 1988 we go to 10 rationing. In the middle of 1990, 20 rationing and this goes to 25 rationing because we still have a small bit of drought supply, 2 million a day of drought supply we havent achieved wed have to go through as we go to the next to the last year of the drought. This ends with this sequence with us getting to del dead pool and that means theres some left in the reservoir but you cant get it out. You throw a hose in and pump it out in an abnormal way but it cant be released through normal mechanisms. This is how we track our work over time. So for the last drought, we followed this basic scenario of getting to higher levels of conservation driven by state water board measures and i was asked by a conference what would have you done different if you had known we were getting into this drought and my answer is nothing. This droughtplanning scenario serves us extremely well to meet obligation to our customers here in the city and outside. Which means, if the drought isnt that severe, yes therell be some water left over but we dont really know for sure about that. That led me as we prepared our comments to the state on the Water Quality control plan to look at more documents. There was a declaration by the general manager at the time when considering the factors associated with the citys entitlement to water and systems and consequences of just being wrong is the forecasting the leng length the drought, i cant not say they were overly conservative. I like to cite a sitting commissioner and former general manager who is the general manager through the 8792 drought and that was a horrific period for water managers in california. Thats what we used going back to 1994 our droughtplanning process adopted as part of the water improvement program. We can look at other alternatives but its a matter of how much risk were willing to take on. Thats a very important question for us to consider. I wanted to summarize what we do, why we do it and how we have used it so far. Are we going to a new drought . Could be but were prepared for it. Thats our response, being prepared as if were getting into a long period of drought no matter what. We plan that way. You saw this being drawn down and it gives me a twitch. If it rains in january well shut the project down and take the water. Its more important to get the water than to finish that. We can do that at a later time. Well have to balance that risk though. And its in our planning scenario and well be happy to answer questions. Commissioners. On the drawdown, that affects and its on the progressive curve you showed. Hows that affect your firstyear actions if it turns out to be the first year of a drought sequence. And if droughts dont last longer, does this change your thinking about a firstyear event . Not particularly. We talked about the eight and a half year planning sequence but i think whats built into that is the first year assumption that youre probably not going to over react because you dont know youre in a drought. When we talk about operationalizing new projects we assume that is going to cover a seven and a half year period and kick in at the end of the first year when we say, gosh, that was dry. We have to act as if were in a drought sequence now. In this case that would take us down 200,000 or 250,000 acre feet of storage which is halfway down the first decreasing year. It would accelerate us getting into a firstyear drought is what it would do for us. It does give you less resource if you were to in fact enter a critical period thats correct. Feel the loss of that but at a later year . Yes, it would. You brought out one comment. The picture at the beginning of oshaughnessy as the island was appearing, brings me flashbacks and nightmares and that. It was a very serious time and that be resulted in a bunch of things. It resulted in changing our operations so we were without any ambiguity of waterfirst operations and power would not be generated in a way that would compromise our long term ability to produce water ability and prompted an extensive and deep analysis of what our hydrolgy can be operated in order to maximize our resiliency, if you will, during a drought sequence. So when you look at the curves you have and the rule curves we have in place, that was the product of deep and sober thougthought and modelling and consideration. The policies that were generated were not without cost. They cost us in our ability to generate power. They cost us in our ability to certify water supplies. Theres no part of that thats back of the envelope calculation. Theres no part of that is aimed at anything other than preserving the ability to serve in a reliable and responsible way. I do get concerned when numbers are cited out of context. That impugning and integrity of the planning process and i take that personally. I think what san franciscans can be confident in and what our wholesale customers can be absolutely confident in, is that the operating criteria were using and the planning criteria were using are not scare tactics and they are not conveniently conservative numbers. Theyre very carefully derived numbers and cognizant of the cost in terms of money. In terms of social impact, in terms of economic viablity viability of the area and there are serious feelings. I wanted to share that with you. We had other numbers presented today that would cast that in a less than serious light. I think thats important to discuss. Commissioners, anything else . Thank you. We have two gentlemen to speak on Public Comment on item number nine. First is mr. Peter dreckmyer. Welcome back. So its interesting that mr. Morans quote from 1994 suggests that people were saying the drought plan at that point or whatever management of the system was 14 years before the 2008 design drought. I would beg to differ with you, mr. Moran. I think the design is arbitrary. Its two droughts combined. I dont think theres Science Behind that. In 2009, the state adopted the coequal goals of ensuring reliable water supply and protect the eco system. I think San Franciscos a little behind on the second of those. I will give you credit. In the upper tuolome Stakeholder Group meeting on friday, its people from state and federal agencies and ngos talking about biology. Its a great, constructive collaborative process and we need Something Like that for the lower tuolome and there was a Climate Change study. I dont think any of that was reflected in the design drought. If the concern is Climate Change, why dont we look at the science. It will affect things in positive and negative ways. The first 2400css belongs to the irrigation district and between april and june the climate study said more precipitation will fall as rain and not snow and the snow will melt earlier shifting to the season when it benefits the fpuc. The last year was the second wettest year on record in the Tuolumne Water shed but yielded the most run off ever probably because of the fire and less taken to vegetation. Thats probably what well see in the future and it does have a positive as far as the water supply, negative for the environment. I hope the state will do more. The proposals focus on measures. We dont see those working in the absence of higher flows and sfpuc hasnt supported the idea of if the measures dont work we need more water. Thats Adaptive Management and we hope to see that and there was an agreement in 1995 that said the state agrees to support the negotiating position regarding volumes of water to be supplied during the mediation professional and during proceedings relating to the fish flow issue. It seems like youre contractually obligated to follow the lead of the irrigati irrigation district for the tuolumne. Next mr. Dave river. Its a pleasure to speak to you again. I think the way id like to approach this is to i think commissioner moran, back when you were going through this problem and i can feel the emotion of you saying the challenge of going through this was an outstanding job at the time. The thing that was missing was the environmental aspect. The questions id love to see you guys asking are what environmental unless was done when the current design drought was created. What is the Environmental Impact . What were the measures implemented to mitigate that impact and does the measures make a difference . I think thats really what san franciscans today would like to have. They would like to have a great, reliable water supply but done with great environmental support. I think weve only got half of that. Another question is, how often do you regularly get updates on the environmental damage going on at tuolumne and the chinook salmon possibly going extinct . Another question is how did the drop planning mile compare to history. Peter covered that. Do you note the results of the last drought was not merely as long but it resulted in us having three years of unneeded storage and that would have been terrifically valuable to the fish. You can ask questions and find solution thats are winwin for both the habitat and for the water reliability which you so wonderfully provided for s citizens. I does notice in the 2015 urban Water Management plan there was an assumption household demand for water increases as affluence increases. I think we may have seen the opposite. Another question that could be asked and maybe it doesnt go anywhere but worth the discussion, is what if we changed that assumption that affluent households take the drought more seriously. They implement more planning measures so we see the demand for those households go down . If you model that, what does that do to overall demand . Does that give you more options for dealing with achieving drought goals and protecting the environment. Thanks so much. Thank you, mr. Warner. Any other Public Comment on item nine . Next item, please. I have a question on where we are in the whole process with the state conversation and negotiations. Deputy general manager, thats covered by a confidentiality agreement we can discuss that later on the agenda. Okay. Is there a public piece to where this process is for the state and Water Quality control plan and the substitute environmental environment the control board took comments on march 17 in 2017. There has not been the release of comment doc. We can only rumor when theyll release that. We hear its maybe february but thats a rumor. Its not official. Maybe they take it up some time in april in may but they dont have a schedule posted on their website at this point in time. Thats helpful. Thank you. Last call for Public Comment . Next item. The clerk item ten is a bay area water supply and conservation update. Good afternoon, commissionerers. I was extremely saddened by the news of the mayors passing and his loss will be fell not just by those of you in San Francisco and by many including those at bosca so i appreciate the difficulty in going through today but government business must go on. I intend to focus my remarks on primarily two things and ill keep them short. Last month dan wade, the program director, came and spoke to the board and provided an update. It was well received and appreciated by the board. This year, parked the anniversary the three years passing one allowing representation and the one bill that allowed San Francisco to rebuild the system and the last bill that created a Financing Authority to assist in financing that rebuild if necessary. Together, those three bills have created great results. We now sit at 90 or more completed. And essentially the seismic reliability is there for the community. Thats a great accomplishment. So you now have you before you with the latest quarterly reports projections for a release of the schedule. Full that engaged with your team on that but it certainly reflects kind of what we think is going to happen as the program tries to wind down. That schedule theres pressures on that schedule for other things as well. The concern is that may not be the end of it with the latest e rebaselining. Well continue to work on that. As necessary, once the schedule gets firmed up we do anticipate reaching out to our legislative contingency to extend the oversight from the sate and well work in collaboration with your staff on that and there was support when we went through that process the last time but that state oversight from our perspective is beneficial and helpful so we want to make sure that continues. On the second point, if i can look at the slides, i did want to provide a regular update on the total water use in the service area. As a reminder, the top line is the predrought for 2013 water use all supplies on a monthly basis. The bottom red line is the lowest use in the 2016 calendar year. And the green is where we are at currently. Were right now tracking 12 less than 2013 in october. Thats an increased reduction compared to last month which is about 8 . The interesting thing and well continue to watch this in the summer months, how much closer to the lower line does the demand go. Or does the reduction stay hardened in through the winter. The weather this year and the lack of precipitation will be an interesting part of that. My board has asked me to continue to present on that and we will do that. Lastly, just to add a few comments to the drought discussion you just had, i sincerely appreciate commissioner morans thoughts on that. It is never something that a water manager wants to go through as a drought. Weve had several Difficult Conversations and didnt get as difficult as it could have the last time. This service area, in many ways, is unique because it does not have a significant access to an alternative water supply source. We dont have a connection to the delta or have the backup available in the event the hechy goes dry and that drives the appropriateness of the planning and something bawsca appreciates so id just add my thoughts to that. Thank you. Commissioners, any comments . Any Public Comment . Madame, secretary, please read the consent calendar. Item 11 is the consent calendar. All matters under are considered to be routine by the San Francisco Public Utilities commission and acted upon by a single vote of the commission. That will be no separate discussion of the items unless a member of the commission or the public so requests in which event the matter will be removed from the calendar and considered as a separate item. Commissioners, do you wish to remove anything from the consent calendar . Id motion to move the consent calendar. Second. Any discussion . Public comment . Okay. All in favor . Aye. Opposed . The clerk item 12 authorized memorandum of understanding for improvements on illinois straight between 18th and 19th street in concession with the mission bay loop project in the amount not to exceed 8 64,96. Any Public Comment . All in favor . Aye. Opposed . Thank you. Item 13. [reading item] may i make a comment on the item . Id like to make a motion but before i do that, im wondering if as part of our budget discussions or maybe even to come before the commission, id like to get a sense of i believe our Grant Program is about 2 million now . Thats correct. I dont have an understanding how that compares to other cities when they do apples to apples who have these similar Flooding Issues that theyre dealing with and have Grant Programs. At some point id love to get an understanding if thats sufficient with Technical Assistance and whats being approved today. To touch a little bit upon it and the previous presentation, the Grant Programs ranges from 30,000 and nonengineer. Were actually trying to do something thats different and so we are providing a budget amount of 2 million just to kind of see what the appetite is and if with we see that we would need more we will come back and talk to the commission about needing more resources out there to address. Now, the program is for folks in those flood areas and not everyone. Theres a limit and also were working with the applicants on solutions. So its not like everyone that we will look at the situation case by case. So we can kind of give you more of an update grand and i know the storm water fee is coming and how they interface together. Would potentially there continue to be a Grant Program . Would it increase . Decrease for the folks not in the flood zones or who may be but then they would be pegged fees instead. I think to talk about about what our strategy has been, the storm water fee in the first stage is to acknowledge thats a component well put on everyones bill. The second part is for folks who do not receive a puc bill because they dont receive a water bill, is to submit a bill. So if you have a parking lot and you dont have water service, we want to make sure we capture those folks because theyre contributing storm water to our system. Thats the first phase. The second phase after we roll that in, we are looking at size of property and see if theres pavement and theres multiple factors we havent fully baked out. So we can maybe talk about where they are as far as runoff if youre on top of t

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