By Mickenzie Hannon, Interning Correspondent with The Apopka Voice
The FY2022 Budget Workshops are crucial in determining a final budget, as city departments can address their budgetary needs to City Council. The July 20th workshop commenced with frustration and confusion over budget materials but pursued and offered commissioners lots of information to consider.
The second Budget Workshop featured the Apopka Public Service Departments, which consists of Facilities, Fleet, Streets, Stormwater, PS Utilities, and sanitation. The Apopka Public Service Department is responsible for maintaining roads, infrastructure, and public facilities that will “support the needs of today, the economic development of today; and to create the foundation for our children's needs for economic growth and quality of life in the future.” According to the Department website, Public Services provides “efficient, cost-effective services in a timely and professional manner.”
At the meeting, Commissioners demonstrated frustration regarding the lack of a final budget proposal. City Administrator Edward Bass and presenters responded by ensuring that a full budget will develop once workshops and budget discussions finalize.
Facilities
Within minutes of the first presentation, commissioners voiced concerns and questioned proposed items, mostly focusing on museum expansion efforts. The expansion of the Museum of Apopkans would make changes to design and architecture, structural maintenance, increase meeting size and improve the exterior of the building. After Facilities Administrator Joe Crisafulli mentioned the expansion, Commissioner Kyle Becker expressed concern for the absence of the project in the capital budget and the task of funding “$120,000 for something that we really have not gotten too much insight into.”
City Administrator Edward Bass responded to Becker's concerns.
“They have been collecting that money for many years,” Bass said. “We have funding that's earmarked specifically for that purpose, and they have funding that is earmarked for that purpose, so the dollars are already designated, already reserved, restricted, and earmarked from prior years.”
First, the museum needs a design to visualize the expansion project “so that we can actually put out a bid,” Bass explained. “We are not designating that $120,000 right now. We are just going to get the design first so we can see what that's going to look like.”
“And, again, I've been asking year over year for an economic development position, and we refuse to fund it," said Becker. "An expenditure like a museum expansion for $120k—which, ironically enough, kind of transports to that funding total—is just kind of coming out of left field for me.”
Currently, there is money included in the capital budget to repair rotted wood in the museum building, which, as Crisafulli shared, were initially pushed back with the hope of expanding the building and fulfilling needed repairs then.
“It is a unique building,” Commissioner Diane Velazquez added. “It doesn't make any sense to go ahead and hire somebody to come in and mobilize to do that work and then hire somebody shortly thereafter to come out and do an expansion on the building,” Crisafulli said.
Commissioner Alexander Smith added to the discussion, requesting at least six museum-only parking space additions to the parking lot.
“Everybody parks there except for the museum employees,” Smith said. Crisafulli agreed to take on that task
Commissioner Kyle Becker addressed the changes in the new budget materials he and other commissioners received for the workshop, which soon led to a disagreement about the purpose of the Budget Workshops.
“Last night, we saw stuff that was on the wish list that was in the budget. Now, we have the funding sheets that $120k was on the funding sheet proper, and now we're saying it's not in it. I'm totally lost,” he said.
“With the budget that you have before you, you are seeing the budget requests that have come directly from the departments with no changes, so tonight as you look through those budgets, you will now see where we've made adjustments or corrections to those budgets," said Bass. "You are getting the raw data. You are seeing the whole package of what has been requested.”
“This is where it needs to change," Becker said, reiterating his frustration. "I have spent a ton of time looking through these sheets thinking that this is what is in the budget, and we are going to argue whether it should stay. Now, we are coming fresh with a new presentation and all the pre-work, to me, it's throwaway.”
“This is a workshop," said Bass. "We want to be transparent and give you everything that the department is requesting or asking for.”
He also reminded commissioners of the two additional hearings scheduled for September.
Becker explained how he would rather have a more determined budget going into the workshop for council members to properly prepare and further allow the departments to propose their desired budget items and exchange approved items for ‘wish list’ items during the workshop session.
Later in the meeting, Velazquez also expressed confusion with the workshop materials.
“What’s in and what’s out?” Velazquez asked.
“You can’t put the cart before the horse," Bass said. “We need to find out first what we're going to build before we tie up all those dollars, so we can use those dollars in other places in the meantime."
“I know, but that conversation should have died in committee,” Becker said. “How am I supposed to know which ones made the cut with the information that I have in hand right now?”
“You have the raw data before you," Bass said. "Each one of the managers is making the adjustments and telling you what they're taking out.”
The confusion over Budget Workshop materials this year is a result of commissioners’ preferences during Workshops last year. As Bass explained, commissioners asked for direct data and budget requests from departments prior to budget adjustments. This year, Bass and the departments worked to fulfill this request, which has only led to more confusion.
Crisafulli expressed a need for one full-time electrician, an item included in the budget. “An electrician is our biggest priority. We outsource nearly everything we do, or we do it in-house and kind of push the limits a little bit sometimes,” he said. “Staff-wise, my interest from where I'm sitting up here is to make sure that you have the staff to be able to tackle any severity ones…the most severe, most prioritized items within the city,” Becker said.
The second priority, as Crisafulli said, would probably be an HVAC technician.
“I think employees at the city are concerned about the ‘three F's’,” Becker said. “It's financial, it's facilities, it's fleet. Especially with some of the jobs that we have, job satisfaction or work quality is probably directly associated with all three of those things.”
“We work very hard to provide all of our employees and, in turn, the public the best building we can in the best facilities we can,” Crisafulli said.
The Facilities Maintenance division requested $383,000, which is a 91% budget increase from FY2021.
Fleet
The 13 full-time employee team “maintains all city vehicles, machinery, and equipment. The division also oversees fueling, which includes environmentally-friendly compressed natural gas (CNG) in some city vehicles,” according to the Public Service Department website. “The goal of the Fleet Maintenance Division is to provide a service and replacement program that maintains vehicles and equipment in a timely, cost-efficient manner ensuring safe and reliable operation of all.”
Charles Stevenson led the Fleet Maintenance division presentation.
Stevenson briefly highlighted a desired new building, as the current two fleet services buildings are becoming overcrowded. He included $1.5 thousand in the budget for the new building. “That was just a ‘guesstimation.’ I am not an engineer by no means, so I just threw a number in there,” Stevenson said. If a new Fleet Services building is purchased, Stevenson hopes the current buildings that the Fleet Maintenance Division is using will become new locations for the Sanitation and Streets divisions. “That way they're utilized and recycled,” Stevenson explained.
Commissioner Doug Bankson added, “We’ve got to get that whole master plan together… We don't want to just do haphazard building. We want to make sure they all kind of flow.”
The need for vehicle maintenance decreased due to the purchase of new vehicles, accounting for a 23% decrease from FY2021.
The overall budget for Fleet Maintenance decreased by 7% for FY2022.
Streets
The Streets Division works to maintain “roadways and rights-of-way to achieve their maximum design life and to ensure the continuation of efficient and safe transit on all City streets and sidewalks.” The Streets Division repairs potholes, sidewalks, curbing. They also resurface streets, trim trees, remove debris and maintain streetlights and traffic signals.
Paul Hathaway led the presentation and announced the new participation with Infrastructure Management Services (IMS) “They're going to start evaluating our roads. That's going to be a great asset for us because they're not only going to evaluate the roads, they are going to give us an idea of what we're going to need to achieve our final goal, which is to make the roads usable, attainable, and have a long life,” he explained.
The Street Division Personnel budget decreased by 10.9%. Currently, there are 10 full-time employees. Hathaway explained the reallocation of two positions from the sidewalk and curb repair to concrete repair, expressing the importance of saving money by fulfilling jobs in-house. “We are going to have them go through the entire city year-round,” he said. “They are going to repair our sidewalks and our curtain gutters.”
Becker asked for clarification for interpreting how the money will be used for street pavement markings. Hathaway explained, “We are going to make sure we have all the crosswalks, stop bars, everything of that nature that needs to be done throughout our schools.” Then, he said, “with the leftover money, we will go to the streets that need repairs and repainted, and we are going to go until we run out of funding.”
Becker also addressed the $1.8 million requested for road resurfacing. Bass explained that the substantial increase in funds for that area is due to the funds received from the American Rescue Plan. “We elected to put a million dollars into our road resurfacing because that's an area where we have struggled funding-wise,” he said.
Included in the budget is a 36% increase for streetlights, which will include new streetlight installations. “We are waiting for cost estimates from Duke Energy and then we will figure out from that which streets we can go through and work with,” Hathaway updated.
The Streets division requested an asphalt heater, which would shorten the time in which it takes to repair a pothole. Hathaway said, “That is going to make us more efficient. It's going to take us where we have less personnel so we can do more:
Bass encourages Apopka residents to submit any pothole or street complaints on the Public Services website or call the Public Services Department at 407-703-1731.
The capital outlay is $1.885 million, and the overall budget for the Street division increased by 37.5%.
Stormwater
The Stormwater Division manages stormwater and develops and maintains stormwater infrastructure within Apopka.
City Engineer Richard Earp presented the Stormwater Division budget requests.
Earp announced two transfer full-time maintenance workers that will be paid from the stormwater fund.
Becker questioned the stormwater at Border Lake and Lake Pleasant. “There's a lot of federal money that looks like we might qualify for,” Earp responded. Also, Orange County will potentially partner with the Division, according to Mayor Bryan Nelson. “What they want to do is replace the drainage well, which is the cheapest way of taking care of the excess water in Border Lake.” However, Nelson suggested receiving federal grants to run a pipe along the same easement as the Utilities Inc pipe, which runs from Wekiva to Cleveland, instead of replacing a drainage well.
“It would take water off Border Lake and off Lake Pleasant, and it would also give us an additional water capacity storage,” Nelson explained.
The Stormwater Division is anticipating the completion of the rate study and assessment to further fund stormwater system maintenance and the retention pond system maintenance, as well as the stormwater permit compliance, Earp explained.
The Stormwater Division has a $420,800 budget for the capital outlay, which Earp said is “primarily keeping status quo of the stormwater system improvements and the stormwater pipelines.”
The overall budget decreased by 17.7%.
Public Works and Utilities
Public Works and Utilities manages the Public Administration Building, answers customer service calls and service requests, and handles department purchases.
This year, there will be a 13.4% budget decrease due to shifting from nine full-time employees in FY2021 to eight full-time employees for FY2022.
Public Works and Utilities requested a 220% increase for repair and maintenance services, which will fund ADA compliant door implementations throughout the Public Service Administration Building. There is another $7,500 allocated for an ADA-accessible entrance door.
There is a 108% increase in training service costs to fund government procurement training so that department employees can learn and apply the skills to the workforce.
The overall budget increased by 9.3%.
Design Engineering
According to the Public Services website, the Design Engineering Division “contributes to the City's Capital Improvement Program with the design and oversight of construction of infrastructure” for public utilities, public roadways, and stormwater systems, public facilities
transportation.
Vladimir Simonovski, Apopka Utility Design Manager, explained the budgetary needs of the Design Engineering Division.
Currently, the Design Engineering Division has nine full-time employees. Still, the personnel budgetary costs increased by 7.6%.
Vehicle maintenance requests increased 100%, as the division previously repurposed vehicles. “We basically didn't request any new vehicles to be purchased, but we are repurposing some of the vehicles from the other divisions and trying to save some money that way,” Simonovski said.
Included in equipment requests was surveying done, which is estimated at $7,600.
“We can generate the surface so when we do the design, it really helps with saving a lot of money on the surveying,” he explained.
The overall budget increased by 6%.
Utilities Capital Improvement Program (CIP)
Simonovski highlighted anticipated future projects, as well as some long-term projects that would require grant funding.
“This year, our plan is to replace one of the oldest lift stations—lift station number 17,” which is located near Fire Station Four,” Simonovski announced.
He also mentioned plans to apply for a grant that would fund the replacement of the 49-year-old ductile iron pipeline that comes from lift station number 17 and goes down to the Apopka Reclamation Facility on East Cleveland Street. “It has really deteriorated over time, and it is right for replacement,” he said.
The next grant deadline is in a few months, according to Simonovski.
Velazquez responded, “It kind of coincides with our budget, and it allows us to say, ‘okay this we can budget for, we definitely need to address it and do it now’, or we can have a project that we can wait for that grant and not put it in the budget.” She continued, “A lot of times, the grant is not awarded if it is in the budget.”
Simonovski said, “Some grants will apply for the replacement rehabilitation programs, some will apply for the new, but most likely, they will go into the 401-operating fund, so it is a little tricky to work with these numbers and to get everything funded right.”
Simonovski suggested the implementation of the asset management program, a complex system that can perform multiple levels of analysis.
“We are going to embed all that data into the system and then the software is going to speed up what is the best maintenance for the roadways that we maintain.” He continued, “We can potentially save between 3-5% of the energy consumption throughout the city.” If approved, the program would start in August. The department will readdress this program at the August 4th City Council meeting.
The 24-inch pipeline at Plymouth Sorrento Road between Lester Road and Ponkan Road is the most critical project, Simonovski said.
“That helps us push all the reclaimed water from the Apopka Water Reclamation Facility to the north, especially the new reclaimed water plant at Golden Gem, as well as Northwest.”
Simonovski added that the department will apply for a grant for this project.
According to Simonovski, Apopka is producing three million gallons of water each day, and the water demand is about six to 6.5 million gallons.
Water Treatment Plants
Lynn Brooks, Water Resource Operations Manager, presented three budgets: water treatment plant, Wastewater Treatment Plant and Water Reclamation, and Utility Plants Maintenance.
The utility services budget increased by 44%, estimating about $211,000. The increase in this area is due to an additional water treatment plant.
The infrastructure projects are extensive and required, as mandated by the St. Johns River Water Management District Consumptive Use Permit (CUP).
The Plymouth Regional Water Treatment Plant project will undergo the replacement of three Upper Floridan Aquifer Wells with one lower Floridan Aquifer Well, which costs $660,000. The Grossenbacher Water Treatment Plant project will replace one upper Floridian Aquifer Well with one lower Floridan Aquifer Well, totaling $533,000. The Grossenbacher Water Treatment Plant project will also see the rehabilitation of Ground Storage Tank Two, costing nearly $500,000. Finally, the miscellaneous water treatment plant projects will replace water distribution flow meters.
“We are pretty efficient on all of our meters coming out, and we are mandated by the state to be within a 5% tolerance.” Books said, “The only thing is we are talking about our distribution leaving our plants.”
As a result, Brooks explained, the Division plans to allocate $50,000 to replace the seven to eight-year-old 24-inch mag meters. “We feel that'll help us to be more efficient on our numbers,” he said.
The Water Treatment Plants Division projected capital outlay to be $1.786 million. The overall budget has increased by 57% since FY2021.
Wastewater Treatment Plant and Water Reclamation
The budget for supplies and other services increased by 35.4% with the budget largely allocated to contractual services, which alone has a 383% increase.
“That increase of $215,000 is to remove that grease that is at our headworks at our plant,” Brooks explained. However, with the implementation of the oil and grease management program, “We are going to have somebody who is going to be proactive and working this system, then we are going to see, we hope, at least half.”
Velazquez inquired about the oil and grease management program, where representatives investigate restaurants to check if they are properly disposing of oils, fats, and grease and not entering the sewer system. Restaurants that comply with the fats, oils, and grease program guidelines and successfully pass an inspection, are required to pay $30 a month to be a fats, oil, and grease management-run business. If they do not comply, the restaurant is put on a surcharge program.
In the infrastructure section of the budget plan, “$50,000 is allocated toward the ground storage tank for the coating and painting at our wastewater treatment plant,” Brooks announced.
An additional $46,000 is allocated to the Northwest Reclamation Water Treatment Plant to remove and replace the generator fuel tank.
The overall budget increased by 23.4%.
Utility Plants Maintenance
The Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system allows for operators to control equipment remotely and ultimately “reduces the manpower we have then go from a 24-hour operation down to 16.” Brooks added, “It gives us that flexibility.”
The $20,000 allocated for contractual services would provide the instrumentations technicians with the service contract for troubleshooting and support. “It gives a service that our staff can reach out and help with updating and doing graphical changes that need to be done,” Brooks said.
The overall budget increased by 7%
Water Distribution Maintenance
George Garcia led the Water Distribution Maintenance Divisions and Wastewater Collection Maintenance Divisions presentations.
$100,000 is allocated to rehabilitate and replace water mains, and an additional $500,000 is allocated to replace aging asbestos cement and cast-iron water mains. Velazquez inquired where the asbestos areas are located, and Garcia mentioned the Park Avenue area.
The overall budget increased by 38.7%
Wastewater Collection Maintenance
Garcia highlighted the Odor Control Program, which the Wastewater Collection Maintenance Division maintains.
“We put in a lot of money for rentals for those order control scrubbers and also chemicals. They need to be able to work together, and you have to have them set in the right places, but, at the same time, it's a lot of money,” he said. “You're using two types of different chemicals, and they are very expensive, and you are pretty much just flushing money down the toilet to help keep the odors as low as possible,” Garcia added.
The overall budget increased by 21.4%
Sanitation
The Solid Waste Management Division is responsible for the collection and management of trash, recyclable materials, and waste.
Josh Robinson, Solid Waste Operations Manager, presented the budgetary outline for the Solid Waste Management Division.
Velazquez asked about residents’ recycling habits and if it has improved.
“We actually hired a contractor that came in and checked all the cans ahead of us, and it showed pretty poor compliance to start with but gradually improved over the four-week cycle that we did each one of those neighborhoods, and so that helps," Robinson said. "We have tried to increase within our budget constraints public information. I think community development is going to start with the Keep America Beautiful Program, and I think that could be a group effort there to put together a little more comprehensive plan on beautifying the city as well as improving our recycling program.”
Under supplies and other services, the fuel and gasoline budget proposed for FY2022 decreased by 28%. “We have actually gotten a little more comfortable with projecting the price of the CNG, and we have also realized almost a complete switch over to CNG with all of our trucks. We just have a few that aren't CNG, so we're budgeting,” Robinson explained.
The overall budget decreased by 12.8%.
Becker thanked Robinson and the Solid Waste Management Division staff.
“Every time I interact with your staff when they are around my house, whether it be a yard, pickup, or just general trash service, it is top-notch.”
Commissioner Alexander Smith commended the Solid Waste staff as well. “We value all of our departments but probably have more conversations about sanitation among our citizens than anything else, and they are really appreciative of the job that you do and the fact that we are collecting trash twice a week and that we have a mandatory pickup day on Tuesdays. When they talk to their other counterparts that don't live inside the City of Apopka, they just flaunt, and they praise our sanitation department.”
