Mesa Water awards contract for study of merger with sanitary district
For all the talk so far of merging with the Costa Mesa Sanitary District, Mesa Water District board members stressed one word this week â preliminary.
Thatâs how they repeatedly described the step they took Thursday to award a contract to study whether combining the two agencies could save ratepayers money.
âEvery election cycle these questions come up as to, âDo we need two special districts with two government agencies, one for specifically water and one specifically for sanitation?ââ Mesa Water President Shawn Dewane said Thursday. âThatâs the question thatâs asked, and a study like this is simply designed and being taken up to answer that question.â
Board members voted unanimously to award a $29,960 contract to Arcadis U.S. Inc. for the study. The sanitary district hasnât yet voted on whether to join in the effort.
âI am supportive of this preliminary study because thatâs what it is â an early study to look at whether thereâs merit to pursuing this any further or not,â said Mesa Water board member Jim Atkinson.
The sanitary district provides sewer and curbside trash collection services to about 116,700 ratepayers in Costa Mesa, parts of Newport Beach and unincorporated sections of Orange County.
Mesa Water provides service to about 110,000 people in a similar area.
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Sanitary district board members this week took issue with the process thus far, saying they didnât have a voice in picking the consultant to do the study or a proper role in shaping what the consultant will examine.
The effort shouldnât be funded until both agencies âhave had an opportunity to jointly work on a study,â sanitary district board member Bob Ooten told Mesa Waterâs board during Thursdayâs meeting.
âThatâs what the sanitary district has proposed, and it doesnât appear that any of you are listening,â he added.
Mesa Water board members, though, insisted that the sanitary district has been kept in the loop throughout the process.
âTo say weâre not listening is really not fair to us, so I really donât take kindly to that,â said Ethan Temianka, the boardâs vice president.
Dewane sent a letter to the sanitary district on April 22 asking if the two agencies could work together on the study to determine whether a merger would make operational and financial sense.
The sanitary district didnât officially respond until May 23, after Dewane had sent a follow-up letter.
The concept of merging the two agencies is not new, Temianka said, and ratepayers deserve to know if doing so would save them money.
âThis is something thatâs been talked about for 20 years,â he said. âIâm not one to sit around and talk about this for another 20 years. I got on this board to make some changes, to make positive impacts on the ratepayers. We think there are a lot of savings here. We could be wrong. Weâre going to find that out.â
Itâs also not unheard of for agencies to merge, but that hasnât been a common occurrence in recent years, said Carolyn Emery, executive officer for the Orange County Local Agency Formation Commission, or LAFCO, which reviews consolidation requests from special districts.
Sometimes it turns out merging districts wouldnât reduce costs, Emery said. Other times there are political reasons that could doom a consolidation.
âIt all has to pencil out,â Emery said. âSometimes thatâs a challenge.â
When it comes to consolidation requests, Emery said, primarily what the commission looks at is what the impacts to ratepayers would be and whether a joint agency would be effective and viable in the long term.
Mesa Water board member Jim Fisler, who also is a LAFCO commissioner, said thatâs exactly what the study seeks to do.
âItâs not going after any district,â he said. âItâs a study to see if there is a way to save money for the ratepayers.â
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Luke Money, [email protected]
Twitter: @LukeMMoney
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