Tag, you’re it

After lunch and a closed session, the Board reconvened to hear a presentation by Joan Maher and former Director Greg Zlotnick on the Delta. It is their opinion that this current attempt to “fix” the Delta is going somewhere, and that Governor Schwarzenegger has a large amount of political capital invested in its success. The current, very ambitious, schedule for the Delta Blue Ribbon Task Force calls for its final report by the end of 2008, a draft environmental impact report and a first draft of the Bay Delta Conservation Plan by the end of 2009, and an implementation agreement by the end of 2010. The State Department of Water Resources has asserted that it already has the authority to build a peripheral canal, but this process outlined above will cost about $140 million, and the DWR doesn’t have that. Water exporters expect to be asked to pony up, and the SCVWD staff estimates that its contribution will be on the order of $6 – 10 million.

The whole project, of course, would be vastly more expensive: more along the lines of $5 billion. The District’s share of this capital cost is estimated to be $200 – 300 million, and the yearly operating cost something like $9 million. This would come from the State Water Project tax paid by county residents as part of our property taxes, and, of course, water rates. Former Director Zlotnick said “The era of cheap water in California is over.”

The next long discussion was of the District staff’s efforts to come up with a tagline. Although the staff’s favorite was “Protecting your water and environment,” the Board felt that this gave short shrift to flood protection. They decided on “Protecting your future,” which is pretty vague. But the stated hope is that, when you hear it, you’ll think “Santa Clara Valley Water District.” They didn’t get this final version up on the screen, but this is the idea:

Finally, there was heated discussion very late in the afternoon about the contract for valve replacement at the Rinconada water treatment plant. The low bid came in about $800,000 below the other two (which were very close,) but the low bidder did not supply the required paperwork, and said that there was no way they could. Staff was of the opinion that the huge difference between bids one and two, compared the the relative closeness of bids two and three indicated that the low bid was not reliable, and recommended that the Board grant the contract to the second bidder.

Director Kwok was passionately opposed to this. He adamantly rejected staff’s warnings that a delay would cause much more expensive problems down the road, and refused to consider the $800,000 difference as a “learning experience” about conflicting Board priorities (small business preference versus low bids) as suggested by the CEO. And a majority of the directors were swayed. Although Director Sanchez “reluctantly” moved to accept staff’s recommendations, “reluctantly” seconded by Director Wilson, the vote was 4-2 (Director Judge had left) against granting the contract to the second-lowest bidder, and unanimous to reject all of the bids and start again.