Keyes Community Services District

5601 7th Street, P O Box 699

Keyes, Ca. 95328

Greetings:

There were a few projects completed and started by the District for the year 2020. We started the year with our water filtration plant fully operational providing treated water to our community. We are looking into getting our Operations Permit from the Waterboards for our Arsenic Treatment Facility.

Northstar Engineering is presently overseeing the earthwork taking place at Keyes 19 South subdivision that is located north of Nunes and west of Washington Road. The infrastructure for Keyes 19 North has been completed for the ninety-one (91) residential units that are to be built starting early this year.

Maintenance workers continue in replacing and upgrading water meters with new ORION Cellular LTE endpoints. The new software and training will be provided by National Meter Company as work on this project progresses.

Other tasks, items, issues and concerns that were discussed during monthly Board meetings but have not been completed are as follows:

Construction of our sewer lift station replacement project at the Foote Road location is presently taking place. Arnaudo Construction from Tracy, CA is doing the work for the bid price of $1,469,500.00. Because of issues with sulfides in the discharge line that deteriorates the sewer lines and manholes, the City of Turlock is requiring that action be taken to reduce the sulfides in the sewer line to acceptable levels. This could increase the cost of the project by another $200,000.00 or so.

Alfonso Manrique from Gouveia Engineering is continuing work on the 1,2,3-TCP Proposition-1 application to the State. The District has also applied for grant funding to install Granular Activated Carbon equipment at the wells to remove the TCP from our domestic water supply. The State Waterboards is presently reviewing our application for funding approval. The purchase of the County property for our GAC site for wells No. 10 and No.7 is on the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisor’s January 26th meeting agenda for approval.

The District is to continue with the installation of streetlights throughout the community. The biggest challenge was the installation of ten (10) street on 10th street between Christine and Grace Avenues. Not having all the necessary equipment and workforce to complete this task, the District solicited bids through a public bid process. Pacific Excavation contractors from Elk Grove installed the lights in March for $240,000.00.   Additional work on the streetlights throughout the community will continue using a prepared plan that was submitted by utilities maintenance supervisor Mike Jones.

When the Governor of the State of California declared a State of Emergency as a result of the threat of COVID-19 on March 4, 2020, the Keyes Board of Directors amended the water consumption rates to allow for regular volumetric water consumption rates to accrue only once a water service user has consumed a volume of 25 hundred cubic feet in a single billing cycle. At a $1.73 a HCF unit for 25 HCF equals $43.25. Since this amendment took place, the District has provided the community with $375,935.00 of free water as of December 31, 2020. The amended water service rates are temporary and only to achieve the public purpose of public health and safety by encouraging water use during the District’s response to the spread of COVID-19. The amended water service rates will return to the current rates upon either the Governor, State, or other local authority lifting any order for individuals to stay home, or at the discretion of the District’s General Manager, whichever comes first.

Respectfully submitted,

Ernie Garza

General Manager