Tampa Bay Water: Regular Board of Directors Meeting - 10.19.26

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the October 19th, 2026 regular board meeting of Tampa Bay Water. This meeting was noticed in the Florida Administrative Register and on the Tampa Bay Water website. The meeting is available for viewing through live streaming, and a recording of the meeting will be posted on the agency's website. And now our vice chair will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance. Seated. Clerk, can you read a roll call? Commissioner Cohen. Here. Mayor Davis. Commissioner Eggers. Councilman Miranda. Here. Commissioner Oakley. Here. Commissioner Peters. Commissioner Wostel. Here. Vice Chair Whiteman. Here. Chair Hanowitz. Here. Madam Chair, a quorum is present. Thank you. Board, are there any changes to the agenda? I don't see none. Okay, at this point, we move on to public comment. Each speaker is going to have three minutes to speak. The first speaker I have here is Karen Hillary. Good morning. You're ready. I'm Karen Hillary, and I live on the pipeline route. I'm here today because I want the board to understand what its decision to approve the pipeline route has meant for the residents of Brandon and the surrounding community. Our lives have been turned upside down. Due to the pipeline, I have lived on a dirt road for over two months. I have dealt with garbage collection not being collected, mail delivery problems, internet interruptions, blocked driveways, re-ratted traffic, and construction crews operating directly outside my front door six days a week. We have endured massive excavators, loud machinery, and a diesel dewatering pump running 24 hours a day. Our house has shaken from the vibrations. Our four rescue dogs have needed calming medication, which I didn't get due to the construction. Our yards have become temporary driveways because our own driveways were closed. Construction workers' vehicles have parked along our property beyond the barriers where we were promised construction-related vehicles and debris would not extend. The disruption does not stop at our property one. Our commutes have become an ordeal because major roads have been blocked and traffic diverted onto neighborhood streets never designed to hold this volume. I have spent countless hours texting, emailing, calling, and trying to resolve problems that residents should have never had to manage themselves. What makes this especially infuriating is that we were told our side of the street would not be a construction staging area because the project was leasing the resident's property on the opposite side. That is not what happened. I have looked out at massive equipment, mounds of dirt, and porta-potties for weeks. Keep in mind, we were not given adequate notice or meaningful opportunity to oppose this route before the decision was made. I understand that infrastructure projects are necessary, but necessity does not excuse poor communication, broken promises, or decisions made without meaningful consideration of the citizens who must live with the consequences. If we were told and received a mailer stating a different route was approved for recommendation, it got switched with no direct communication to the residents, the businesses, the churches, and the schools that have negatively been impacted. Now, we are left with serious consequences, potential sinkholes. Dewatering and heavy construction have occurred in our neighborhood within 50 feet of my front door. I have raised this concern through this timeline, and I have been reassured the situation is under control. Yet at a neighborhood meeting in July, a project engineer responded to my question about sinkholes by saying, well, I'm not from Florida, I don't know anything about sinkholes. That response has stayed with me. Who will be accountable if our properties develop sinkholes months or years from now? Who will residents turn to when the construction cooters are gone? I am asking this board to take responsibility for the consequences of this route, establish clear accountability for any future property damage to the residents, and ensure residents receive honest communication and meaningful input decisions like these are ever made again. Our property taxes help fund this project. We deserve transparency, respect, and a voice before the vote, not placations after the damage has been done to our lives and our property. I have videos. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Hiller. Your time is up. Thank you. David Ballard Geddes, Jr.? Hi. Good morning. David Ballard Geddes, Jr. I live on Georgia Avenue in Palm Harbor. Is the unbridled development in the state being conducted for the purpose of eating us out of our subsistence, as written in the Declaration of Independence, unrestrained development intending to purposefully waste and uniformly bankrupt the water supply as based in Article I, Section 8, Clause 4, in a constituted act of sacrilege and blaspheme capturing the water supply in Article I, Section 8, Clause 11, intending to control the will of mankind based on Federalist Paper Number 79 in the materializing of independent, individual, despotic water jurisdictions born under the 14th Amendment, taking our liberty, property, and life claimed as process due. How far is the eminent domain process of this board intending to pursue in the taking of both of our personal and real property in Statute 15303, Section 5, based on the Reclaim Water Variance Application, which also includes the eminent domaining of my religion, Christianity, in its development process of not turning water into wine. Florida Statute 180.08 permits the issuing of mortgage revenue certificates to finance the re-plumbing of all of our residential homes to include reclaimed water for laundry and toilet hookups, to include stormwater vaults to be installed underneath our driveways and to levy into the equity of our homes to pay for it. As Florida is being overdeveloped, are all the newly built homes being outfitted with stormwater vaults and reclaimed water toilets? Is our current government purposefully neglecting conservation measures, currently practicing in half measures, intending to further aggregate the water supply, causing further problems so that they can later on down the road, ad hoc greywater infrastructure, and avail themselves of the added revenue of requiring conservation measures as an afterthought, re-navigating with backbiting charges, levying into the equity of our homes to finance such greywater infrastructure devices, legislatively building up backbiting charges, and violating our constitutional guarantees in their process. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Kedden. Public comment is closed. At this time, we move to consent. Are there any items that board members wish to pull? If not, I'll entertain a motion for approval, and you can cast your vote on screen. Move approval. Second. Okay. We have, Council Member Miranda, if you can go ahead and second on the screen, did you? Very. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Clerk, if you can tally the votes. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Now we move on to our regular agenda, and the first item is the general manager's report. Good morning. Good morning, Madam Chair and members of the board. Today, I'd like to start with just a reminder, the regional system update is usually included in my report, but Mr. Hogg will go to the podium under the presentation D2 and give us the latest, which is, I hear, good news. End of the year true-up is the first thing I'd like to talk about. It's under F8, and so every year at the close of the water year, we tally up, and members either will receive money back or have to pay in a little bit. It's kind of the true-up, and so take a look at that. I also want to mention the Polk Regional Water Cooperative Coordination. As you recall, we had a settlement agreement a few months back with Polk Regional Water. We upgraded our All-A-Fire River Water Use Permit, and as part of the settlement, there was these quarterly cooperative meetings from the district, Polk, and Tampa Bay Water. We had our first quarterly meeting, I think it was in August, Mr. Hogg. He's saying yes, and so the next one is selected for November, and the purpose of the meetings is to have a dialogue with all the parties involved to see if there's any water supply that the Polk could use in the future, just helping them out with some of our advisors to help them with their water supply going forward. If they can find 12 MGD by the year 2032, it would replace them wanting any more water on the All-A-Fire River is the main basis of that. I did want to remind the board that the 2027 Water Conservation and Source Water Protection Grants are out there. We're accepting applications. Anywhere from $2,000 to $10,000, a nonprofit community group, school, or universities could get this grant. Right now, we are evaluating the applications as they're coming in, and that closes in early November, and the goal would be to bring back the recipient awardees in January for that. After this meeting, I just want to let the board know that the legal staffs from all the members and the utility directors and their staffs will be meeting informally to talk about a draft policy for point of connection. So we have a draft out there. We've received comments, and so we would like to chat about how that's coming along. That eventually would be brought back to this board for approval of the policy. And then I'll give you a couple of slides of us out in the community. This is us participating and sponsoring Ignite, which is a science festival hosted by the Great X. And if you can see the picture on the far left, Chair Hanowitz is there. That wasn't that long ago. Our chief operating officer spoke to the St. Pete Rotary Club recently, and I heard that was well attended, over 100 attendees there. And then here's a picture of, you know, I was speaking of the grant awardees. This is one of the grantee awardees last year using some of the funding that they receive. I believe this is Florida Polytechnic University. They got a 5,000 grant to have an environmental engineering day. So there's pictures of that taking place. We also were at the Glazer's birthday bash. We sponsored a hydration station. I think it was their 16th birthday, right? And we had a tour with the Hillsborough County Water Resources Department recently at our surface water treatment plant. And each year we participate in a value water campaign. It's called Imagine a Day Without Water. And it is done to bring attention to the importance of water in our everyday lives. This year we partnered with the Port of Tampa Bay, Tampa International Airport, and Mosey. And then finally, I'd like to show you that I'm on my tour schedule. I go around to all the boards and all the member governments this time of year. And I was at Pinellas County last week. I will be in Pasco tomorrow morning at your board meeting, Pasco County. And then I will be scheduling throughout. And my last one is in the City of St. Pete on January 15th. And with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions. Commissioner Wasthel. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm not sure if it's more appropriate to handle some of the comments that the speaker addressed in item B1 or D4. With that being said, the drive from Brandon this early in the morning is extremely far, and I don't want to keep them here for any more time than necessary. Some of the items were new to me, the issues with trash pickup. I believe that we have a speaker here available. Is that correct, Mr. Carden? I can address some of the things. I would like to hear about them staging on the opposite side of the street. I understand the challenge with the pipeline is that in politics, when someone makes a decision and it's bad, that person answers during voting. And the person that did the pipeline has already been fired by the voters of Hillsborough County. She was fired a couple of years ago, four years ago now. But her decisions have these lingering effects that are just kind of out of my control. I get complaints about the pipeline all the time. I have talked to the construction team. They've reassured me that they can't do anything different and better, which is also very frustrating for my taxpayers. But can we hear, as the board will, can we hear a little bit about what's going on, and if any of those concerns that were just brought up and what resolutions could possibly be made? I will handle the trash pickup question. I know that he can't handle that. But is that available and appropriate to handle right now? Yes. We have Mr. Sam Flowers. He is with Garnie Construction, who is overall seeing the pipeline construction. Mr. Flowers? Yeah, good morning, board members. Sam Flowers. I'm an area manager with Garnie, overseeing the South Hillsborough Pipeline Construction Project as the CMAR. I sit in our field office. I'm involved in the day-to-day operations. I do want to first say that I sympathize with Ms. Hillary's experience of the project so far. It is a very disruptive project to the community, and we recognize that. And I want to assure the board that Garnie and the project team as a whole are committed to minimizing the impacts to the public to the greatest extent possible. The questions about, though, the comments about staging on opposite sides of the street, there was supposed to be a leased property, evidently. Can you speak to any of that? Yeah, so we acquired temporary construction easements on the north side of Ronell. However, there is a right-of-way on the south side of Ronell that we needed to use as well. So I think that's what she's referring to is the use of that right-of-way. And any encroachments beyond the barrier? Have you heard all of these complaints before? That's news to me. As far as I'm aware, we're working within the right-of-way limits and the temporary construction easement limits. Are these complaints going through this hotline that was discussed at the last meeting that this issue was brought up? Do we know what's going on with that hotline? Is it being used? The responses to that hotline? Are these going directly to you? I'll let Michelle Robinson respond to that directly, but I will say that our community coordinators are out there every single day and addressing a lot of these issues. As far as the trash pickup goes, I know there was at least one day where the trucks couldn't get in, and our community coordinators with a loader went around and picked up trash from every resident on Ronell and put it into our own dumpster. Hi, Michelle Robinson, Dialogue Public Relations, working on public engagement and outreach for the project. Some of these issues are handled in the field by the community coordinator. Ms. Hillary has a number, and she communicates directly with them. And then when needed, she communicates through the hotline. We've met with Ms. Hillary on site a couple of times just to check in because where she's located, she is located next to a creek crossing, which is really an intensive and long. It was a longer construction operation, and then she's also next to a street. So she is getting a lot of impact. And after she expressed some of the concerns to us, Garney put a sound mitigating barrier around those pumps, moved the port-a-johns, I believe, correct? So we're trying to work with her, but we understand it's very disrupted. It's a very small road. So you've been trying to actively address many of the complaints that she received. Okay. Just anything that we can do. It's a lot of complaints. And I know this was not y'all's decision and that you also preferred the other route. But anything that we can do to continue to address these issues, I just appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you for addressing Commissioner Walsall's questions and concerns. Okay. I see no other requests to speak on this item. Next up, we have B2, the Pasco County Point of Connection request. This requires a board vote. And Chuck, you're going to present this? Yes. Shortly after the August board meeting, we received a request from the Pasco County Board of County and commissioners wanting or requesting a new point of connection in eastern Pasco County. So we did receive the letter. I believe all of you did. And we are bringing it forth to have the board approve that, which, if approved, will initiate planning and negotiations with the county regarding the new connection. It will take the form of an MOU or a joint project agreement, and it would be back in front of this board at a future date. I believe their letter stated the new POC would be needed by the year 2035. But we keep an eye on growth and demands, and so it could change. But there appears to be adequate time to be able to plan and construct this new POC. Okay. Okay. I see no requests to speak. If there is a motion, if you can voice it and then cast your vote accordingly. I have a motion. Hold on. I lost it there. Second. I think. Oh, there you go. No. For some reason, it's at the top there. So we have a motion to approve by Commissioner Whiteman and a second by Commissioner Wastel. If you can open the machine for voting, please enter your votes and announce a vote clerk. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Next up, we have B3, and this is going to be presented by our general counsel. Kelly. Good morning, everyone. Yes, this is a purchase and sale agreement related to the South Hillsboro pipeline for Hillsboro County ELAP environmental parcels that have a Florida community's trust interest associated with them. The policy we have is for purchase and sale agreements that exceed $400,000 to be brought to the board for approval. This one is the approximate amount of $525,000, but I would like to point out that most of that cost is related to restoration costs and environmental contribution costs given the environmentally sensitive nature of the property. So with that, we ask for approval. Okay. Board members, here's a motion. Move approval. Second. We have a motion by Commissioner Wastel, second by Commissioner Cohen. Clerk, if you can open the machine. Board members, please enter your votes. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you, and thank you, Kelly. Next up, we go to the action items. The first action item is C-1, and this will be presented by Christina. Good morning, Chair and members of the board. Agenda item C-1 is a presentation of the proposed revisions to the agency's purchasing policy, and board action will be requested at the end of the presentation. The existing purchasing policy was approved in August of 2025 and included four revisions. It included increasing the general manager's purchasing approval level to $150,000, increasing the procurement method threshold levels, aligning the competitive purchasing exception amount with the general manager's approval level, and authorizing the general manager to reject any and all bids and proposals. And the current recommended revisions include increasing the delegated approval threshold levels and adding core technology infrastructure systems and services to the aggregate expenditures section. The next two slides will provide a little more detail on these recommendations. The first revision is to increase the executive staff member's approval thresholds that is delegated by the general manager. These changes will align with the level 1 amount to the threshold amount for small purchases in the existing purchasing policy, and will also align the threshold levels 2, 3, and 4 with Florida Statute 287.017 purchasing categories and thresholds. The second revision relates to the board delegated authority to the general manager to approve certain operational expenditures that may exceed $150,000 annually or in aggregate. These expenditures may result from prior board action, may be required by regulatory bodies or by state or federal law, they may be mandated by debt covenants, or may be mandatory for water production. While the individual transactions are handled by the general manager to ensure timely approval and payment, the board maintains oversight by approving the total cost of these expenditures by the annual budget category and receiving the monthly check register as a receive-and-file item in the agenda package. Some of these designated expenditure types are salaries and employee benefits, taxes, utilities, and debt service. The second revision is to add core technology infrastructure systems and services to this list of delegated expenditures. Core technology infrastructure systems and services form the foundational backbone that powers daily operations and secures enterprise data. Adding this category to the delegated expenditure list allows the agency to continue operating efficiently, making real-time decisions, and protect agency data and infrastructure being uninterrupted. These are the two proposed revisions to the agency's purchasing policy. Staff recommends approval of Resolution 2026-003, which adopts the revised purchasing policy. This does conclude my presentation and I'd be happy to answer any questions. Thank you. I see no request to speak. We retain a motion. Move approval. Second. We have a motion and a second. Commissioner Wastel moves. Commissioner Oakley, if you can just second the motion on the machine. There you go. There. Thank you. Okay. Clerk, if you can open the machine for voting for everyone. Please enter your votes, board members. Once they're entered, please announce vote. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you and thank you, Christina. Next up, we have C2. Ms. Arceri, the senior project manager, will be presenting this item and it requires a vote. Good morning. Good morning, Madam Chair and members of the board. My name is Adrienne Arceri and I'm a project manager with Tampa Bay Water. Today, I will be presenting an action item and requesting approval for integrated program management services for the five-year long-term master water plan update due in 2028. The amended and restated interlocal agreement requires the long-term master water plan to be updated every five years to ensure Tampa Bay water has enough water supply over the 20-year horizon. The sixth revision of the plan was last approved by the board in November of 2023, and the next update must be completed no later than November of 2028. At a high level, the plan identifies when new supplies will need to be built by considering demand forecasts, water shortage mitigation strategies, and demand management. The plan also identifies what to build by considering new water supply projects, optimization of existing assets and facilities, where to deliver and how, and public input. There are three components to the master water planning process. Update of the master water plan, the feasibility program and water supply selection, and design and construction of the project or portfolio that is selected. This complete cycle typically takes about 10 years. These are overlapping cycles, reflective of the iterative, adaptive nature of master water planning. Right now, we are in the construction phase of the long-term master water plan for 2028 demands. The feasibility program and water supply selection phase of the 2033 projected demands. And we're about to commence the five-year update of the long-term master water plan to address 2038 projected demands. The long-term master water plan update will identify, evaluate, and shortlist potential new water supply options to support feasibility studies, project development, and long-term capital improvements planning. Black & Veatch serves as Tampa Bay Water's integrated program manager and will support staff in the development of the five-year update of the long-term master water plan, providing program management coordination and technical support throughout the planning process. Professional services required for the long-term master water plan update include water demand forecasting and future needs assessment, development of the universe of potential future water supply alternatives, course and fine screening of project concepts, identification, feasibility assessments, and shortlisting of new water supply concepts, co-authoring, along with Tampa Bay Water staff, of the long-term master water plan report, public information and stakeholder engagement activities, and coordination with ongoing planning and technical initiatives. Staff is recommending board approval of work assignment number 36 with Black & Veatch in the amount of $1,853,941. This concludes my presentation. I'll be happy to answer any questions. Thank you. I don't see any requests to speak if there is a motion on the floor. Move approval. Second. We have a motion by Commissioner Wassel, second by Commissioner Cohen. Clerk, if you can open the machine. Board numbers please enter your votes. Clerk, please announce the vote once votes are entered. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you. Next up we have C3. Ms. Molina Oyola is going to be presenting. She's a senior project manager. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning, Madam Chair and members of the board. I am Karine Molina Oyola, project manager here at Tampa Bay Water. Agenda item C3 is an action item and at the end of this presentation, I will be requesting your approval of the contract amendment with Veolia for the interim pilot implementation and operation services in support of the surface water treatment plant water quality pilot study. The surface water treatment plant water quality pilot study, best known as the pilot project, was approved by this board back in April to prepare Tampa Bay water for meeting the EPA PFAS compliance requirements. Following approval of the project concept, the board also approved an amendment for Veolia to initiate the design of an interim pilot plant and the design of a permanent pilot plant at the site. To support compliance with the EPA requirements, this project will be implemented using a structured approach consisting of two paths. This slide provides a high level overview of this approach. Each path follows its own timeline which will be outlined later in the presentation. The interim pilot path on the left side consists of a 12-month evaluation of near-term PFAS treatment technologies using granulated activated carbon and ion exchange under existing plant conditions. Because these systems can be connected to the operating facility with relatively limited modifications. This path allows Tampa Bay water to begin performance monitoring early and support readiness for EPA compliance. In parallel, the permanent pilot path on the right side will advance through design, permitting, and construction of a dedicated pilot facility. Unlike the interim pilot, this will be a multi-processed system designed to replicate the full-scale treatment plant processes, allowing Tampa Bay water to evaluate both current and emerging treatment technologies, optimize treatment performance, and assess future treatment objectives, including total organic carbon removal. Because of its complexity, this permanent pilot plant requires additional time to develop, making it essential for us to pursue both paths concurrently. This timeline shows how the two project tracks will advance over the near term, beginning with the approval of the design services by this board back in April of this year, and followed by the amendment 21 being presented today for implementation and operation services of the interim pilot. In parallel, the permanent pilot plant will continue to advance through permitting and final design by the end of this year, while the construction and operations scope of the permanent pilot plant will be brought to the board separately in the spring of 2027. Moving on. This summarizes the proposed contract amendment costs under the existing Veolia operations and maintenance contract that supports the implementation and operations services of the interim pilot scope, which includes physical demolition required to prepare the interim pilot site along with the interim pilot installation itself, the startup operations and maintenance, a 12-month operations for data collection, and the conceptual design report for a future full-scale PFAS treatment facility, while it also facilitates for the early procurement of long-lead equipment associated to the permanent pilot. The total amendment is in the amount of $1.98 million, which includes $1.24 million in implementation and operations services, and $735,000 in owner's allowance for additional professional services and procurement of equipment necessary to support the pilot program. Now, this is a longer-term view of the interim pilot scope and how it supports future full-scale PFAS treatment at the site. The first bar shows the commencement of the interim pilot that includes the design scope, followed by the implementation and operations services being presented today. Operations of the interim pilot are anticipated to continue through the spring of 2028. The full-scale PFAS treatment design and construction effort is planned to begin in 2028 upon completion of the conceptual design report from this interim pilot, and will advance toward the anticipated April 2031 compliance deadline. And with that, staff request approval of the negotiated agreement with Veolia for the interim pilot implementation and operations services in the amount of $1.98 million, inclusive of $735,000 for owner's allowances. And this concludes my presentation. I'm happy to take any questions. Thank you. Commissioner Hostel. Thank you. I figured since Commissioner Eggers isn't here to ask questions on every item, I would at least ask one. Could you refresh my memory on where we're at on the PFAS ruling? I mean, have they figured out the standards concretely at this point? Is that actually done? Just before I start voting yes on spending any money on it, I want to understand. Good morning, Chair, members of the Board. To answer your question, Commissioner, the EPA is currently still has their proposed rule extension. That proposed rule extension will be finalized according to them by December of this year. Once that happens, then we have firm word that the compliance deadline will be 2031. That's where we're at right now. So we're still working on an if and a maybe? It's, yeah, it's a maybe, but it's a very good maybe. I just want to be clear about that because I'm not voting yes to spend money to rely on the federal government to do anything. So, is it still, it could change and then all of a sudden we are not required to do this? The only way that could happen is the outcome of the litigation that has been brought forth by AWWA and that there was a, there was a, a hearing a couple of months back in September. Okay. And we're waiting for the judicial review and, and, and completion of that decision. That's now anticipated to be early next year. So then is there a sense of urgency for us to start spending money today instead of waiting for something that could prevent us from unnecessarily spending money? Yes, Commissioner, we'll still, um, what we're doing is spending some pre dollars before construction to get us in line to be able to make that deadline. So if that is the deadline, so that we're working on the design efforts for these treatments and the interim piloting to see what is that we need to do exactly. We would not proceed spending construction dollars, uh, if something changed drastically, we will know that answer before we would start spending, but these would go on the shelf to be implemented if we needed to, uh, if we didn't start this work and they, they didn't change their minds and we would be hard pressed to make, make those deadlines for it by letting this time elapse that we could be doing the pre-work. I'm only being clear because I'm counting votes and mine puts you on the margin. Um, if I say no and, and, and that's, it does, it does sound like there's still a real chance, especially since one, one court already ruled against the EPA. It got overturned eventually, but now if they bring it in a different jurisdiction and they prevail, then what, we're still in limbo. That's, that's where we're at. I just want to point out that currently the regulations that are in effect say that we need to make compliance by April of 2029. The proposed rule is for an, an extension of that deadline to 2031. That's the regulatory process. From everything we've read is a very good chance that that proposed rule will in fact pass. And so that there'll be an extended deadline from 2029 to 2031. The PFAS that we address in this project is, is one that's called PFOS. That's the one of most interest to us here in this region. Yeah. The organic compounds. Yes. So that's not changing. Okay. Okay. Unless, unless the, the, the court case drives that change. But based on the exchange of the judges and the attorneys, it's unlikely that that would happen. But we won't know for sure until the ruling comes. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you. I don't see any of the requests to speak. Is there a motion on this item? Approval. No motion to approve by Commissioner Cohen. Is there a second? Second. We have a second by council member Miranda. Clerk, if you can open the machine for voting. Board members, please enter your votes. Once you're, everyone's voted, you please tally announce the vote. Motion passes five to one. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, we have items C4, C5, and C6 that are going to be presented by Mr. Hogg. Hi, Warren, and I believe after each item, we're going to, you're going to stop for approval. Good morning, Madam Chair, members of the board. Um, I would like to cover the next three items in a single presentation, but as you mentioned, I will stop for board consideration and request approval at the end of each item. We continue to look for and acquire unused and unneeded permit capacity in Southern Hillsborough County from landowners, where their properties are transitioning from typically agriculture to residential or utility land use. We have two of these acquisition agreements this morning be covered in the first two items. And then we'll have an, uh, an item requesting approval of modification of our bomb farm permit to accept the water from these two new and one existing agreement. Damari Ruskin LLC owns property that's shown in red on the map, which is located just to the west of our bomb farm permit. The property owned by Damari has been used for agriculture and is currently transitioning to residential land use. They have identified 93,400 gallons per day that they no longer need that can be acquired by Tampa Bay Water. Our staff met with the Swift Mud Regulation staff, Hillsborough County and EPC and Damari in September to confirm the transfer process and the quantities. The negotiated agreement attached to this item specifies the transfer of 93,400 gallons per day will be permanently retired from their permit and available to transfer to our bomb farm permit. The groundwater modeling analysis indicates that this transfer would give us an increase of almost 91,000 gallons per day on our water use permit. This transfer meets the net benefit requirement of the water management district and reduces those aquifer impacts by 10% when the transfer is complete. The cost of the acquisition is $3.83 per gallon of capacity acquired. As I talked to you in prior agreements, this is based on the $2 per gallon for which the agency acquired permits and capacity from the members back in 1998 and in Carol Wood in 2004. That $2 has been adjusted by the consumer price index and the agreement is for a total of $357,722 plus up to $50,000 of verified transaction cost for execution of the legal documents and for the water use permit application. Our staff have a high degree of confidence in this acquisition and transfer based on the groundwater modeling analysis and our prior transactions with and discussions with the district. Our staff recommends approval of the negotiated agreement with the Mari Ruskin LLC to acquire the permitted capacity that I've just described. Thank you. I don't see any requests to speak if there is a motion if you can announce it and cast your vote accordingly. I'll move approval and I'll just make a comment. We have a motion by Commissioner Wassel, second by Commissioner Cohen. Commissioner Wassel, you have the floor. I'll just make a personal note that Demare Family Farms is one of the last remaining and almost century pioneer tomato farmers in Hillsborough County. In a couple of years, they'll be farming the same land for over a hundred years, but they're selling because of NAFTA and all of the regulations that exist against our agricultural community. It's unfortunate. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We have a motion and a second. Clerk, if you can open the machine for voting. Court numbers, please enter your votes. Clerk of Cowley announced votes once votes are entered. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Mr. Hogg. Mr. Hogg. We have a second agreement today to acquire permitted water supply capacity from the Tampa Electric Company, which will be covered in agenda presentation C5. Tampa Electric Company owns property shown in red southwest of the Baum Farm permit in South Hillsborough County. This property has been used for agriculture in the past and is currently transitioning to utility use as a solar farm. Tampa Electric Company. Tampa Electric has identified 91,134 gallons per day from their permit that's no longer needed and available for transfer to our permit. We met with the water management district. We met with the water management district staff, Hillsborough County EPC and Tampa Electric in September, confirmed the process and the quantity for acquisition and transfer. The negotiated agreement specifies that 91,134 gallons per day will be permanently retired from the Tampa Electric Permit and can be transferred to our Baum Farm permit. The modeling analysis indicates that we can achieve about 94,400 gallons per day of increase to our permit based on the transfer, which also leaves water for the environment through the net benefit transfer. The impacts to the Florida aquifer will be reduced. The unit acquisition cost is, as I described for the prior agreement and the total price is $349,043 plus up to $50,000 in related transaction costs that will be verified by staff. Again, we have a high degree of confidence in the process and our predictions for the transfer quantities. Our staff recommends approval of the agreement with Tampa Electric Company to acquire 91,134 gallons per day to transfer to our permit. Thank you. I don't see any requests to speak. Move approval. We have a motion by Commissioner Walsko. Is there a second? Commissioner Miranda is second. Clerk, if you can open the machine for voting. Board members, please enter your votes. Clerk, tally announce the vote once they're entered. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. C-6. Mr. Mayor. Thank you. C-6. Mr. Hogg. The companion item, C-6, is to modify our Balm Farm Water Use Permit to receive the water to be acquired through the two prior agreements and one from Farmland Reserve that I'll describe in a moment. The Balm Farm Permit is located on the AgMart property that was purchased by Hillsborough County a few years ago. And this permit, the Balm Farm Permit, is the recipient for the water acquired from Farmland Reserve, Damari Ruskin, and Tampa Electric Company. The previous acquisitions from Land Reserve and Farmland Reserve have increased our permit to about 3.72 million gallons per day. And the three donor permits, Tico, Damari, and Farmland Reserve, are shown in red. Balm Farm property is shown in yellow on this map. The properties are located in the most impacted area of the Southern Water Use Caution Area where water is not available unless a net benefit is provided for the aquifer. For these three acquisitions, that net benefit will be provided and impacts to the aquifer will be reduced by 10%. The acquisition from Farmland Reserve is covered in an agreement that the board approved and executed in 2025. There were five permits under that agreement. Four of them have already been transferred. The fifth permit quantity is now available and ready for transfer. The quantity that we can transfer is based on the historical use on these properties and the modeled result transferring from one site to the other. A total of 367,900 gallons a day will be added to our Balm Farm Permit based on the coordinated transfer for these three permits to ours. And the total that we should achieve is about 4.09 million gallons per day from our Balm Farm Permit. With the next acquisition, hopefully next year, we would then rename this the South Hillsboro Wellfield Permit. Our staff coordinated with Farmland Reserve, Tampa Electric, and Amari Ruskin, Hillsboro County Agencies, to develop this water use permit application package. It was reviewed at a pre-application meeting in September with all parties in the district and all questions or concerns raised or have been addressed in these permit application documents. Our staff recommends approval of the permit application to Swift Mud to modify the Balm Farm Permit to increase the annual average quantity to 4.09 million gallons per day. This permit is a primary environmental permit as defined by the amended and restated interlocal agreement. If the board approves this today, we would hold the application for 30 days to allow Hillsboro County and the EPC of Hillsboro County to decide if they choose arbitration or not before filing with the district. I'd be happy to answer questions. Thank you. I see no request to speak at this time. Is there a motion on the floor? Move approval. We have a motion by Commissioner Waskell, second by Councilmember Miranda. If you can open the machine for voting clerk. Board members, please enter your votes. Clerk can tell and announce the vote once they're entered. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. And our last action item, Warren, you're still with us. I am still here. Good morning again, Madam Chair, members of the board. This is an action item for approval of environmental monitoring and assessment contracts for the 10 well fields covered in the consolidated water use permit. And we'll be requesting board approval of these five contracts at the end of this short presentation. The consolidated permit requires us to monitor and assess the environmental conditions around these 10 well fields shown on the map. The existing contracts expired at the end of September of this year. And these new contracts will continue the permit required monitoring through the end of water year 2030. We followed the agency procurement procedure to solicit proposals for the new contracts. 50 consulting firms downloaded the solicitation documents. And we received timely submittals from 10 of those firms. Our staff evaluated all responses against the published technical scoring criteria. And we judged that five respondents were qualified to perform the work that we advertised. Our staff assigned the advertised work to these five highest rated consulting firms based on their experience and their stated priority preference for individual well fields. Our staff negotiated scopes of work and fee schedules with these firms to conduct the permit required monitoring as shown in the table. The work for Cypress Creek and Crossbar Ranch will be combined into one contract. And the monitoring services for the five Northwest Hillsborough area well fields will be combined into a second contract. Our staff recommends approval of these five contracts to complete the permit required work in the amounts listed in the agenda item and the prior slide. We'd be happy to answer questions. Thank you. I don't see any requests to speak. Entertain a motion if there is one. Approved approval. Second. Commissioner Cohen with a motion to approve. Second by Commissioner Waskell. Commissioner Waskell. I just didn't want to do it again. Look, I mean, you're working hard today on the motion. I appreciate the response. Machines open for voting. Board members please enter the votes. Clerk, Talley announce the votes. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Okay. We get to presentations and reports. The first item is D1. This is the city of Tampa. And this is Mr. Jones with the water department. He's the director of city of Tampa joining us this morning. Good morning. Good morning, board members. And I was going to let Warren give our update as well, but he left too early. He was on the, he was on the run. I am Rory Jones with the city of Tampa. And the last time I provided Tampa's update, I spent quite a bit of time on the projects we were building. This, this time around, I wanted to show you a little different part of the work. Show how our system operates and interdependencies among, among all the different resources. But fair warning, my presentation is not as interesting or creative as John Palanchard. So you're going to have to hang with me on this one. I'll start with a little context thing, then get into the decisions. First, a quick overview of our physical system. Then I'll show how our water sources work together both to serve our customers and to support the river below the dam. From there, we'll walk through the drought timeline, what we learned from the coordination and communication, and what we're working on next. Here's the obligatory system overview, and I'll keep it brief. We serve over 744,000 customers across 220 square miles. More than 2200 miles of pipe. Pipe sizes range from 2 to 54 inch. The Hillsborough River is our primary source of water. Tampa Bay water and our aquifer storage, or ASR system, is our secondary sources. The important part for today is how those sources interact. Let me start with a simplified picture of our normal day, normal ideal day, when river flows are supporting our needs and water quantity is not an issue. Here's a schematic that I hope helps to simplify it, and I'll build up the flow paths one step at a time and highlight the sources that I'm talking about. It starts with the rainfall in the Green Swamp watershed, which feeds the Upper Hillsborough River, where the rain falls matters, not just where it rains in Tampa. If it falls south of our dam, we don't get an opportunity to harvest or collect. That water moves downstream to the Hillsborough River reservoir. This is the source water for our treatment plant, and the USGS stream flow gauges along that flow path are the variables that we really watch closely as conditions change. We pump from the reservoir into the David L. Tippin Water Treatment Facility, our 100-year-old treatment plant, where we treat up to a max day of 120 million gallons. From the plant, we pump treated water into our distribution system and out to our customers. That demand we have to meet every day, regardless of the weather or stream conditions. When river conditions and permit limits and plant capacity allow, we also send treated water to our ASR system, aquifer storage and recovery system wells. This is how we collect water for that dry day. We inject the treated water underground. The ASR system has up to 1.2 billion gallons of permitted storage capacity. The amount we can actually recover depends on the quality and operating conditions. So storage capacity and dependable, usable supply are not quite the same thing. During ideal times, the river flows greatly exceed what we're using and storing, and water passes over the dam into the lower Hillsborough River and eventually out to the bay there. Now let's look at what changes during a drought. The system is the same, but the amount of water coming into it is not. So we have to use alternate water sources. Our customers still need water. We still have a reservoir and a treatment plant, but we have to keep comparing what water is coming in with what water is going out to balance those different resources. Here we're illustrating the loss of reliable rainfall-driven inflow. That doesn't mean every upstream source falls to zero. It just means the natural inflow is not sustaining what our customers' demands are. One of our first supplemental options is recovered water we previously stored in ASR. That water returns to the tip and plant for treatment again before going out to customers. But it is a finite supply, and water quality can limit recovery before the stored volume is exhausted. We saw that in this most recent drought. Another option is purchasing raw water through our arrangement with tempeh water. When it is available, middle pool water is pumped around that S-161 there towards the middle of the screen. Through the Harnikau pump station and into the reservoir, we can draw it into the plant. This is an important supply path for us, separate from finished water purchases. Its availability really depends on pool levels, water quality, and other various operating limits. We also purchase finished water from tempeh water through our Morse Bridge interconnection. That water comes into our distribution system and helps serve customers and augment our sources. These are not rigid steps where we have to exhaust one source before using the other. They can overlap, and we coordinate the mix based on what is available, what the system needs, and what each shorts can support. Serving our customers is one responsibility. We also have a responsibility to the health of the river below the dam. The minimum flows and levels requirements, or MFLs, support the lower river's ecology and salinity conditions by maintaining water releases downstream. That responsibility remains during a drought, so we have to consider it alongside drinking water supply and available sources. Sulfur Springs and Blue Sink are two of the sources we use for that downstream support. Blue Sink connects into the Sulfur Springs pipeline, and the water is delivered to the flume just below the dam. The contribution depends on how much water is available and its salinity or water quality. That water enters the lower river below the dam. When those sources can provide the needed support, they reduce what otherwise has to be released from our drinking water reservoir. The flow continues out to Tampa Bay. When the springs are not enough, the middle pool becomes an additional option for us. The north side transfer pumps move water around S-161 into Harney Canal on the reservoir. We can then use our low flow control gate there at the dam to release water to support that lower river MFL. It's different from water kind of spilling over the dam. It's a slow and calculated release. When needed and available, the lower pool water can be pumped upstream of S-162 to replenish the middle pool, and it then follows the same route towards the reservoir and controlled release below the dam. There are limits on levels. Pumping and the sequence of operation is not a simple matter of having water somewhere in the canal. We can kind of shift things around. This is a simplified whole picture and a change in one part of the system changes what we need from another. Lower springs, spring flows can increase the reservoirs downstream responsibility. Lower canal levels can reduce our supplemental options. Water quality can limit ASR and customer demand and MFL needs continue through all of it. That's why we need to watch the system together and stay closely coordinated with Tempe water and the district. Now, let me give you a little brief recap of the current drought timeline and our decisions. First, I'll rewind the clock a bit further back to the previous drought in 2023. I wanted to highlight an important decision we made during that timeframe that has really helped us out ever since. Across the bottom, you'll see some general tracking gauges here. I've got the city's reservoir elevation. Essentially, that's the river. Our seven-day average demand, the volume of Bill Young, and our fiscal year purchases, finished water purchases from Tempe Bay water. That last purchase calendar kind of resets every fiscal year as well. In December 2023, once per week watering restrictions began, that set up the decision we made the following year. In August 2024, City of Tampa Council made once per week watering permanent within the city. Thankfully, we had this extra conservation measure in place. This saved us approximately five MGD every day since enacting and put us in a better position to handle our current drought. When the regional order ended that October, we kept our local restrictions. We were able to quickly build storage and put us in a little bit better position to handle this go-around. Now, fast-forward to our recent drought. September 2025, a new dry period was developing, and we didn't know how severe it would get. The regional reservoir still held about 14.5 billion gallons at month end, while Tampa's seven-day demand average was about 91.5 million gallons a day. It was worth noticing. Storage looks strong. We were heading into drier conditions with substantial demand. And uncharacteristically, we began buying water from Tampa Bay water, finished water from them at the fiscal term. The district declared phase one in November, effective December 1st. That order did not really change any allowable watering schedules, just put people on alert. And thankfully, our once-per-week policy was already in place. We continued reinforcing conservation while watching local conditions and continue to draw on regional reserves. Bill Young was trending downward at this point, about 12.9 billion gallons in this snapshot. In January, the district declared modified phase two with a region-wide once-per-week watering returning February 8th. By then, the Bill Young was down to about 9 billion gallons. And in this snapshot, our local reservoir is around 21.5 feet. It doesn't really show you the volatility of our reservoir elevation swings. A small rain event can really swing things drastically in that reservoir for us. As conditions tightened, we worked closely with Tampa Bay water in the district on additional operating flexibility. Elevations within the middle pool began to drop below permitted thresholds. And in March, the district issued an emergency order allowing the middle pool to be lowered from 12 feet to 10 feet, subject to safeguards as well. That kept a raw water source available longer for drinking water and MFLs, rather than losing access to the normal operating limit. This was a coordinated effort between Tampa Bay water, the city, and the district. And we appreciate that work that went into making that option available. Five days later, the district declared modified phase three effective April 3rd. And once-per-week watering continued with tighter hours and stronger enforcement requirements. By this point, the regional storage was below 40%. The response was becoming more intense on both sides, and our MFL sources were increasingly becoming less reliable, which drove us to continue purchasing finished water from Tempe, further taxing the regional resources. In April, Tempe water, the city, and the district worked to extend the use of the lower pool via emergency order. Similar to the middle pool, this added the ability to lower the lower pool from 6 feet to 4 feet, again with additional structural safeguards as well. This was critical because the springs for MFLs were also under stress and not dependable. Keeping the lower pool water helped preserve a source for downstream MFL support, instead of putting that full additional responsibility on the reservoir and the regional water supply. At this point, the drought was affecting several sources at the same time, not just our Hillsborough River. A separate district emergency order helped us address the seasonal increase in MFL releases. It temporarily kept the MFL base flow at 20 cubic feet per second, instead of the usual spring increase to 24 CFS, with the freshwater equivalent kind of retained in that as well. That reduced the additional spring obligation while supplies were constrained. It really didn't eliminate the obligation to meet that MFL need though. And this was a separate from the middle and lower pool flexibility. Extending access to the pools did not automatically extend the spring flow relief. The district's June 5th emergency order extension kept the existing pool flexibility through October 1st. The benefit was the continued source option, not permission to lower the pools further. By this snapshot, the regional reservoir was around 20% full. Tampa's fiscal year finished water purchases had reached a little over about 2.4 billion gallons. That total stays level in the timeline from here on out because we did see some rain that really helped out. But we did continue transferring there at the Harney Canal. The district also extended Phase 3 through October 1st. Bill Young was down to about 2.4 billion gallons or 16%. And Tampa's seven-day demand average was about 83 million gallons a day. We had received some rain, but it had not restored any sort of reserves. So we could not treat a few improved days as the end of the end of the problem. It's important to note that had Tampa not enacted the one-day-per-week watering restriction, we would have likely contributed to an additional drawdown of 650 million gallons to 700 million gallons from the Bill Young reservoir. And from what I recall, the low point of the reservoir was 2.1 billion gallons. You take off that additional demand that we would have had had we not had the one-day-per-week water restriction and would have put it less than a million and a half. I mean, Paul would have been fishing and de-fishing the reservoir there. By September, the conversation was really shifting from stretching these sources to rebuilding storage. We worked with Tempeh Water and the district on additional harvesting flexibility. Tempeh supported lowering the rivers over the dam discharge threshold from 100 to 40 cubic feet per second. Gave them a little bit smaller window to pull water at those lower flow periods. The purpose was to give, really, Tempeh Water more opportunity to capture that flow. Earlier in the drought, the close coordination with Tempeh Water and the district helped us preserve options for our sources. As conditions changed, the same coordination was extended to help support regional recovery. In September, the district extended the phase three restrictions through March 31st, 2027. Storage continued improving, but Bill Young was still only a little over half full at the snapshot. The district also extended the emergency orders that continued the flexibility of the pools. These orders were put in place to help us react quicker should the need arise. It was about being proactive rather than reactive as we approach this next dry season. That brings us to the October update. Using October 11th, you see this snapshot here, but I believe as of yesterday, I wrote down some numbers. Bill Young was up to almost 12.4 billion gallons. We're continuing to store away in our ASR system, but we are significantly behind at this moment. Our current operating position is clearly better. Our focus remains conservation, rebuilding that storage when conditions allow, and keeping the coordination going. If I had to boil down this experience into one takeover way, it would be good communication. Not just sharing numbers, but sharing what we thought those numbers meant while the situation was developing. First, stronger partnerships. We met weekly with Warren, Paul, Chuck to compare what we were seeing locally with the Tampa Bay waters regional perspective. We could raise concerns early and talk through how operating change on one side could affect the other. Those conversations were valuable during the decline, and they remain valuable when working together looking on additional opportunities. Through this drought process, we created a casual briefing for our mayors and council members. This was a weekly email that summarized the state of the river. This briefing was shared with Tim Bay Water, with the district, and other various stakeholders. This state of the river update gave our leadership and council, and really all who were recipients, a look behind the curtain a bit, and an understanding of our mindset and the decisions that were in front of us. That helped us create a shared responsibility for the region's water. Conservation became a message they were enthusiastic to help carry forward rather than something coming only from the water department. Our voice and our reach got much bigger, and it made decision making easier. When we needed support for operating change or emergency order, people had already seen the conditions develop. The request did not appear to be a knee-jerk reaction. It did not mean everyone had to agree with every detail. It meant we could start from a common understanding, and that is something we want to carry going forward. This is a partial screenshot of that state of the river update. You know, this along with a commentary-type email, really informal, casual. We started off these with three short takeaways, then backed them up with simple color-coded key indicator table with explanations. This example is from July. It shows the previous reading, the current reading, the direction of the trend, our comments, and I think most importantly, the why it matters. For example, lower reservoir level was not just a number. We explained what it meant for available supply and what we were watching next. The same table could show no finished water purchases while Harney transfers were still providing regional support. As I mentioned, we shared the updates with the mayor, council, and our leadership in Tampa Bay Water and the district. We wanted people to understand the situation as it developed, so an important call would not come out of nowhere. That helped us raise conservation awareness. Council members kept sharing the same messages with their constituents, and the support went beyond messaging. We developed a program to help some of our highest irrigation users in converting them over to reclaim the water. Mayor Castor personally called customers to encourage them to participate. At one point, I believe she had an overseas trip that got delayed, and she reached out asking for that list again. She had some unexpected time and started making some phone calls going down that list while sitting and waiting for her flight. I can only imagine getting a phone call from the mayor asking me to switch over to reclaims. I'd be on board. We had great support, and it was largely because of the communication aspect. That's really what I mean by the shared responsibility. It was not just the water department working on the response. It was the team working on the response. There are also some challenges that better rainfall cannot resolve for us. Sulfur Springs is getting saltier, and we anticipate needing to reduce, potentially stop, relying on that for lower Hillsborough River MFL support. Blue Sink presented a different problem. During the drought, its level dropped out intermittently, and we couldn't count on a continuous contribution from that source. The downstream MFL responsibility remains. Unless we have another dependable source available, more of that water has to come from the Hillsborough River or the regional water supply. The same source we use for our customers. It is not necessarily that the requirement is increasing for the MFLs. It's the reservoir's share of meat that could increase. That's one of the challenges behind our recent permit renewal work. Our intent is to maintain Tampa's existing 82 million gallon per day annual average potable allocation identified within the interlocal agreement, while building more dependable support for the lower river. That is not a daily demand proposal for additional potable allocation, though. During wet conditions, there may be an eligible flow we can capture after immediate needs, downstream protections, and after Tampa Bay waters, regional needs are addressed. I pulled up our SCADA system here as I walked in. Right now we have 330 million gallons of water going over the dam that could help us if we can capture that and store it in our ASR system. We can store that water in our ASR and recover it later to help offset the contributions for MFL support in full or partial flows. We may lose from the springs rather than place that additional demand on the reservoir during dry conditions. ASR is not new. The work establishing what additional CISL capture and environmental use can be authorized and how it is accounted for is. We still have to resolve storage, recovery, water quality, and operating priorities with the district and the Tampa Bay water. We want to work through those questions before a source becomes unavailable. The permit renewal is a relatively near-term regulatory piece. We will soon be kicking off our first water resources master plan. That will give us a broader framework and outlook. It looks 20 years out with updates intended every five years. We will consider conservation, minimum flows and levels, river health, source reliability, storage and regional partnerships together rather than treating each separately and separate issues. The water resources master plan has two main goals and that's increase the city's ability to meet the lower Hillsborough River minimum flows and levels and improve the resiliency of the city's water supply within its permitted quantity limits. The plan is not a commitment to one solution already selected. We're looking at an honest look at our needs and how we meet them through evaluating policies, programs, and projects within our permitted supply framework. We want to carry the same communication approach into that work. Involve our partners, the leadership community while the options are taking shape, not just when it's time to make a decision. To wrap it up, these are some of our next practical steps. First, we want to complete our water use permit renewal and work through the seasonal capture and ASR questions I briefly shared. Second, keep advancing our pipes capital improvements. Available water is only part of the reliability. We need dependable infrastructure to treat and deliver it. Third, complete our various master plans so our projects, operations, and long-term resource decisions are working towards the same needs. And finally, revisit rates through the appropriate process to keep our long-term infrastructure program sustainable. That discussion will follow all our master plans, sometimes a couple years from now. And throughout that, we will continue the regular coordination, clear updates that helped us manage this drought. That's basically it, and thank you. We appreciate the time, cooperation from Tempe Water, the district, and our fellow member governments. Chuck, Paul, Warren, Kathleen, thank you guys for the continued dialogue and working through these decisions in challenging times. With that, happy to take any questions you guys may have. Thank you, Mr. Jones, for that in-depth report from Tampa. Commissioner Wastel. Thank you. Good presentation. I saw your comments about communication and asking for the community partners. I do want to ask about the reality of really the thing that's talked about the most in the city of Tampa is improving the skyline, improving the skyline, improving the skyline. Build, build, build. Massive buildings are going up right now in the city of Tampa. What internal communications do you have? It's an interesting thing when I first got here, and Warren answered, and correctly so, about what is Tampa Bay Water's involvement in communicating certificates of occupancy? And legislatively, Tampa Bay Water's authority is only to meet the mandates, which is an interesting misnomer because they have no say-so in yes or no. We just went through a record drought. You said that you want to keep the city at 82 MGD, and I appreciate that. But what's the reality of that when they're exploding the skyline? Like, what dialogue? Have you ever denied the certificate of occupancy? Not that I know of, that we've denied any COs, but we do work closely with Tampa Bay Water and the projections, and we're continuing to ramp up our conservation efforts. It is a real concern that we have long term. Okay. I only ask because Commissioner Cohen has heard me say this many times ad nauseum. I represent 100% of the city of Tampa residents because I'm countywide. That's something that's often forgotten about in Hillsborough County. I don't have the authority, though. I don't have the legislative authority to really intercede or interject even on development decisions that the city of Tampa makes. We've done a good job in Unincorporated of quashing most of the really dense multifamily that exploded the four years before I got there. But I do find it interesting. It's a political issue that you have no authority over, and it would be very unattractive as a director of the agency. You're the supplier for the city. You're technically the person that has the authority to say, hey, the skyline is potentially a problem as we're going into a very dry season. As you said, we're kind of behind. We're on our hills on conservation. We're behind the ball. But it would be a very politically unattractive thing for you who is an employee of the city who has aspirations for exploding the skyline to make the hard decision of, as the supplier, to say, no, we can't do that. And I wonder if we're close to that timeframe of saying, you know what? The river is just not doing as well. Sulphur Springs is getting saltier. And I'm going to have to follow back up with you on the Blue Sink. Is that your... Blue Sink, yes. ...ARS? ASR, yes. ASR? Okay. I understand what it is now. I don't want you to answer because I understand that that's a politically charged question and comment. But I hope that my point is made, though, because it seems contradictory when all that you hear about is density, density, density, exploding density, residential 100, residential 60, which are not things that we have in unincorporated Hillsborough. So I don't know. It's tough sitting on this board, who's also technically a supplier, and we're saying, hey, we need to look at more regional support for us exploding the skyline in the city of Tampa. But we don't have the authority to say no. I guess, what, do we seek counsel from Swift Mud? I mean, are they the ultimate authority on permitting? I mean, this is where strong partnerships and dialogue with Tampa Bay Water and their team come into play. We really aren't adding to our pull from the river anything above and beyond 82. This is really trying to maximize what we have in conservation efforts. And to be honest, as things have gotten more dense, we see per capita drop. So we don't have any new, necessarily new land in the city of Tampa. It's just going to become more dense. And I'm hopeful that per capita continues to drop with that denser. But usage goes up. Those lawns go, those lawns drop off as well. So 50% of our use is coming through irrigation or spraying potable water onto lawns. And as the density increases, we're seeing that continue to drop. Well, how are you going to handle, for instance, the explosive development for the Hillsborough County site? The Hillsborough Community College site. No longer community. Sorry. Hillsborough College site. So again, that's factored into the development, growth and development planning effort. But we will include that in our projection demands. Anything above and beyond that too, 82, really falls to Tampa Bay Water. And so we're working closely with them. Our plans really here are to help shore up the 82 below 82. You know, during times like this, the river doesn't support 82. But you, I think you just unintentionally pointed to my issue, which is your comment that anything over 82 follows to Tampa Bay Water. Yes. Who does not have the authority to say no. But they do have that robust planning effort that we are looking at land use and potential development of properties and incorporate it into their master planning effort. So I believe the last I saw, and of course, I think some of the consultants are here, but I think 2033, they were looking to develop that new resource. Am I correct in saying that? Yes. Okay. So it is on the horizon. They do know about this. They do have some wonderful forecasting modeling that they're planning for that growth. Now. But, for instance, the 100 acres on the Hillsborough College, no one planned for or knew about or had any inkling that the state was going to allow that to be. I'll just, when I start, I, I, we're, we're viewing off track and. I hear the concerns though. I hear the concerns. When I start, when I start getting in a conversation where it's just talking in circles, I realize I'm never going to get my clear answer. But I think that my question went unanswered because the answer is a very unattractive answer. Nobody could have planned, for instance, for the 100 acres of Hillsborough College. That wasn't on anybody's radar to be that densely developed. No one had that crystal ball. Yeah. With that much new water usage. Right. Which is the whole conversation. But I thought you did a very good presentation. So I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner. I mean, council member Miranda. Well, thank you for the upgrade, but let me just say this. I really appreciate your, your, you know, I've never seen it. You said it just like it was, and you have to understand something back in 1998. We didn't have Tampa Bay water going full speed like we have now. However, the cities of St. Pete, Newport Ritchie, Tampa, County of Pasco, Pinellas, and Hillsborough didn't have the problem either. We had very few people here compared to what we have today. So somehow everybody wanted to move this area. So I'm blaming all of you. So what I'm saying is this. Look how far we've come that the city of Tampa's 82 million gallon. I guarantee it was back in the 80s when we got the 82 million. It was 62 something when we had less than half a million people, whatever it was. We don't have that now. We don't have half a million now. So I correct myself. It was something like 250,000 people. We had a permit of 60 million gallons a day, whatever it was. And now we have 82. However, the whole area has grown, not the city of Tampa. If you look at the population in South Hillsborough County, I believe it's far grown the population of those that came into the city of Tampa. And I may be wrong, but I see more development there than I've seen anywhere else. Now the good county of Pasco is starting to experience the same thing that who? Hillsborough County and the city of Tampa had envisioned. So we have a problem that people want to move here. But is it really a problem or is it an asset? We had a lot of young people living in this area that moved somewhere else when they finished college. Now they're all staying here, most of them. And you have a lot of people that come here for the first time and don't want to leave. That's a problem we created. We have a problem that that is it workable up to up to this point has been workable. And if it wasn't for the congregation of everybody getting together and forming Tampa Bay water, we would really be have a problem. Because there'd be no water for the amount of money we spent and the amount of money we bonded out. Just look at the pipeline alone. Who said there was going to be a pipeline from South Hillsborough County all the way around? It's connected to everything. All the cities that I mentioned, the county, it had some connection where you can at least get something in return. So what I'm looking at is if it wasn't for everyone that served here before and the people that worked one way or the other directly with it, we wouldn't be where we are today. And still, if it's happening up north, it's happening about whatever they want to call everybody. They got all kind of names for everybody now in elected office. There'll still be a movement that they want to move here. I don't know why, and it's not about sports. I thought I'd just throw that knuckleball at you. But what I'm saying is that we have created our own problem by being good who we are. And if you look at it, the city of Tampa, the government, not us, the government way back, and Brad can tell you more likely the year when we had our connection pipes all around the city to service the city. The state, I believe, asked us to put in the water because at that time, Tampa Bay water didn't have what they have today, and we had to connect the water lines all the way around where the county was feeding where the population was growing just outside the city. And I think they were charging, I think, 2.5% more or something like that. I forget how much, 2.25% of the cost to those that were getting that water, and rightly so. They didn't have it. We had to supply it. Now they tell me, and that Mr. Day and I don't get along very well, that you're not going to be able to charge that in the future because some lawsuit in Dade County somewhere or whatever it was. So these things are incumbent upon another pressure that the city of Tampa has. And like I told you guys, I'll tell them. They want it. They can have it. Very simple. But then we've got to be responsible for serving the people that we have in the city of Tampa. And the problem with Tampa is that the younger people at one time weren't having only one child. Now they're having two and three. They found it was kind of fun to do that, I guess. So what we're having is a water problem and the situation that we have here now. Everybody's having fun, and I've got to supply the water. So that's a wonderful thing to have. It really is. Don't laugh. I'm laughing myself. I enjoy that. But what I'm saying is that these things happen in life, and we're prepared as best as we can be. But the city of Tampa is going to need some help in the future because the population is going to continue to come. We have, yes, like Commissioner Walsall said, we're going forward on the tall buildings. But we only have like 3.5% left of the land available in the city of Tampa for any type of development. So sooner or later, we're going to hit the jackpot where it's back down to normal. Thank you all very much for listening. Thank you. Well, I think we've covered everything with this presentation. Thank you. Thank you very much. We go back to Warren. Day two. Good morning again, Madam Chair, members of the board. This morning, I'd like to quickly highlight what we experienced for demands and hydrologic conditions in the past year and peek into what's coming for the next year. This is just for presentation. No action is requested. Rainfall, as Mr. Jones was discussing, was very sparse. We began our drought in September, and it really continued through June. Once the rain started over the summer, it was mostly pinned along the coastal areas and really didn't recharge our rivers until August. For August and September, our rainfall was about normal, but it was finally where we needed it to be, and that continued into October. We've seen a dramatic improvement in drought conditions over the spring to summer months. When we started May, much of the state was either in an exceptional or extreme drought condition, but that has abated through most of the area, and we're still under a severe to moderate drought through part of our service area. So things are definitely improving, not quite out of the woods yet. We entered a stage one drought alert on November 1st, and we moved to a stage three shortage on March the 1st of this year. At the end of September, our rainfall deficit had improved, but was still 10 inches below normal, and river flow was 28 million gallons a day below normal. So it will take continued months of above-average rain this winter, and it will take sustained river flows, but we will make progress on these metrics. The blue line shows where we projected our reservoir to be for this year and part of the prior year, just to show the seasonal nature. We did reach a low of 2.11 billion gallons in July. We closed the fiscal year at the end of September at 9.4. And as Mr. Jones had mentioned, we are up to 12.4 billion gallons as of last night. That is about 80% full, and we're still storing at a rate of over 200 million gallons per day. So by the weekend, we hope to top 13 and should continue to fill. We delivered an average of 202.07 million gallons a day to the members in fiscal year 26. That's about 2% higher than the prior year. And since we were in drought conditions, 70% was from groundwater, 24% surface water, and 6% from our desalination facility. Our actual monthly water delivery is shown here for the year. The colors of each bar show where the water came from, groundwater, river water, reservoir, or desalinated seawater. Our seawater desalination plant, shown in yellow, has been constantly producing for the year, actually since December of 24. And for the last three months, July through September, we delivered less water than we had anticipated. And that was at least in part due to the watering restrictions and enforcement. The darker blue bars show the actual monthly average production from the consolidated permit wellfields, and the light blue is the coming three months. We ended the fiscal year with a running average of 108.73 million gallons a day. And with the cooler, wetter weather that's predicted for the winter, we expect this to decline, and we hope to be back in compliance with the permit limit sometime in the summer of next year. South Central Hillsboro Wellfield averaged 26.66 million gallons a day at the end of the fiscal year, and we do expect to remain close to the permit limit for the year that has just started. We have budgeted 212.84 million gallons a day of delivery to the members in the current year. And when we began the year in our budget prep, we estimated about 57% groundwater, 37% surface water, 6% again from our desalination facility. So our conditions are definitely improving with the rains we received late summer and the increased river flows. Our drought conditions continue to improve and could improve further through the winter because it's supposed to be a cool and wet winter months. We expect to be back in compliance with the consolidated permit sometime in the summer of 27. And as always, we will balance our supplies to meet your demands 24-7. Happy to answer any questions. Thank you. Commissioner Waskell. I feel like he said that will meet your demands to twist the knife of my previous comments. But I just wanted to reiterate that I hope that we continue to drive forward for a second reservoir. I think it would make your jobs easier. I know it's an expensive undertaking, but I think that it would also prevent so much concerns in the times of heavy droughts that we just went through. And Commissioner Mariano isn't here to re-ask for it, so I'll ask for it for him. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Thank you so much, Warren, for your report. I have no other speakers. Next item up is D3, and Mr. Johnson is here for his report. Good morning, Chair, members of the Board. As the Continuous Improvement Director, I'm providing the annual review of the agency's strategic plan. The update is to provide you with information on the progress and show that Tampa Bay Water has completed the 2022 to 2027 strategic plan. In addition, I'll be presenting the proposed fiscal years 2027-2032 strategic plan for your review and feedback, then approval request in November. The annual review and update process the staff adopted includes quarterly milestone workshops on tactical progress. In addition, we met to develop the new strategic plan. We took into consideration the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats assessment, along with the results of the performance and management audit, which we did adopt all 11 recommendations in the strategic plan. July wrapped up with the workshops reviewing the goals and objectives in our current plan, and Tampa Bay Water's current strategic plan was approved in 2022 by the Board and updated during the September 2023 meeting. Today, I'm happy to report that we have come to the end of our current plan, and through our quarterly review meetings, we have determined that our selected goals were met. Each quarter, we would review our strategies and tactics and determine if they were completed, no longer aligned with our objectives, needed to shift to our operational plan, or would be reevaluated for our next strategic plan. In the spirit of continuous improvement, we will continue to build on these efforts now and into the future. The completion of one strategic plan is not an end point. It's the beginning of the next strategic plan on a continuous cycle. Therefore, I want to shift to the new proposed strategic plan. In September, we finalized developing our proposed next five-year plan that we would like to share with you today. The new proposed strategic plan has five goals and 19 objectives. We feel that these goals continue to align with achieving our mission and vision. The first goal, reliable, resilient, and sustainable water supply focuses on ensuring a dependable and sustainable regional water supply by strengthening regulatory compliance systems, improving the reliability and resilience of critical infrastructure, enhancing evaluation of capital investment impacts, and advancing risk-informed planning practices. Next, operational excellence, security, and innovation is centered on improving preparedness for system disruptions, protecting technology and information assets, enhancing governance of technology investments, responsibly leveraging emerging technologies, and modernizing facility security. Financial stability seeks to maintain the long-term financial sustainability of the agency through increased transparency, stronger financial resilience, integrated asset and capital planning, and expanded funding opportunities. The stakeholder partnership emphasizes building and maintaining strong relationships with regional partners, regulators, policymakers, and other stakeholders whose collaboration is essential to the agency's success. Workforce capability, readiness, and engagement focus on developing and sustaining a highly capable workforce prepared to meet future organizational needs. The next step in the process is to receive feedback from the board, adjust the plan, and request for approval in November. Staff will provide annual reports to the board on progress towards reaching the strategic goals. This concludes my presentation. I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you, Mr. Johnson. I don't see any requests to speak, and thank you for your work on the strategic plan, and look forward to seeing it back in November. Excellent. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Next up, we have Ms. Medina, D4. This is our last presentation. Okay. I will try to be expeditious in here. Good morning, Madam Chair and members of the board. The Surface Water Treatment Plant Expansion Project and the South Hillswater Pipeline Projects both remain on track, and today I will be highlighting construction progress to date. I will begin with the treatment plant expansion, which will add up to 12.5 million gallons per day to help meet the region's projected 2028 water needs. The expansion adds a fifth treatment train and the supporting systems needed to deliver additional capacity. Starting with the area A and moving clockwise, the diagram highlights the principal work areas, the new treatment train, belt filter presses, new filters, chemical facilities, and the expanded solids drying beds. Work on the fifth treatment train continues to advance. The contractor has completed the underground 48-inch filter inlet piping and electrical duct bank. Crews are now constructing the load transfer platform and preparing the ozone building foundation, keeping this major treatment component moving towards the next phase. The top picture shows the new train load transfer platform, and the bottom picture shows the electrical duct bank installation to the new train. Assembly and piping connections for the belt filter presses five through seven are substantially complete. The current work now focuses on the pump connections, the supporting duct bank, and preparations for start-up and commissioning. The small picture shows the belt filter press duct bank installation to the dewatering building, and the large picture shows a belt filter feed pump installation. The crews have completed the first major concrete placements for the new filters and chemical building. Work now includes additional foundations, recycling water piping, pressure testing, electrical conduits, and containment coatings. The larger picture shows the concrete pour in the filter area, and the bottom right picture shows the final concrete finish on the filter area, and the bottom left picture shows the coating prep work for the chemical tank containment walls. Construction work is currently at 15% completed, and spending is aligned at 22% of the total $167 million budget. I will now provide an update on our distribution system expansion project, the South Hills Border Pipeline. As you know, this facility or the pipeline will connect to our surface water treatment plant. In this image, you can see a drone view of the project staging yard, which serves as a central hub for equipment, materials, and crew operations supporting the construction activities. This 26-mile pipeline will deliver up to 65 million gallons per day to the Lithia and Balm areas. 17 tunnel crossings were selected to reduce traffic and environmental impacts, and the newly completed State Road 60 crossing brings a total tunnel completion to seven. This route view shows the construction activity across segments A and B. Work now includes microtunneling, open-cut installation, site preparation, restoration, and environmental controls. The State Road 60 microtunnel was completed successfully using trenchless construction. This approach allowed the contractor to cross beneath the roadway while minimizing traffic disruption and avoiding existing utilities. Work will continue at this point with six additional microtunnel locations. In segment A, three open-cut crews are working along Victoria Street, Ronell Drive, and Boyette Road. And the image on the left shows the open-cut pipe installation operation on Boyette Road. And the image on the right shows the open-cut pipe installation on Ronell Drive. Temporary restoration is following construction, so access and roadway conditions can be maintained as work progresses. Clearing and grubbing and temporary restoration activities are also underway throughout segment A. In segment B, the crews are building the launch shaft for the first microtunnel and preparing to begin open-cut installation along Bon Boyette Road. The image on the left shows the installation of the secant pile shaft for the first microtunnel, and the image on the right shows the environmental controls, site preparation, and wildlife protection measures to begin open-cut pipe installation along Bon Boyette Road. As you know, our priority has been maintaining safe, reliable access for schools and families along the Boyette Road corridor. In response to observed site conditions, the contractor added traffic control personnel, better known as flaggers, near St. Stephen's Catholic School and Sech Brook Drive, and coordinated signal adjustments with Hillsborough County. The project team has maintained close communications with schools and residents in this area to continue collaborating on improvements. And we have communicated with HOAs and schools regarding a sidewalk detour on Fitchhawk Boulevard near the Fitchhawk Sports Complex. We are also working to keep businesses along the route visible and accessible with custom signage and flags. Over the past two months, we have created a CHOP Local webpage that features a business directory of all businesses along the route. We have been encouraging everyone on our email list to CHOP Local and support businesses on the route. And we continue to meet one-on-one with businesses as construction progresses. And finally, we have met also with the Hillsborough County's Entrepreneur Collaborative Center to learn about the resources the county can provide to the affected businesses. Here's a quick glance on summary of our engagement efforts for both August and September. We are up to 2,440 email subscribers. We had 16 media mentions over the past two months, completed four influencer reels to promote businesses along the route, and shot new B-roll footage for editing and distribution. Construction for the pipeline is about 13% complete, and this is based on the linear feet of pipe installed. And construction spending continues to be aligned at 27% of the total $461.2 million construction budget. In summary, both projects remain on track, and we're advancing as expected. We continue to monitor schedule, spending, safety, and community impacts. And with that, it concludes my super brief presentation. I will be happy to take any questions. Thank you. Any requests to speak? I don't see any. Okay. Well, thank you, Maribel, for the presentation. So we're only at 13% yet on time. Still a little ways to go. Okay. I just threw that in for Commissioner Waskell benefit. I was reading his mind. Okay. We are done with presentations, and now we get to administrative matters. I just need a vote on the receive and file motion a second. If we can press the little button, we have Commissioner Whiteman moving, seconded by Council Member Miranda. Please open the machine for voting, enter your votes, and tally the votes. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. And we have reached the end of our October 19, 2026 meeting. Thank you, everyone, for joining us. This meeting is adjourned.