Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Why is the water level so low?????

We have lost almost another foot of water since last week. It has not rained significantly and as usual some evaporation took place and very little water was used for landscape irrigation within the Village..

At the same time, we were getting recycled water from the County.

Since January 26 to this date we have purchased 13,162,000 gallons.
We were allowed 22,500,000 gallons during that same period and therefore we are suffering a shortfall of 9,338,000 gallons.

Why have we not purchased our full complement of water since January 26 while in the middle of a very dry season????

Why are we not getting our full bucket of water?????

Looking back at UCO 2008 budget we can see that line item 5070 ( Reclaimed Water Usage ) had an annual budget of $ 9,125. and that we have spent $ $3,475. out of it.

We can also see that line item 5069 ( Reclaimed Water Base Fee ) had a budget of $ 32,600. and that we have spent almost all of it with $ 32,570.

Why do we pay a full Base Fee if we are not getting our full complement of water?

Following are some extracts of Clause 8 of the BULK RECLAIMED WATER AGREEMENT:
...This agreement is contingent on the County's access
to sufficient quantities of reclaimed water to provide UCO
with the amount of Reclaimed Water provided in this agreement...

... In the event that County must reduced the amount of
Reclaimed Water provided to UCO, or temporarily or permanently
ceases providing Reclaimed Water to UCO ,
the monthly base fee
will be adjusted by an amount proportionate to the reduction

in service...

Since UCO has not shown in its 2008 budget that the Monthly Base Fee had been prorated to the percentage of water received from the County, one must conclude that the shortage in supply was the failure of UCO and not of the County.
If this is not a true statement then the County owes UCO $ 20,860.00 $

Why UCO did not purchased all its allocation of Reclaimed Water in 2008 and is continuing doing the same in 2009????

Were the lakes full in 2008 or didn't they look the same as of this year?

Why are we not monitoring and managing this contract specifications in a responsible manner?

As per Clause 9 of the Bulk Reclaimed Water Agreement with the County, a water level sensor was installed and is supposed to be remotely connected with a flow control valve located on County's side of the Point of Service. The flow control valve will be designed to automatically shut off the flow of Reclaimed Water should the elevation of the Lake System exceed the level authorized by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.

Is the maintenance of that system properly done by the County?

The inside of the blue plastic tube housing this level sensor is located near the pipe dumping water into our canal system. As can be seen lookng into it sand, mud and weed fills the base of the reservoir and the metallic pieces holding the float is all rusted. Furthermore when moving the float ( similar to a toilet bowl installation ) a funny rattle can be hear and the thing is loose and may fall apart soon. When lifting the float to its maximum level .....nothing happens.....

Why is UCO accepting such technical components of a critical system to become so deteriorated?

Our lawns, shrubs, trees and flower beds are suffering from an evident lack of water and the lake system is very ugly to look at from any point of vue. Nature does not help by not sending water and UCO is worsening the case by not professionally managing the only other mean at our disposal to give our Village an upscale look.
Since writing about the problem is not sufficient to move the decision makers, let's make sure that a large number of owners fed up with this situation,
attend the next Executive Meeting on Monday March 2nd at 1.00 p.m. in room B of the Main Clubhouse.
We could also attend the Irrigation/Infrastructure Committee at 09.30 a.m. in the UCO office on March 10th 2009..

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

And why is UCO pumping water from wells ??? Does SFWMD know this ???

UCO President said...

CVBLOGGER said...
Hi All,
Here are the current Restrictions on watering in Palm Beach County; they are not really very restrictive, as Lake "O" is at 12.89 Feet. Low, but not at record lows.

https://my.sfwmd.gov/pls/portal/docs/page/common/pdf/splash/ataglance_200809_coast.pdf

The source of the water is quite irrelevant, including Wells.

The only source free of restrictions is 100% Reclaimed Water, thus I have said from the beginning that our system should have been a direct connection between the reclaimed water and the Irrigation system, with a second tap for maintaining lake levels.

Since we cannot correct this error without lots of revisions and planning; we should indeed take our full complement of 750K gallons, retroactive to day one of operation and forward.

Dave Israel

Anonymous said...

What’s in Your Water?
Dr. Lisa Plano's research found staph present in the water dripping off 37 percent of South Florida ocean swimmers examined in her study. The study also found that 3 percent of the staph was the drug-resistant MRSA.
As a result, she recommended that swimmers off South Florida beaches take showers before and after going into the ocean to avoid staph infections.
OK, for those of you keeping score, that's sharks, sea lice, stinging jellyfish, skin-damaging solar radiation, riptides, the occasional sewage discharge, running out of coins for the parking meter and now ... staph infections.

Anonymous said...

I was told by a reliable source that we are getting all the water that the county is sending us. Is it possible that the county is not sending the water we contracted for?

elaineb said...

The pbcwud technician was here last week checking continuing working of meter, there was no problem it was just routine. He did not look at blue depth pipe, that may be an off switch only for when water is too high^.
When the reclaimed water flows in it is quite noisy - That clinking clanking sound, at the purple pipes and meter, Can make the world go round, but we don’t mind the jangling noise.
Frank stay on your own blog.