City of LaSalle Finance Committee met Jan. 24
Here are the minutes provided by the committee:
Chairman Pro-Tem Lavieri called the Meeting to order at 6:00pm
ROLL CALL
Present: Chairman Pro-Tem Lavieri, Aldermen Demes, Jeppson, Herndon
Excused Absence: Chairman Ptak
Others Present: Mayor Jeff Grove, Deputy Clerk Brent Bader, Superintendent of Public Works Patrick Watson, Alderman Reynolds, Alderman Bacidore, Finance Director John Duncan, Fire Chief Jerry Janick, Treasurer Virginia Kochanowski
Others Present Remotely: Economic Developer Leah Inman
A quorum was present.
Moved by Alderman Demes and seconded by Alderman Jeppson to approve and place on file the minutes of the Finance Committee for January 10, 2022.
Each and every alderman has a copy.
Voice vote, all ayes. Motion carried.
Lavieri questioned what the MPUs were under bills. Superintendent Watson verified that every water meter has an MPU and that it sends a remote read to the city. The $8,800 bill is for multiple MPU’s. They need to be replaced every 10-12 years. The city has been replacing approximately 5 to 10 per week.
Mr. Terry Boyer with Donohue Engineering spoke in regard to the aerobic digester conversion project at the WasteWater Treatment Plant (WWTP). He is here to get the approval from the Finance Committee to bring the recommendation to the city council to proceed with the advertising and the bidding of the project.
He explained, in the Aeration basins, they grow bugs to eat the sludge, that sludge goes to the aerobic digester. Primary clarifier is filtering out the heavy materials and that sludge goes to anaerobic digester. Anaerobic and Aerobic digesters are needed to stabilize sludge. It is part of an IEP requirement. Anaerobic has been in service for a long time. For smaller waste water plants, like the city’s, they would never be designed with the anaerobic digesters. The city currently has older lids and older digesters gas migrating out and around the parts of the building.
Mr. Boyer continued to discuss digester gas safety. Inspectors have been sent out to check out the lids. There is leaking going on with the current lids and it is making the operators a little nervous. The plan after doing a study over a year was to come up with a plan to replace this current anaerobic digester with an aerobic digester. The old equipment is from about the 1970s, it needs to be replaced. Along with the boiler, it needs almost daily repairs. Mr. Boyer stated how the goal of this project is to convert and remove the digester lid, remove boiler, install diffusers and install blowers. It will be using air to create the digestion effect instead of letting methane gas develop. It will eliminate unsafe digester gas. The team has set up the project as an IEP loan with the goal of obtaining loan forgiveness dollars. They are currently at the part in the plan that they need to go out and receive bids prior to 3/31/2022. As for design and permits, they are all ready to proceed with this plan. The current schedule is to advertise on Feb 8th. Pre-bid meetings will continue in the mid-late February with bid opening in the late part of March. First loan payment would be May 2024.
Mayor Grove questioned what may happen when they open the roof up and if it will increase the smell. Mr. Boyer reassured him that it will not increase smell because it is like the aeration tanks.
Mayor did state that there is just a very bad smell constantly coming from WWTP from down by the plant up to the downtown. Mr. Boyer stated that the key smell generator will be at the clarifiers. The sludge grind beds are not used anymore so it would not be coming from there. There are options to look at the other places that have had issues. Mr. Boyer stated that he can put together an evaluation of that for a future discussion on how to treat that odor issue.
Chair Pro-Tem Lavieri asked about the primary clarifiers and if they are just settling tanks. These clarifiers will not be touched in the current plans but could potentially be an add-on if they were a problem in the future discussion of the WWTP current smell.
Mr. Boyer is looking for the authority from the Finance Committee to recommend to the City Council for him to go out for bids for this project. He mentioned that the original advertising date was stated as February, 8 But he asked the IEP if they would be able to advertise on the First of February, hoping to get an adequate amount of bid time.
Moved by Alderman Demes and seconded by Alderman Herndon to take recommendation to the City council for authorization to proceed bidding for the aerobic digester conversion project.
ROLL CALL
AYE : Chairman Pro-Tem Lavieri, Aldermen Demes, Jeppson, Herndon
NAY: None Absent: Chairman Ptak Abstain: None
MOTION CARRIED: 4-0
Chairman Pro-Tem Lavieri stated that Chairman Ptak was unable to make the meeting but was in favor of this project proceeding.
There were no more questions or comments from the public.
Chairman Pro-Tem Lavieri adjourned the meeting at 6:14 p.m.
https://www.lasalle-il.gov/sites/default/files/agendas-minutes/2022-02/1-24-22_1.pdf
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