WATER: Clarifying the Issues

CLARIFYING THE ISSUES

WINDER’S WATER SYSTEM

The City of Winder is proud of its 115 years of excellence in the municipal water industry. It is an award-winning water system that remains dedicated to the public health, safety, and prosperity of the Winder-Barrow County community.

As we enter 2023, the Mayor and City Council of Winder are committed to continuing to provide the water that makes health, jobs, fire protection, and quality of life possible for generations to come. To make good on their commitment, we are asking our community and business leaders to join us and support our efforts to resolve the multiple issues threatening our water system— a system that serves 62% of the Barrow County community.

WINDER WATER HISTORY

Winder’s water system began distributing water to residents from the first waterworks building located on Beulah Street in 1908. Fast-forward a little more than a decade and the Georgia General Assembly recognized Winder’s leadership in the water industry, authorizing service to customers outside of the City limits to support economic development and growth of Barrow County as a whole.

watch the video: How Winder Got Into the Water Business bit.ly/WinderWater

Success in the Water Business

As a best in class utility operator, Winder refrains from using tax revenues to construct or operate water and wastewater utilities. In fact, these services are operated as a business enterprise that charges rates to customers based on their usage of the system. To ensure the financial strength of the enterprise, external professionals perform cost of service analysis and provide rate recommendations to the Winder City Council. These rates must:

• Cover all operations, maintenance, growth and investments in the system without support from taxpayers.

• New growth coming onto the system must pay for itself. Existing customers are not paying to support the demand of new customers.

• Cost must be spread over time so that today’s users pay for today’s cost and tomorrow’s users pay for tomorrow’s cost.

SOURCE: City of Winder Audits

COMMUNITY INVESTMENTS

Just as successful private enterprise provides profits to its shareholders, the City’s successful utility enterprises have provided millions of dollars in community investments. These investments have provided parks, streetscapes, landscaping, beautification projects, events, and other quality of life amenities for the greater Winder-Barrow community.

The Barrow County Board of Commissioners should dismiss (Barrow County v the City of Winder, 19-CV-001017-M) and recognize the community investments made by the City of Winder to enhance the quality of life for all of the Winder-Barrow Community.

(L-R): Spooktacular 2022 Rose Hill Cemetery Fire Hydrant Testing

AWARDWINNING

The City of Winder’s water and wastewater departments are committed to excellence. The Georgia Association of Water Professionals consistently recognizes the City of Winder as a best in class utility operation.

Platinum Award

4

Meeting all compliance criteria for maximum contaminant level and NPDES permits for a period of 5 consecutive years, the City of Winder has received 3 consecutive Platinum Awards from the GAWP, which represents 8 years of meeting all compliance criteria.

Certificate of Achievement

4

The Certificate of Achievement recognizes municipal water treatment facilities that have operated in an outstanding manner. This certification is given to facilities in the state of Georgia that score 90 percent or higher on a rigorous inspection conducted by GAWP.

BY THE NUMBERS

gold award

11

Water and wastewater plants remaining in compliance with the facility permits over the previous calendar year.

Certificate of Distinguished Merit

3

The Highway 53 Water Treatment Plant was awarded the Certificate of Distinguished Merit by the GAWP by earning an above 90 score on a detailed independent inspection of the facility.

412 miles of Water Mains A

B

B pump stations

A

51,000

3 115 YEARS STRONG Maximum Permitted Usage

5.1 Million Gallons Daily Average Daily Withdrawal

6.2 million gallons daily Treatment Capacity

customers

A

storage Tanks

8 6 elevated 2 ground

B

18,938 water meters

WASTEWATER ATTACHMENTS TERRITORIES ENCROACHMENTS

OUR WASTEWATER SYSTEM

Winder’s water system treats water that is pure and safe for drinking and human interaction.

The City’s system also collects and receives used water, also known as wastewater (or sewage), and applies the latest technologies and innovations to clean and treat used water for its safe release back into the environment.

Strong financial management, innovative services, and forward business planning have built a City wastewater system that is financially self-supporting without taxpayer dollars and with the capacity to serve much more of the Winder-Barrow community.

However, our shared community is facing a wastewater challenge in the small system currently owned and operated by Barrow County. Serving less than ten percent (10%) of the Barrow County population, the County’s wastewater system is subsidized by Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) Dollars coming from 100% of the community. Furthermore, the system is reaching capacity and will require millions of dollars to expand.

Barrow County must choose. Spend more millions of SPLOST dollars, like the $13 Million of SPLOST* that Barrow County spent to upgrade the Tanners Bridge Wastewater Treatment Plant, or spend those same dollars in the 30 miles of new roads that $13 Million could have built for everyone.

The City of Winder is prepared to provide the needed wastewater treatment, to more people and properties in our community, without spending one cent of tax dollars.

*SOURCE: FY 2021 Barrow County Audit

RATES

On the following pages, the City of Winder would like to clarify critical issues challenging our water system through a discussion of these key topics:

INNOVATING with PURPOSE

DID YOU KNOW?

• The City of Winder’s land application system irrigates the Barrow County Recreation Fields and The Chimneys Golf Course.

• The Chimneys Golf Course serves as a part of the City’s wastewater treatment process.

• The Chimneys Golf Course saw record profits of $454,443 at the close of Fiscal Year 2022.*

*City of Winder 2022 Financial Report

Wastewater: In addition to our award winning treatment plants, the City of Winder operates an Land Application System (LAS) as part of its wastewater operation. A LAS cleans used water through natural biological systems and allows for its safe return to the environment. The greens of the Chimneys Golf Course are actually the fields of the City’s LAS. Rather than allowing the fields to lie unused, the City leased the grounds in 2002 to Eagle Greens Ltd, which built and originally operated the Chimneys Golf Course. The City purchased the golf business hosted on our LAS fields in 2013. At the close of Fiscal Year 2022, Chimneys Golf Course generated a record $454,443 in profits for the City.

Water: Winder’s water system produces both drinking water and reclaimed water. Reclaimed water provides water for irrigation and other environmental uses without placing demands on the drinking water system. Winder’s reclaimed water system irrigates the recreation fields of Victor Lord Park, the school’s softball/baseball complex on Caddy Lane, and the greens of Chimneys Golf Course.

The Barrow County Board of Commissioners should seek additional wastewater treatment capacity from the City of Winder and pay for that capacity through user charges, not tax dollars. SPLOST dollars should be invested into our roads, bridges, parks, and recreation areas for all— not subsidizing water and wastewater treatment facilities that only serve a small percentage of the population.

A Vital Resource

Water is a vital resource. Our customers depend on us to provide a fresh glass of drinking water, a dependable shower, and toilets that flush. They also depend on us to ensure the hospital can care for patients, the economic engines can continue to churn, and the fires can be extinguished. None of this is possible if the water isn’t flowing.

To keep the water continuously flowing, to prepare for emergencies, and to ensure that no customer is without this vital resource, the City of Winder has developed a system built on redundancy. Redundancy in a water system refers to the attachments to neighboring water systems also known as interconnects. These interconnects keep water flowing, ensuring no customer is without this vital resource.

Our water system’s 19 interconnects support proper emergency management and are placed throughout our system.

The City of Winder and Barrow County share 13 mutually beneficial interconnects between the two systems.

The Barrow County Board of Commissioners can and should design a solution that adds Jackson County residents to their system rather than removing Barrow County residents.

Areas in green receive emergency water from the Carl connection

The Carl Connection

The City of Winder recently discovered that Barrow County had removed them from an interconnect at a storage tank located in the Town of Carl. This tank, and its interconnects were constructed in the 1990s and paid for by all Barrow County taxpayers as part of a wholesale water transmission system to provide wholesale water supply and redundancy to municipalities in Barrow County.

Nearly 100% of Winder’s water customers served by this interconnect live in unincorporated Barrow County. The Barrow County Board of Commissioners now intends to sell that water to systems that represent a large portion of Jackson County, rather than the taxpayers of Barrow County. As a result of Barrow County removing those unincorporated customers from the interconnect, Barrow County is jeopardizing the stable delivery of water to those customers, including in emergency situations such as a major fire and drought.

bit.ly/WinderWater

Emergency plans for these customers rely on the Carl connection.

Service Far & Wide

The City of Winder began construction of its water system in 1908. Since 1920, Winder has been legally providing water services to customers outside of its city limits (also known as unincorporated Barrow County). Since that time, Winder’s water system has reliably provided service to more than 60% of the Barrow County land area.

Nearly one hundred years later in 2018, state law required the Barrow County Board of Commissioners and the City of Winder to reaffirm the geographic territories of their respective water systems. The Barrow County Board of Commissioners refused to recognize the City’s historic service territories and the hundreds of millions of dollars of infrastructure already in the ground.

In 2019, the Barrow County Board of Commissioners sued the City of Winder seeking to dissolve the historical territories and divest the City’s utility customers of its hundreds of millions of dollars in investments already made.

62%

of Barrow County’s land area served by the City of Winder Water System of the Barrow County population served

72%

of ALL industrial & commercial businesses in unincorporated Barrow County served

The Barrow County Board of Commissioners should dismiss Barrow County v the City of Winder, 19-CV-001017-M and recognize the historical water service territories and the 115 years of investment City customers have made in their system.

54% retail establishments served

All but 100

Inside The Lines

For the last 115 years, the City of Winder has placed water pipes in the ground, constructed storage tanks, and installed valves, pumps, treatment plants, and other infrastructure necessary to support them.

Two thirds of those pipes are located outside the City of Winder’s boundaries to serve the residents of unincorporated Barrow County. In 2022, Barrow County followed its 2019 lawsuit to dissolve the City’s territory, and in violation of local law*, began installing a duplicate water system in parts of Winder’s service area.

Barrow County’s encroachment into Winder’s water service territory not only duplicates water systems, it adds additional layers of government and millions of dollars in unnecessary expenses to put pipes over existing pipes. In Fiscal Year 2023 alone, Barrow County has budgeted $10 Million in projects to put pipes over pipes. This duplication of services conflicts with state law** that requires cities and counties to agree to service delivery strategies preventing service duplication and government inefficiency.

EXAMPLES OF BARROW COUNTY ENCROACHMENTS

TOP: Current construction at State Route 81 at Carl Bethlehem Accent Springs Commercial Development is inside the City of Winder’s water territory.

LEFT: Groundbreaking of new Medical Plaza located off of Carl Bethlehem Road.

(L-R) Sonja McLendon, chief of Operational Excellence/interim president of NGMC Barrow; Carol Burrell, president and CEO of NGHS; Pat Graham, Chairman of the Barrow County Board of Commissioners. Photo by Morgan Ervin.

SOURCES:

*Local and Special Act and Resolutions of the General Assembly of the State of Georgia 1987, Law No. 276

**Local and Special Act and Resolutions of the General Assembly of the State of Georgia 1987, p.4457

Mains

The Barrow County Board of Commissioners should stop spending tax dollars to illegally duplicate services.

AUBURNWINDER RESERVOIR PROJECT

Barrow County, including the municipalities of Winder, Carl, Auburn, Bethlehem, and Statham increased in population nearly 20% between the 2010 and 2020 Census. Growth is on track to continue at that pace for the next decade and longer.

As our community’s population and more jobs and industries have located within the Winder service territory, the demand for water has increased. To meet this demand, the City of Winder primarily depends on the waters of the Mulberry River. In times of high demand, Winder turns to secondary water sources at Laurel Lane Reservoir and Bear Creek Reservoir and, in emergency

Intentional planning for future vitality comes with a $60 Million Price Tag for Winder.

conditions from Lake Yargo in Fort Yargo State Park. Bear Creek Reservoir is partly owned by the taxpayers of Barrow County, who purchased the ownership share through Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax Dollar to in part, to sell wholesale water to the cities of Barrow County. With a 260% price increase, Winder had to find an alternative source for wholesale water.

Therefore, the City of Winder has partnered with the City of Auburn to construct a new 1.1 billion gallon raw water storage pond (also known as a reservoir), a new water intake and pumping station on the Mulberry River near Covered Bridge Road; a second new raw water intake and pumping station on the Little Mulberry River at Old Thompson Mill Road; a 30,000 feet long raw water pipeline; and a RSWSP pumping station with a 9.1 million gallons per day capacity. Raw water will travel from the reservoir to an upgraded and expanded Highway 53 Drinking Water Treatment Plant through a 44,000 feet long transmission line.

All told, approximately $60 Million of additions and upgrades are currently in design. In 2020, the City of Winder was awarded $10 Million in State of Georgia ARPA grant funds toward the cost of this reservoir. Improvements are expected to be online and serving customers within the next two years.

Even at an almost $100 Million combined cost to build the reservoir, water treatment plants, and associated infrastructure, this project is more affordable to the rate payers of the City of Auburn and Winder water systems than continuing to purchase raw water from the Barrow County Board of Commissioners.

Taxpayers, Follow Your Dollars

Since 1908, the City of Winder has been providing an award-winning system dedicated to the health, safety, and prosperity of the Winder Barrow County community. Winder has provided clean reliable drinking water to more than 60% of Barrow County, supported economic development with water and sewer, built jobs, and ensured reliable water supply for fire protection— all while reinvesting the proceeds of that water system into the community without spending a single tax dollar.

The Barrow County system serves less than 18 percent of the community’s population and depends on all of us to subsidize the operation with our tax dollars— $10 million in budget year 2023 alone.

Stop the Subsidies

Barrow County could stop spending your tax dollars in three simple steps:

1. Stop encroaching into Winder’s service territory to put pipe over pipe to duplicate services.

2. Leave Winder on the Carl interconnect.

3. Increase wholesale water sales.

Unfortunately, Barrow County has instead chosen to sue the City of Winder in an effort to control rate setting in the City’s successful tax free system— and to force the City to stop using water proceeds to invest in our community.

Increase Wholesale Water Sales

The City of Winder has offered to purchase wholesale raw water from the Barrow County Board of Commissioners at a rate and amount that eliminate their need for tax support.

However, the Barrow County Board of Commissioners has increased its wholesale water rate to the Cities of Auburn and Winder from $1.60 per thousand gallons to up to $5.15 per thousand gallons… an increase of 260%!

This price increase makes the $100 million reservoir a more affordable option for Auburn and Winder customers than purchasing wholesale water from Barrow County at their current rates.

Barrow County Board of Commissioners should negotiate a wholesale water rate that produces more sales and eliminates the need for tax subsidies.

The

WASTEWATER ATTACHMENTS TERRITORIES ENCROACHMENTS RATES

The City of Winder asks you to support our efforts to continue to bring quality, reliable drinking water, innovative wastewater, and a reclaimed water system to you that has been bringing health, prosperity, and quality of life to the Winder-Barrow Community for 115 years.

Please call your Barrow County Commissioners and ask them to:

Dismiss Barrow County v the City of Winder, 19-CV001017-M.

Recognize Winder’s historical water service territories and the 115 years of investment City customers have made in their system.

Seek additional wastewater treatment capacity from the City of Winder.

Not remove Barrow County residents from interconnects.

Stop spending tax dollars to put pipe over pipe to duplicate services.

Negotiate a wholesale water rate that produces more sales and eliminates the need for tax subsidies.