Finance-Human Resources Minutes 12-18-19 with Attachments<\/a><\/p>\nTo read the minutes, please open or download the pdf from the link above, or you may see more below.<\/p>\n
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Brunswick-Glynn County Joint Water & Sewer Commission<\/strong><\/p>\n1703 Gloucester Street, Brunswick, GA 31520<\/strong><\/p>\nCommission Meeting Room<\/strong><\/p>\nWednesday, December 18, 2019 at 1:00 PM<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\nFINANCE & HUMAN RESOURCES <\/strong><\/h2>\nCOMMITTEE MINUTES<\/strong><\/h2>\nMEMBERS PRESENT: \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\nSteve Copeland, Finance Committee Chairman<\/strong><\/p>\nDonald Elliott, Human Resources Committee Chairman<\/strong><\/p>\nTripp Stephens, Commissioner<\/strong><\/p>\nCornell Harvey, Commissioner<\/strong><\/p>\nWayne Neal, Commissioner<\/strong><\/p>\nAndrew Burroughs, Executive Director<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\nALSO PRESENT: \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\nBen Turnipseed, Commission Chairman<\/strong><\/p>\nBob Duncan, Commissioner <\/strong><\/p>\nJohn Donaghy, Chief Financial Officer<\/strong><\/p>\nLaDonnah Roberts, Senior Financial Analyst<\/strong><\/p>\nTodd Kline, Director of Engineering<\/strong><\/p>\nJanice Meridith, Executive Commission Admin.<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\nMEDIA PRESENT:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\nTaylor Cooper, The Brunswick News<\/strong>\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\nChairman Copeland called the meeting to order at 1:00 PM.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\nPUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD<\/strong><\/p>\nThere being no citizens that wished to address the committee, Committee Chairman Copeland closed the Public Comment Period.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\nAPPROVAL<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- Minutes from November 20, 2019 Finance Committee Meeting<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Commissioner Elliott made a motion seconded by Commissioner Copeland to approve the minutes from the November 20, 2019 Finance Committee Meeting.\u00a0 Motion carried 2-0-1. (Commissioner Stephens was absent for the vote.)<\/u>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- Minutes from December 5, 2019 Human Resources Committee Meeting<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Commissioner Neal made a motion seconded by Commissioner Harvey to approve the minutes from the December 5, 2019 Human Resources Committee Meeting.\u00a0 Motion carried 3-0-0.<\/u><\/p>\n\n- Worker\u2019s Compensation Insurance Renewal<\/strong> \u2013 Jeffrey Singletary, T.S.I. \/ Jarrett Bridges, Turner and Associates<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Jarrett Bridges provided that for the past ten years JWSC has used Zenith for Worker\u2019s Compensation Insurance.\u00a0 He obtained proposals from four carriers for the coverage for 2020, and noted that the lowest cost proposal was from Bitco at $251,765.00.\u00a0 The renewal quote from Zenith was the second lowest at $257,231.00, which is a reduction of $973.00 from 2019.\u00a0 The difference between Bitco\u2019s quote and Zenith\u2019s quote was $5,466.00.\u00a0 Mr. Bridges commented that Zenith has provided Defensive Driver Training annually for 100 JWSC employees per year at a value of $2,035.00.\u00a0 JWSC also started using Zenith\u2019s training portal, Zenith Solution Center Platform, from which all JWSC employees obtained sexual harassment training this year, and he added that the value of using their portal training is $18,600.00 for the first year.\u00a0 The additional services and training portal are provided to JWSC from Zenith at no cost to JWSC, but have a combined value of $20,635.00.\u00a0 Mr. Bridges noted that Bitco does provide risk management services, however he has not worked with Bitco, and he commented that he is not sure if they provide defensive driver training nor how detailed their portal is.\u00a0 Jeffrey Singletary from TSI provided that JWSC\u2019s staff is also using The Zenith\u2019s portal for safety and other types of training as required every twelve months, and he added that all JWSC new hires will be required to take certain training on the portal during their orientation.\u00a0 Mr. Singletary commented that he was not able to access any of the material from Bitco in order to compare, but the training offered on Zenith\u2019s portal is very solid.\u00a0 He has not worked with Bitco, nor have any of TSI\u2019s other seventy-plus clients.\u00a0 He noted that in his opinion, he has found Zenith to be the best company to work with as far as the services and the adjusters. \u00a0Mr. Singletary added that when JWSC has a claim he already knows who the adjuster will be, and Zenith quickly processes the claims.<\/p>\n
The Commissioners asked a few questions regarding Bitco, their risk management services, their rating, services, etc. and requested to learn more about Bitco. \u00a0Mr. Bridges discussed the rates and calculations in the proposals, explained the base and net numbers, and noted that the net rates are really the bottom line number.\u00a0 He noted the base is the starting point and the net includes the credits, experience mod, and all the components. \u00a0Mr. Bridges agreed to bring more information for the Commission meeting on the next day as requested by the Commissioners.\u00a0 Commissioner Elliott commented that the presentation should not be about low cost, but should be about best value, and asked Mr. Bridges to justify between Bitco and Zenith why one is the best value over the other.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Elliott made a motion seconded by Commissioner Copeland to defer this item until the Commission Meeting on December 19th<\/sup>.\u00a0 Motion carried 4-0-1.\u00a0 (Commissioner Stephens was absent for the vote.) (This item pertained to both Committees.)<\/u><\/p>\nCommissioner Stephens arrived to the meeting at 1:25 p.m.\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n
Charlie Dorminy stated that he would not be at the Commission Meeting, but his partner Dan would be in attendance and could speak on his experience with Zenith having had a long standing relationship with Zenith and is very happy to do work with them.\u00a0 Mr. Dorminy noted that his firm has never worked with Bitco, that Zenith is one of their larger \u201ccomp\u201d clients, and they have a lot of local businesses throughout the southeast that utilize Zenith.\u00a0 Commissioner Elliott questioned if Bitco was offering a \u201clow-ball\u201d bid.\u00a0 Commissioner Copeland commented that they are offering a low bid, but their rating is high.\u00a0 Mr. Bridges responded that the concern he has is that Bitco is offering 26% schedule credit which is pretty aggressive, and we have ten years of equity built with Zenith who is offering 20% schedule credit.\u00a0 He stated that his concern would be if a change was made over a $5,000 difference and then we had a catastrophic year, we would be looking for a new carrier next year, the stability is gone, and we are going through this process of trying to find the right partner for you again.<\/p>\n
Mr. Dorminy then asked Mr. Bridges to confirm if the AM Best Rating has to do with the carrier\u2019s financial strength and not the satisfaction of their customers.\u00a0 Mr. Bridges confirmed that the rating has nothing to do with customer satisfaction, only with financial strength.\u00a0 He then explained the reason that Bitco has a higher AM Rating is that Bitco is owned by Old Republic who is a national carrier like Travelers that has regional offices and a huge client base in different sectors, whether it be logging, construction, municipality, etc.\u00a0 They write various lines of other insurance from property to liability and auto, so they are bigger because they are in more spaces.\u00a0 Zenith is just a worker\u2019s compensation carrier.\u00a0 They don\u2019t write auto insurance, general liability, or property.\u00a0 All they do is worker\u2019s compensation. \u00a0\u00a0Commissioner Elliott asked Mr. Bridges to present all the factors the next day at the Commission meeting.\u00a0\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n\n- Banking Services Recommendation<\/strong> \u2013 L. Roberts<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
LaDonnah Roberts presented the recommendation for Banking Services to the Commissioners.\u00a0 She provided a brief synopsis that the three banking services needed were bundled previously, and the challenge was made to find the best overall value.\u00a0 Mrs. Roberts commented that there was a diverse evaluation team who did interface with or utilize the services directly within our organization.\u00a0 Different people had different focuses within our organization so that is why some of the scores are varying within the scoring categories.\u00a0 All of the six participants were scored in each of the scoring categories for the three different services.\u00a0 She provided that the recommendation was made to remain with BB&T for the banking services and the merchant services, but the scores did show overall that Synovus would be the one to provide the best overall value for the investment services.\u00a0\u00a0 Mrs. Roberts highlighted some of the reasons that the recommendation was based upon, and explained that the contracts would be for one year contracts with options for four renewals on each.\u00a0 She did comment that one very important factor was that there was no disruption to the customer base and staff wanted to be sure that customers can continue to continue to utilize those services without having to go through a transition unnecessarily.\u00a0 In this particular case they did not believe that a transition was needed and that BB&T was providing the best value in the banking services and merchant services.\u00a0 Mrs. Roberts then explained that the decision for the investment services came down to money and Synovus was more competitive with their rates which was the primary reason for the recommendation to change, and added that as far as changing those services the evaluation team discussed the fact that they believed investment services was the simplest one to separate from the three.\u00a0 Transitional costs and implementation costs would be minimal.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Elliott inquired about Synovus and what kind of securities are they going to put us into? Mrs. Roberts responded that our market is limited because of our organizational structure.\u00a0 She said a question had been asked as to why were there so few people that wanted to bid on our investment services, and then referred to when the financial policy was passed was that there are only certain types of investments that JWSC can make as an organization so that limits the abilities of anyone who bids on those services.\u00a0 JWSC\u2019s financial policy follows Georgia Code.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Stephens made a motion seconded by Commissioner Elliott to forward this item to the full Commission for review and approval to enter into a contract with BB&T for banking and merchant services and a contract with Synovus for investment services.\u00a0 Motion carried 3-0-0.<\/u><\/p>\n\n- SPLOST V IGA<\/strong> \u2013 A. Burroughs<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Mr. Burroughs provided that JWSC\u2019s final remaining SPLOST V funds in the amount of $178,595.00 have been allocated and reserved by the County for the completion of the SPLOST V Water Line Rehabilitation Project.\u00a0 JWSC has existing infrastructure repair\/replacement needs to the water system serving Sea Palms East.\u00a0 Mr. Burroughs stated that the proposed IGA would allow the County to distribute the remaining funds to facilitate that project, and he added that if this IGA is not done then the project will have to be bid out by Glynn County in order to move forward.\u00a0 He noted that this item is also on the Glynn County agenda the next day.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Elliott made a motion seconded by Commissioner Stephens to move that the Finance Committee recommend entering into an intergovernmental agreement with Glynn County for remaining SPLOST V funds in the amount of $178,595.00 for water repairs to Sea Palms East.<\/u><\/p>\n
Mr. Burroughs commented that this will be the last of the SPLOST V funds from Glynn County that were for water and sewer projects.<\/p>\n
Motion carried 3-0-0.<\/u><\/p>\n\n- Ridgewood Water Production Facility Contract Award <\/strong>\u2013 A. Burroughs<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Mr. Burroughs advised that bids were recently received for the Ridgewood Water Production Facility that is a current fire well in the North Mainland District, and is an Upper Floridian well that staff is asking to convert into a production well.\u00a0 A ground storage tank and treatment capacity will be added to provide additional water production capacity that can be used for drinking water purposes.\u00a0 He noted that five bids were received with the low bid being from Southern Civil, LLC., in an amount just below $1.4M.\u00a0 Mr. Burroughs recalled that this project was scoped back in 2014, so the budget that was put in at that time is no longer appropriate.\u00a0 JWSC staff has been discussing with the engineer of record since the project has been restarted and the project did come in under the engineer\u2019s estimated cost.\u00a0 He stated that staff is requesting to award the contract to Southern Civil, LLC. to do this work, as well as an additional $650,000.00 to the budget for the completion of this project, and the additional funds will come from the R&R Reserve.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Copeland asked about the reasoning for the difference of $650,000 between 2014 budget and the current budget. \u00a0Todd Kline responded that construction costs have increased since 2014.\u00a0 He noted a comparison to the Hampton Project in 2015 which was a much smaller project and it came in at about one million dollars then.\u00a0 Mr. Burroughs commented that this requested amount covers the cost of construction plus a $75,000 contingency for incidentals that might occur during the project.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Stephens made a motion seconded by Commissioner Elliott to move that the Finance Committee recommend to amend the existing Ridgewood Water Production Facility project budget by $650,000 to a new total of 1,650,000, and I further move that the Finance Committee recommend entering into a contract with Southern Civil, LLC., in the amount of $1,398,532 for the construction of the Ridgewood Water Production Facility. \u00a0Motion carried 3-0-0.\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n
DISCUSSION<\/strong><\/p>\n\n- Potential Pension Changes<\/strong> \u2013 A. Burroughs<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Mr. Burroughs recalled that the pension plan has been discussed in Human Resources Committee Meetings and a Finance Committee Meeting where there was discussion of grandfathering in the current employees and creating a date when new employees would come under the new plan which would fall under the same GMA calculation for retirement benefit except the new plan would include a 3% contribution by the employee and a matched 3% from the Commission, instead of the Commission paying the full 6%. \u00a0Mr. Burroughs provided that in discussions with GMA, it would take about 90 days to make any changes to the current pension plan. \u00a0He commented that the recommendation that has been discussed is to grandfather in the current employees as the costs decrease as new employees come on to continue to pay off the unfunded portion quicker, and he added that the unfunded portion will be paid off in roughly half the time if the same amount that has been contributed is continued as new employees come on to the new plan.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Copeland questioned if the new employees that were paying in their 3% decided to leave JWSC would they be entitled to receive their 3% portion back, and Mr. Burroughs response was yes. \u00a0Commissioner Copeland then asked if the offset included the new employees\u2019 portion staying in the funds, and Mr. Burroughs replied no that it did not include that, and he added that the market value of our pension plan is around $5M and it is unlikely that one employee would contribute enough prior to being vested to significantly impact the amount of money in that plan at 3% of their salary.\u00a0 Commissioner Elliott asked if when the employees are vested, would they receive their portion plus our portion, and Mr. Burroughs commented yes but that that amount would stay in the pension plan fund and at retirement age they would get whatever benefit that is due them because of being vested.\u00a0 The question was raised concerning employees being partially vested at 3 years and the amount they would receive.\u00a0 Mr. Burroughs commented that under the new plan employees would not become vested until 10 years of employment for vesting rights on the program. Mr. Burroughs stated that today this was a discussion to consider which way the Commission wanted to go.\u00a0 It was also an opportunity to answer the questions raised by both the Human Resources Committee and the Finance Committee which was the reason for having this combined meeting and to get a more complete picture of\u00a0 the direction they wanted to move forward in.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Stephens suggested that this is such a large item with long term implications for the financial health of the Utility as well as an immediate impact and a long term impact on the team members.\u00a0 He commented that he would like for someone who has expertise, but doesn\u2019t sell pensions, to come in and discuss pensions with the Commissioners and do an evaluation of JWSC\u2019s plan to see what our long term sustainability is.\u00a0 Commissioner Copeland commented he agreed and what he would like to see considered among other alternatives would be for existing employees the option is keep the plan, for brand new employees there could be several options, and he named several alternatives.\u00a0 After some continued discussion on pensions and options, all agreed more information was needed and a presentation by an expert should be arranged.<\/p>\n
\n- Health Care Plan Staff Feedback<\/strong> \u2013 A. Burroughs<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Mr. Burroughs noted that at the previous two Human Resources Committee Meetings the upcoming renewal of the health insurance plan was discussed with Catina Tindall of First Coast Benefits.\u00a0 Options were discussed as to why the costs for JWSC have increased, and the types of plans offered have changed such as higher deductible plans.\u00a0 The entirety of the cost changes made with the last renewal was placed on the employees.\u00a0 Mr. Burroughs noted that looking at the claims history for the last nine months, JWSC appears to be in better shape as far as renewals, but that cannot be determined until the time is closer for renewal.\u00a0 He provided that at the last Human Resources Meeting he had discussed meeting with a focus group made up of randomly selected staff members to see how the changes made for 2019 impacted the ways in which the employees have used their health insurance.\u00a0 Two staff members from each division were randomly selected to participate in this group discussion.\u00a0 Mr. Burroughs stated that the discussions included the high costs for the insurance, wellness programs and incentives, and the question was asked if the higher deductible amount prevented them from going to the doctor and for the vast majority of the staff in the group the answer was yes.\u00a0 Employees were not going to the doctor because if they thought it was going to cost too much then they could not afford to go unless it is a major situation.\u00a0 Mr. Burroughs stated that the discussion included the health reimbursement account that the Commissioners had previously discussed where potentially if employees went to the H.S.A. the Commission would contribute the second $2,500 to that plan.\u00a0 The employees were asked what their concerns would be with that type of plan, and their concerns were about how they would come up with the first $2,500.\u00a0 Catina Tindall will be gathering the information for the 2020 renewal and will be presenting that to the Commission in January.\u00a0 The Commissioners indicated they would like to review the health renewal information in a combined Finance and Human Resources Committee Meeting in January.<\/p>\n
\n- Financial Statements Month End November 30, 2019 <\/strong>\u2013 J. Donaghy<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Mr. Donaghy reviewed the financial statements for the month ending November 30, 2019 with the Committees.\u00a0 He noted that on the Balance Sheet the Bond Sinking Fund showed just below $2.2M at November month end, however there was a bond interest payment due on December 1st<\/sup> which is paid from that account.\u00a0 Mr. Donaghy also discussed the Accounts Receivables decrease.\u00a0 After a brief review of the Balance Sheet, he continued on to review and discuss the Supplemental Schedule of Cash Balances, Combined Revenue Statement, the Project Report, and the Detail Revenue and Expense Report with the Commissioners and provided explanations and responses to their questions. \u00a0There was an extended discussion pertaining to investments and SPLOST funds.<\/p>\nEXECUTIVE SESSION<\/strong><\/p>\nCommissioner Stephens made a motion seconded by Commissioner Harvey to enter into Executive Session to discuss Litigation and Property with no vote to be taken after.\u00a0 Motion carried 5-0-0.<\/u><\/p>\n
Commissioner Stephens left the meeting at 2:45 p.m. during Executive Session.<\/p>\n
Return to Regular Session.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Elliott made a motion seconded by Commissioner Neal to return to Regular Session.\u00a0 Motion carried 4-0-1. (Commissioner Stephens was absent for the vote.)<\/u><\/p>\n
There being no further business, Chairman Copeland adjourned the meeting at 3:00 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For your consideration, please read the minutes from the Finance and Human Resources Joint Committee Meeting held on Wednesday, December 18, 2019 at 1:00 p.m. in the Commission Meeting Room. Finance-Human Resources Minutes 12-18-19 with Attachments To read the minutes, please open or download the pdf from the link above, or you may see more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[18,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-finance-committee-minutes","category-human-resources-safety-committee-minutes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14356\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goldenisleslepc.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}