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Welcome to the California Public Utilities Commission
forum on suburban water rate request. Today's call
is being recorded. If you object, you may disconnect
Judge Kelly, you may begin. Thank you. I just wanna
confirm the court reporters are ready to go ready,
judge. Thank you. We are on the record. The commission
will come to order. My name is Gerald F. Kelly and
I am the administrative law judge assigned to this
proceeding. Today is August 28th, 2023. We are conducting
this public participation hearing or PPH remotely.
The assigned commissioner to this proceeding is Commissioner
Chroma and she is with us today and she will address
everyone shortly. Please note that this PPH is being
recorded and it's available on our website. If you
do not wish to be recorded. Please disconnect. Now
this is the time and place for the PP pertaining to
application 23 101, the application of suburban water
systems or suburban to increase rates for water service
for 2024 2025 and 2026 on January 3rd, 2023 suburban
filed its application which first appeared on the commission's
daily calendar on January 6th, 2023. The application
seeks to increase rates starting January 1 2024. The
application seeks approval to increase rates by approximately
19.74 million or 19.79% in 2024 6.4 million or 5.49%
in 2025 and 6.39 million or 5.20% in 2026. The application
requests that the commission find that suburban follows
all federal and state drinking water standards and
commission rules orders and decisions. Additionally
the application made 18 special requests on February
2nd 2023 A LJ resolution 176-3522 was issued and found
that this proceeding is rate making. The commission's
Public Advocate's Office or Cal Advocates reviewed
the application and filed a protest on February 6 2
23. Cal Advocates set forth its concerns with the application
and its protest. No other protests were filed as it
relates to this application. On February 16th, 2023
Suburban filed a response to the public Advocates or
cow advocates protest on February 17th, 2023. Suburban
submitted the required 45 day update to its application
A pre hearing conference was conducted in this proceeding
on May 1 2023 and the scopy memo was issued on May
25 2023. There will be a fact sheet posted at www dot
CPUC dot C A dot gov forward slash PPH. That will have
additional details concerning the application. As I
noted earlier, Commissioner Chroma is with us today
Commissioner. Would you like to make some opening remarks
Uh Yes, thank you, Jeff Kelly. Good afternoon, everyone
Uh My name is Javi Shama. My pronouns are she her uh
as Judge Kelly indicated on the assigned commissioner
for this proceeding for Urban Water Systems General
rate case uh application. Oh, on January 3rd 2023 as
Judge Kelly outlined to be submitted an application
for approval of rate increases. I will be working with
Judge Kelly very carefully to consider Veron's request
in this general rate case and to ensure that customer
bills reflect quality water service as this rate case
proceeding may have large impacts on the rate payers
We at the public commission take all participation
very seriously and work to ensure that customers have
ample opportunity to understand the proceedings that
affect them and voice any questions or concerns. Today
we'll have an opportunity to hear from suburban water
system uh about their application and also from the
public advocates. Uh The public will have an opportunity
to share their questions with concern uh online via
phone. I look forward to hearing from all of you and
from our presenters today. Before I turn the microphone
back to judge Kelly, I would like to thank today's
court reporters or woman and Shannon laws who are working
very hard to cover the hearing today and have a tough
job of capturing everything that will be set here for
the record. I also want to thank Joseph Haga Jacob
and Robert Stanford from our information technology
team to make these, these meetings possible. Thank
you and back to you, Judge Kelly.
Thank you, Commissioner. Before we start, I just want
to give everybody a brief overview of what the California
Public Utilities Commission or C PC is and what we
do. The C PC is the state agency that regulates privately
owned utilities like suburban that provide essential
services such as electric, gas and water. There are
five commissioners at the C PC. The five commissioners
will be the people who vote and decide whether to approve
the application. My role as the assigned administrative
law judge in this case is to review the application
based on the evidence that is presented. I will write
a proposed decision for the commissioners to consider
the commissioners will vote to adopt my proposed decision
or an alternate decision if put forth by a commissioner
hearings are tentatively set to start October 2nd 2023
and last for three days at this time. It is expected
that these hearings will be conducted remotely. Although
hearings are tentatively set, it is possible that the
parties may settle the matter prior to the date of
hearings. If they do settle. The commission will evaluate
whether to adopt the settlement agreement or portions
thereof. Currently, there are two parties in this proceeding
The two parties are suburban and the commission's Public
Advocate's office. The Public Advocate's Office is
an independent branch within the C PC who works to
represent the interest of the rate payers in proceedings
like this. They do not work for me or the commissioner
both suburban and the Public Advocate's office will
give you a brief presentation shortly. I will now explain
the purpose of the PPH we are having today. We are
here today to listen to your comments on suburban's
application for the increase in rates. We want to hear
how the application will impact you, your family or
your community as a suburban customer. Your comments
will help the CPC gather information to determine whether
to grant the application. In addition to considering
the comments received here today, we will also consider
all comments that have been submitted electronically
or by other means in this proceeding. If you would
like to provide public comments today, you may do so
by Kyle calling 808 571917 entering pass code 603 278
£8 and pressing star one on your phone. This will alert
the operator who will begin to cue public speakers
Please provide your name. If you are a public official
please notify the operator of your title and position
in addition to your name, I will not be answering questions
about the application here today as the purpose of
this PP is to obtain public comments about the application
However, if you have a customer specific question,
such as a question about your bill or your service
or the application, we have a customer service representative
available from excuse me, from suburban that you may
call and direct your specific questions to you may
reach this individual by calling MS Lisa Lozano at
626543 2656 or emailing her at llo va no at swwc dot
com. I'm just going to go over a few basic ground rules
for the proceeding here. Today, the court reporters
will be transcribing everything that is said here today
Please remember to speak slowly and clearly as the
court reporters have the difficult job of taking down
everything which is said here today, only one person
at a time can speak as the court reporters are unable
to transcribe an accurate record when more than one
person is speaking. The first time you speak, please
state and spell your name to ensure that we have an
accurate record. It may be excuse me. It may be necessary
for the court reporters to interrupt a speaker that
something is not comprehendible after this public participation
hearing is over. The court reporters will prepare a
written transcript of this hearing. This transcript
will be provided to myself and the five commissioners
Additionally, it will be available to the public and
will be posted to the dock a card of this proceeding
We will now have a brief presentation from the parties
as it relates to their application and their protest
at this time. Suburban will give its brief presentation
Thank you, Judge Kelly. This is Craig got Craiggo TT
and I'm the president of Suburban Water Systems. I
wanted to say good afternoon to judge Kelly and Commissioner
SRO Thank you. Uh My pronouns are he? He? And I'll
get started with a brief introduction. I've been the
I've been at suburban water systems for 21 years. I've
been working in engineering operations and now as the
president, um I'm gonna skip to the next slide please
At suburban. Our mission is to provide life sustaining
water and wastewater services to our customers, empowering
the communities. We serve. Our core values are safety
environmental stewardship, customer care, employee
empowerment, integrity and community partnership. Our
request in this GRC is aligned with our mission and
values. Move to the next slide, please.
I wanted to highlight our, our low income rate assistance
program or cap program. Our customer assistance program
that provides monthly discounts to qualifying low income
customers to make sure that bills are affordable. We
have currently 11,600 I guess as of December, 11,627
customers signed up for this representing about 15%
of our customer base and the rate on here, 876 we're
proposing to increase proportionately with that rate
increase. And I think that at our requested rate increase
would be about $10.50. I wanted to also highlight on
this slide that in the past year, a couple of years
we have applied $1.8 million of grants to relieve a
big portion of our customers COVID arrearage debt.
We're also applying for more in the upcoming program
And then we are also promoting the low income household
water assistance program or for our customers and that
gives debt up to $12,000 and can also be used for future
debt. So I encourage anybody listening, that's interested
to call our number and we can give you more information
about those two programs. Also want to point out I
mention in the Water Resources Group report, the Human
Rights of Water in poor communities of color suburban
was called out as the least expensive of the of the
investor owned water utilities. Uh We're very proud
of that fact. We can move on to the next slide, please
In December, we became the owners of the Sativa water
system and we're pleased to say that everything is
going very well. Customers immediately became eligible
for our $8.76 customer assistance program that I just
described if they're qualifying, we're in process designing
over $10 million of capital improvements to improve
the supply of reliability, fire flow capacity and water
quality. We've had many town hall events. We had one
back in January 26th. We've had informal quarterly
food distributions and we had a career fair with our
neighbor there community. Sorry Compton Youth Field
And we have another town hall coming up on 9 21. So
I certainly invite any customers that have called in
to join us at our future events, especially the town
hall meeting. Um I I want to highlight too here, the
employee that you see was actually an employee of the
community. Uh One of the customers of water that we
were able to hire after we took um started operating
the system. We can skip to the next slide, please.
In this case, we have proposed a thoughtful improvement
capital investment plan. It is required to provide
our customers to ensure our customers keep getting
safe and reliable water supply when they want it and
when they need it, the recent fires in Maui demonstrated
the importance of a reliable water system for firefighting
and also the recent drought demonstrated the importance
of access to local water resources like local water
rights that save money for customers. Just some highlights
Some of the projects that we have here is drilling
wells and acquiring water rights to make more use of
local water aquifers, ami meters to improve service
for customers, solar power and electric vehicles to
reduce our carbon footprint. We have annual projects
that we are always working on pipeline, pipeline replacements
hydrants and valves and a big project. I'm actually
going to talk a little bit more about is our pfas removal
project so we can skip to the next slide
and that is about PFAS. So PFAS is a man made chemical
with heat and water resistance properties that makes
it very hard to break down in the environment. PFAS
is found in all those products you see on the right
paint shampoo, non stick cookware, stainless stain
resistant products, photography, firefighting phones
fast food packaging, pesticides and paint. So pretty
much everything they have reported and studied health
effects, reproductive for child development, developmental
effects, increase cancer risk, reduce immune response
and increase cholesterol and risk of obesity. Suburban
has tested for PFAS in its wells and some of our wells
and found them. Sorry. We have tested all of our wells
and we have found it in some of our wells at plant
two and one. And in this rate case, we're requesting
approval to invest $42 million to construct a treatment
plant to remove this PFAS at the source. We're also
pursuing insurance and litigation against the manufacturers
of these chemicals to help bring down the cost of these
treatment facilities if you can move on to the next
slide.
Conservation suburban's customers did great responding
to the governor's executive orders over the last couple
of years and actually reduced our use their usage by
more than 20% suburban was recognized as an all star
conservation utility by the state. What we have seen
now, even after the very wet winter that we've had
customers have actually made permanent changes to their
landscaping that's reduced their water, their water
demand and also changed their water use behavior. So
we're seeing significantly lower water use sticking
around even after the rains and getting back into the
summer months, which is very surprising to us so could
work for our customers conserving water. The next slide
is about supplier diversity, suburban led all CP regulated
utilities in supplier diversity spend in 2022 was 67%
and we are committed to supporting businesses that
represent our community. So I wanted to just note that
and then the last slide that I have and I'm going to
wrap up there is about public outreach and we have
engaged in extensive public outreach to provide our
community important, timely accurate and Multilingual
communication. And we've done that through many different
forms like the picture you see there is a community
forum, we do mailers and bill inputs and emails, community
booths at events. We have payment lobbies that are
open to receive customers. We have social media presence
we do food distribution events and of course, our website
is a great place to see what's going on at suburban
and a good place for resources for our customers. The
very last slide now is just for me to wrap up. As
you can see, there are a lot of challenges and opportunities
facing our utility. They are complex. I'm really proud
of the great work that our diverse team of employees
does around the clock to make sure that we're serving
our customers. So please don't hesitate to let us know
if we can be of help. And here is all of our
contact information. Should anybody need it? And I
did want to give a shout out and thank Lisa for being
available today to take calls for our customers.
Thank you, Mr T. The Commission's Public Advocate's
Office will now give their presentation.
Thank you, Judge Kelly. My name is uh Soloman Ibrahim
Sul I MA N Ibrahim. I'm a senior utilities engineer
with the Public Advocate's Office and I will be giving
you a brief overview of our recommendations and the
current proceedings. Next flight, please.
So the Public Advocate's Office is an independent office
within the California Public Utilities Commission that
represents the interests of great fair. Our multidisciplinary
team has expertise in a variety of topics including
engineering, economics, accounting and finance
because we are an independent office within the CPUC
Our views are not necessarily reflected of the commission
and places
our statutory mission is to obtain the lowest possible
rate per service, consistent with the reliable and
safe service levels.
So we independently analyzed suburbans request and
present are results to the commission. That's why I
see.
And we present our results in the form of testimony
that shows our analysis and recommendations on a wide
range of issues including capital investment, sales
and rate, design and conservation and operating expenses
Oh, can you go to like this?
So, based on our independent analysis, the Public Advocate's
Office is recommending a January 1 2024 increase of
no more than approximately $3.6 million or 3.52% as
compared to suburbans request of a little under $20
million or 19.7 months.
And so,
and some of our specific recommendations include authorizing
funding for a more moderate pipeline replacement program
than the one proposed by suburban
reducing suburban's proposed purchase and pumps water
costs. The more accurately reflect suburban's actual
cost of purchasing and pumping water. Let's play it
if you don't mind
removing the budget for purchasing water rights as
the proposed purchases are not cost effective and we
are also forecasting lower rate increases due to differences
in customer consumption forecasts. That's right.
So for any more details on our actual recommendations
or if you would like to read our reports, you can visit
our website and download the report. Our website is
www dot public advocates dot cpuc dot C A dot That
concludes my presentation. Thank you very much.
Thank you, sir. A reminder to those who wish to speak
if you have not already done. So please press star
one on your phone and the operator will add you to
a list of speakers. Also a reminder that if you are
a public official, please notify the operator of your
title in addition to your name. I just want to remind
any anyone who will be speaking to, please try to keep
your comments to around three minutes. Uh If we don't
have a lot of speakers, you could have a longer time
Uh Otherwise if, if there, if we do get a number of
speakers, then I would have to request that people
keep it to around three minutes. Also, please remember
to try to speak slowly and clearly, this will help
the court reporters out tremendously. And when the
operator informs you that it's your turn to speak,
please start your comments by stating and spelling
your name along with your location. We will hear you
best. If you speak directly into your phone or headset
please try to avoid using a speaker phone when you
are providing public comments. And it's my understanding
that we do have one person in the queue to make comments
at this time. Uh We can go ahead and allow the operator
to have the person make their public comments.
Thank you again. If you would like to make a comment
please unmute your phone, press start one and record
your first and last name slowly and clearly our first
caller is Laurel Mendoza. You may go ahead, your line
is open.
Thank you. Can you hear me clearly?
Hello.
Can you hear me? Go ahead. All right, thank you. Um
my name is Laura Mendoza and I've been a resident of
of for the past 23 years. Um, excuse me, I'm sorry
And I, um, I'm kind of coming in late to the game
of this issue a few weeks ago or so I received, um
what looked to be junk mail, um, in the mail and saw
that it had suburban water systems um logo on it. Usually
I throw this type of junk mail away. I'll admit and
I apologize, I probably should have been paying more
attention
when I read the contents of this document. I was really
surprised to see the reasons why they were asking for
these rate increases. Um We were told in Lara that
we were, we were to to conserve water. We did everything
that we were supposed to do and like they said, Lara
residents did a very good job. And during uh the president
of suburb water water systems, one of the comments
that he made was that he has community partnership
Um I would like to give an example or maybe ask a
question of if this falls into the category of community
partnership. One day in the mail I received from suburban
water systems, a picture of my home where water was
was running on the sidewalk and on the grass. And I
felt very surprised, ashamed all the words you want
to say. I had no idea. So, apparently trucks are driving
around the city to Lara residents taking pictures of
us. And I feel like, I don't know. It's a little strange
to me. Um, you know, if you're trying to save money
driving around the city and spying on your neighbors
and your residents, I don't think is the way to do
it. So I went to Lamda City Council meeting this last
Tuesday and voiced my concern about it. And I was told
by the city council point blank, they've already tried
this before and the commission doesn't care and no
matter what the residents say it's going to go through
And he told me that the last application cycle you
all cited for the reason for the increase was residents
were using too much water. So which is it? Ok. And
and asking this increase on the, the taxpayers of mama
that do pay their bills. We pride ourselves and we
want to help our community. If somebody needs help
paying their water bill, I would be more than fine
to, it's never been given to us. I want to help everybody
We all do. So I'm hoping and I understand I read through
the application very, very carefully and I do agree
with some of the requests that they made. Obviously
they are a legitimate request but asking for um additional
employees. What are they gonna do? Are they still gonna
drive around the city and take pictures of our houses
So I I just um am voicing my concern today and hoping
that our leadership in Lara City Council and others
because I doubt none of our neighbors knew about this
I will tell you right now, I spoke to so many members
of my community. You could say that you went to events
blah, blah, blah, our city, these people, we work.
We didn't know I found this by a piece of junk bail
by the grace of God. I found this or I would not
know come January 1st that my water rates were going
to go up. So I'm hoping that that this forum here today
will light a little ignition in some people to say
you know, it's disappointing to hear from our city
council that they're giving up and saying, oh, wait
oh boy, don't fight it because don't fight City Hall
Very disappointing. I'm hoping that the commission
I agree with everything. The gentleman that spoke earlier
I know he's speaking on a technical term and his difference
and his recommendation between whatever 3% and that
the egregious outrageous amount that, that sws was
asking. You could just see that it is, it's an outrageous
request and the demand on this community. It will show
please support the committee of Lara Whittier. I appreciate
your time. Thank you. Excuse me. This is a court reporter
ma'am. Would you please state and spell your name or
just? Yes. Yes. I'm sorry. My name is Laurel. Laurel
middle initial, a last name Mendoza Mendoz A and I
just want to thank everybody for your time. I appreciate
it.
Thank you operator. Do we have anybody uh in
and we have no additional callers on the line at this
time. But again, that is star one. If you would like
to make a comment, what I think we're gonna do. It's
2 30 I think we should take a 10 minute break. Uh
2 31. So we'll come back at 2 41. We'll take a
short break to see if anybody joins the line. Uh We
are temporarily off the record. Thank you.
The feed for this streaming event brought to you by
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you for your patience. Could get some additional callers
to call in my understanding that we do have a one caller
Uh Could the caller, please when they are told that
it's time to speak to, please state and spell their
name operator, go ahead and announce the caller, please
and it looks like we have Laurel Mendoza. He's back
on cue. You may go ahead. Hi. Thank you. I appreciate
it. Um I also want to just thank everybody for your
time today. I know that this is a sensitive topic for
for you all and the residents as well. And you know
I just want to make this other comment um regarding
urban water systems efforts or the marketing campaign
or what they call, uh didn't seem to be too successful
since I am literally the only resident in Lamb or that's
calling into this call. I really find it preposterous
that nobody else in the city cares about their water
rates increasing and we get that, we understand that
everybody is suffering and, you know, as all of us
are, I'm newly retired, so I never really paid attention
to this stuff until now. And now I kind of see what
what's um happening a little bit. If we don't pay attention
this is gonna um under our nose. And then in January
we're gonna have this huge bill and everybody is gonna
go, what happened. So I, I just wanted to say that
and also this program that you mentioned where if people
can't afford to um pay for their bills, that there's
programs. Um And then also what I understand there
there's a um from reading the application um that was
submitted by SW us um that um there, I'm sorry, I lost
my train of thought. I'm so sorry.
I, I apologize. I lost my train thought. However, um
it, it just seems that if, you know, they're asking
us to watch our water usage, which a lot of us did
And then they're, they're, it seems to be penalizing
the ones that watered little or less and paid their
bills and the people that are watering more and yet
they're on this program, I don't know if that's true
or not. I'd like to see the statistics on that because
again, I would, you know, I want everybody in the community
to course have water and be safe drinking water, et
cetera. But these are just my comments and I'm hoping
that our, you know, sub city council will hear this
recorded conversation and help the, the residents of
Lavada understand because the difference in the proposed
increase from an advocate, which I feel kind of silly
about that. I never even knew that there was an advocate
for us because I don't pay attention. I just worked
and now I'm paying attention. So I'm hoping that others
will. And I just wanted to um again, stress the fact
that the residents of the city of Lara, they love our
city. It's a beautiful city and we um we've never had
any problems with suburban water systems for me personally
until they took a picture of my home. And I took that
as kind of a, a little bit of a threat and I
even received a second notice and it was, it was just
something that I, I just find surprising that they
could have used their efforts better in their, their
employees time. And I hope hopefully that we can, you
know, I need to find out more about this advocacy group
because it sounds to me like nobody else does but the
advocates. So I'm hoping to change that. And if there
is, I'm, I'm just coming into the game maybe late,
but it just, I, I appreciate you giving me the, the
the forum to discuss the concerns of the. Hopefully
I can speak for some of the residents of the city and
where's Whittier where I don't hear anybody from Whittier
So I guess that campaign didn't do so well either.
Thank you so much for your time
and I have no additional callers in queue at this time
But again, as a reminder, if you would like to make
a comment, please unmute your phone. Press star one
and record your first and last name slowly and clearly
at 6 p.m. Commissioner. Do you have any concluding
remarks?
Yes. Thank you, Judge Kelly. Just again, appreciation
uh for the presentations provided by water systems
and our advocates and also, uh our one caller MS Mendoza
she covered quite a few different uh concerns. Uh and
um, uh, I, I know that we required to go to water
to publicize the proposed increase and there is a number
of different, but it is something that in the future
we can take a look at what's been working and what's
been improve. But meanwhile, I will be back at six
o'clock, uh, with you, Judge Kelly. And, uh, thank
you again to all.
Thank you, Commissioner. I look forward to working
with you on this matter on behalf of myself and the
commissioners at the puc. I want to thank everybody
for your participation here today. Uh I really do appreciate
it. Comments from the public do help us when we review
these applications and we do make a decision. I also
want to thank the parties for their very useful presentations
that was very helpful and I just wanted to thank everybody
who helped pull this remote hearing off today. Uh could
not have done it without the help of the court reporters
the it and the staff at the public advisor's office
Uh Again, thanks to everyone for the help. I do, I
do personally appreciate everything that everybody
does for us at this point. Uh Just one final check
to make sure that there are no further uh calls before
we go off the record
and we have no colors. Ok. So with that, uh this concludes
the two P MP PH for suburban water systems, general
rate case. Uh We are adjourned and off the record.
Thank you, everybody.