|
September 7, 2018
There is an organization that we belong to called Cities
& Schools. It is comprised of the cities of Auburn, Algona and Pacific, as well as the Auburn
School District and Green River College. We have meet at least twice per year
for over ten years to discuss topics of interest or concern to each of us.
During the past year we have decided to work on how to create, attract and
retain family-wage sustainable jobs in our community. We realize that not
everyone is four-year-college bound, but everyone should have some post-secondary
education/training. To the end, we are hosting a Mayors’ Summit on Tuesday
morning, September 11, from 7:30 - 9:00 a.m. at the Junior Achievement Building.
We have invited business owners, leaders, managers, non-profits and others to
join us in this conversation and ultimately create a steering committee that
will assist in assuring our students and residents of Auburn, Algona and Pacific are qualified and trained for the jobs that are available. If you have
not heard about this and you are interested in attending, please RSVP by Monday afternoon.
With the
implementation of the Automated Metering Infrastructure program for our city’s
water meters, we are now able to detect small leaks which water service users
may not have previously known about. To do this, the system’s
Continuous Consumption After 3 Days Report is the initial notification that
there may be a water leak. Typically a small (1-2 CF) leak is found in a
toilet.
So, how do we help our customers? We notify the customer that
they may have a leak and if they are unable to find it, we can provide dye
tablets which are dropped in the toilet’s tank when not in use and if, after a
few minutes, there is color in the bowl it indicates a leak. This is one
of many options available to our customers for locating water leaks. No one benefits when there is a leak – not you as
the consumer or us as the provider.
|
Every now and then, we think we’re in a time the likes of
which have never been seen. I came across this quote last week, and felt it
appropriate for today’s society - just as it must have been during Thomas
Jefferson’s life.
“I never considered a difference of opinion in politics,
in religion, in philosophy as cause to withdraw from a friend.”
Thomas
Jefferson
The Operator’s Strike is still going on and as I included
in one of my previous updates, there are impacts right here in Auburn. The
union covers workers such as asphalt and concrete plant operators, concrete
pump truck operators, loader, excavator and backhoe operators, and many many
other types of operators. This impacts Auburn in our capital
construction projects and to a much lesser extent in our maintenance work. Some of the capital construction projects that are impacted include the
15th Street NW/NE Pavement Preservation Project and projects that
have multiple locations of work happening throughout the City such as the 2018
Storm Drainage Repair and Replacement Project, the 2018 Local Street
Reconstruction Project and the Arterial Pavement Patching and Overlay project.
Contractors are still unable in many cases to get the materials
that they need and the operators for onsite equipment. We are still
hopeful that the issues get resolved quickly so that we can complete our
projects but there is no way to know exactly when the strike will end. Unfortunately, until it is resolved, you will not see significant progress on
many of our projects and other projects in the region. To give you an
idea of the scope of the impact in the Puget Sound region, the counties involved
include Clallam, Jefferson, Mason, Grays Harbor, Kitsap, Island, San Juan,
King, Snohomish, Skagit, Whatcom, Kittitas, and parts of Okanogan,
Chelan, Douglas, and Yakima. So we ask that the public be patient as we
work with our contractors to keep projects moving as best we can during this
time.
|
