PUD board considers employee evaluations, hydro power

Wahkiakum Public Utility District board of commissioners held its first evening workshop for long range planning, continued from its regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday morning.

Topics of concern included personnel evaluations for both non-union and union staff, a code of ethics for commissioners, and small-scale hydroelectric projects.

Lee Tischer, who plans to run for PUD commissioner, and Pete Fleury, attended the meeting.

Each commissioner brought items of concern. Commissioner Dennis Reid discussed the need for a mission statement and governance documents. He said the board could not find the PUD’s mission statement when they interviewed candidates for the recent commission appointee.

Reid has been collecting documents from other PUDs. He believes non-union employees, the general manager and the auditor, need job descriptions and personnel evaluations.

“I know this isn’t popular.” Reid said, adding that these should be completed prior to broader governance documents, since budget hearings will occur later this year.

Jungers said he had been frustrated for years with “shallow, meaningless evaluations." He and previous commissioners Larry Reese and Esther Gregg developed a job description but dropped it when Reese’s support flagged. The commissioners will review that document.

Newly appointed commissioner Gene Healy said he felt personnel evaluations and governance documents were important and he’d like to have a “salary administration plan. So that people will know what a satisfactory employee can earn up to an outstanding employee.”

Reid agreed with the need for a salary consideration to be sure the PUD was adequately paying employees.

“We need to keep our people. We need to know if we’re paying them properly. They can leave,” he said.

Jungers came to discuss hydroelectric power.

“I’m a kind of nuts and bolts guy. I want to provide reliable power at a reasonable cost—accent on reliable, without being a spendthrift about it,” he said.

“For 60 years, a hydro project on the Grays River has been studied, and found to be not feasible. Maybe this time. It’s a question of how far the board wants to stick its neck out politically.”

Jungers said a small 1.5-megawatt project is being explored to serve the city of Bandon, Ore. Jungers has received a $70,000 proposal from Buzz Ketcham of the PUD’s engineering firm, Brown and Kyzer, who visited the PUD last meeting. Ketcham, who is also a Cowlitz PUD commissioner, detailed costs for site visit and design of a small project on the Grays River.

“Does Brown and Kyzer usually advocate for us like this?” Healy asked.

“If it serves their interest,” Jungers said.

Reid and Healy said they wanted to see the hydro proposal from Brown and Kyzer pursued.

The board discussed funding repairs to the Western Wahkiakum Water System. The State Department of Health wants the system brought up to standard.

“It’s an aging system with obsolete technology; an economically fragile system,” Jungers said.

The board agreed they needed a plan and a timetable for improvements.

“The rates are already high because there are so few ratepayers, only 315,” Reid said.

The board adjourned at 5:50 p.m. with plans to review personnel evaluations, job descriptions and further information on hydroelectric power at its next workshop meeting.