Wastewater Meetings Get Testy (Exclusive Audio)
— by Jeffrey Wisniewski — 13 August 2010 — No comments yet »
The relationship between the cities of Hercules and Pinole could seemingly not be any more strained. A principal reason — if not the only reason — is the continued shared operation of the wastewater treatment facility just over the Pinole border. Hercules has formally left the joint facility (opting for a switch to WCWD or even construction of a new facility) and tempers seem to flair every time the Joint Powers Authority board meets. Or so the minutes tend to suggest.
The meeting on June 23 is a great example. Apparently, freakishly-high measurements of copper and mercury were recorded during recent sampling events and the offending materials supposedly came from Hercules. The ensuing conversation became rather tense and City Manager Nelson Oliva took exception to the issue and blasted Pinole for their own faults in wastewater operations. Exclusive audio of that conversation follows (transcript below).
Note: If you don’t recognize the voices of the Hercules City Manager and Pinole Mayor, it is likely because the two reportedly had head colds at the time this meeting took place. (At least that is what I was told.)
The verbatim draft minutes (as recorded by board secretary; audio above slightly modified for context and clarity)…
Nelson Oliva, City Manager for the City of Hercules, When we meet with them we will ask them the question about the follow-up in reference to this letter.
Debbie Long, Mayor for the City of Pinole, Exactly. We need to have this response to protect all of us; what I am saying is as we all know email is not always the best form of communication to address an issue like this.
Virginia Fuiita, Council Member for the City of Pinole, Was your City Council aware of this situation? ,
Nelson Oliva, City Manager for the City of Hercules, It is operations, no
Virginia Fujita, Council Member for the City of Pinole, So they were not notified?
Nelson Oliva, City Manager for the City of Hercules, No, it was operation
Virginia Fujita, Council Member for the City of Pinole, If not the whole City Council the Sub-Committee Members, was they notified?
Nelson Oliva, City Manager for the City of Hercules, No, it was operations
Debbie Long, Mayor for the City of Pinole, It seems to me is a little more than operations, but that is my impression.
Nelson Oliva, City Manager for the City of Hercules, Let me go back this seems to be a tiff for tagger, we know by statements made by your Engineer, that you are discharging almost a half-million gallons of clean water into your sewer streets, coming from infiltration system, and if we are going to talk about dealing with important issues to the plant why are we not talking about that issue, that is a half-million gallons per day more than we need to be putting into the plant, which then would accommodate any additional flow that we could send in, and we would not be talking about leaving, but we don’t want to addressed the infiltration problem because in the words of Dean, it is cheaper to treat it than to fix the leak problem. We are working on fixing the leaks in the system because that is the right thing to do from an environmental approach. To come here and be chastised because we got a letter about why staff did or did not respond to your staff and continue to relive the point, I think it is a little bit… we understand it, we get it, if we were responsible we will deal with all the issues that came from that, if it is coming from somewhere else I think that is more alarming to us to make sure that it is not sipping into the system, you know, we get it, we understand the message, we are moving forward and I don’t think that has anything to do with jeopardizing our relationship, I think we are supposed to be working together to make sure we have the most effective system that we can to provide the services based on its age and ability to treat the waste water and dealing with the governing state agencies that we look up or respond to, but I did not come here to get chastised and bitten over and over again and neither did my Council. I want to move forward and be a good partner– we have been a good partner. I understand you used the word trust, you know there are a lot of things we would talk about trust, that I don’t even want to get into right now, because I believe on moving forward, with all respect we will respond to your letter in writing, we hope that the Water Regional Control Board responds in writing also, so that we can deal with the reprecautions that come with this, and, if we are responsible, we will deal with all the reprecautions, as simple as that.
Debbie Long, Mayer for the City of Pinole, That’s fine, that’s all we want is to make sure that everyone is aware appropriately.
Nelson Oliva, City Manager for the City of Hercules, Thanks very much
Nelson Oliva, City Manager for the City of Hercules, Alright thanks












