Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission
Ad Hoc Infrastructure Committee
November 8, 2000
Commission Hearing RoomTexas Parks & Wildlife Department Headquarters Complex
4200 Smith School Road
Austin, TX 78744
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BE IT REMEMBERED...regulatory authority of the
6 Parks and Wildlife Commission of texas, in the
commission hearing room of the Texas Parks and Wildlife
7 Headquarters complex, to wit:
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APPEARANCES:
9 THE PARKS AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION:
10 AD HOC INFRASTRUCTURE COMMITTEE:
CHAIR: John Avila, Jr.
11 Lee M. Bass
Carol E. Dinkins
12 Nolan Ryan, (Absent)
Dick Heath, (Absent)
13 Ernest Angelo, Jr.
John Avila, Jr.,
14 Alvin L. Henry
Katharine Armstrong Idsal
15 Mark W. Watson, Jr., (Absent)
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THE TEXAS PARKS AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION:
20 Andrew H. Sansom, Executive Director, and other
personnel of the Parks and Wildlife Department
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1 AD HOC INFRASTRUCTURE COMMITTEE
2 CHAIR BASS: Thank you.
3 Call a meeting, the meeting of the ad
4 hoc infrastructure committee, and ask for approval of
5 last -- ask for the approval of last month's meeting
6 notes.
7 COMMISSIONER HENRY: So moved.
8 CHAIR BASS: Second?
9 COMMISSIONER IDSAL: Second.
10 CHAIR BASS: All in favor say aye.
11 Motion carries.
12 (Motion carries unanimously.)
13 AGENDA ITEM NO. 2: BRIEFING-BOND AND CAPITAL PROGRAM
14 UPDATE.
15 CHAIR BASS: This will just be a brief
16 by Scott. Status of the Bond program.
17 MR. BORUFF: Mr. Chairman,
18 Commissioners, my name is Scott Boruff, a relatively
19 new director of the infrastructure division.
20 We're here today to brief you on the --
21 the capital program, in particular the bond program,
22 which, as you know, was a result of a revenue bond
23 authority provided by the 75th Legislature back in
24 1997. We're going to, as I say, talk primarily about
25 the bond program update.
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1 As you'll recall, back in 1996, the
2 agency chartered an infrastructure task force committee
3 which was interested in looking at the critical repairs
4 that were necessary with -- throughout the system.
5 Those backlog issues were kind of clumped into three
6 major categories: Facility repair, water/wastewater
7 renovations, and ADA compliance issues.
8 The infrastructure task force identified
9 $75 million in critical repair needs, broken down as
10 you see on this particular slide right here: $50
11 million for water/wastewater, $20 million for facility
12 repair, $5 million for ADA.
13 The legislature authorized $60 million
14 to address those issues, broken down as you see: $40
15 million in water/wastewater, $16 million in facility
16 repair, $4 million in ADA.
17 With our upcoming issuance, which is
18 going to happen in February -- we'll talk a little bit
19 about that in a minute -- you can see where our
20 proposed total distribution will land. This is where
21 we think we will ultimately end up: $34.6 million in
22 water/wastewater, 24.7 in facility repair, and 4.2
23 million in ADA repairs.
24 We opted to issue these bond funds in
25 four different issues. The first one, in March of '98,
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1 for $12 million, and the second one, in February of
2 '99, for 18 million; February of 2000, for $20
3 million, and we're proposing the last 13.5 million this
4 coming February. And that 13.5 million happens to
5 include $3.5 million in interest that we've earned on
6 the bond money in the last four years.
7 This is a slide we decided to throw in
8 here just to give you a perspective of the phenomena
9 that happens as the bonds are issued. That dotted line
10 running down the center is essentially where we are
11 now, and it just gives you an appreciation for the fact
12 that we are currently managing three different bond
13 issues; although, we're just about to finish up with
14 the'98 bond issuance, those particular projects, within
15 a couple of months here. We will then issue the 2001
16 bond dollars, so we will once -- once again be managing
17 three different bond issues.
18 It's important to point out here, I
19 think, that, with the exception of the O-1 bond
20 issuances, all these other projects, whether in red or
21 stripes or in blue, are all programmed; that is,
22 they're all identified, scoped, and dollars have been
23 projected, and a schedule has been prepared to get
24 those done.
25 This particular slide demonstrates the
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1 process that we go through in order to have a project
2 completed and out in the field, ready to go.
3 Now, the top bubbles that you notice
4 there is the legislative and the -- on through your own
5 approval process. Our shop gets this, down here, where
6 it says "TPFA Approval," and the reason we threw this
7 in here was twofold: One is to kind of give you an
8 appreciation for the timelines that it requires us to
9 get these projects done, and as you can see at the end
10 there, it's typically a 2 1/2 -- 2- to 2 1/2-year
11 process, from the time we get the -- from the time you
12 approve the projects, to the time they're actually
13 completed.
14 Another thing I'd like you to glance at
15 for a moment is the red line at the bottom of the
16 chart -- kind of the thick red line -- and that's an
17 expenditure line which kind of demonstrates the reality
18 that you spend more money at the tail end of the
19 project than you do early on. So sometimes there may
20 be a perception we're not spending money fast enough,
21 but, as you probably well know, in this industry, you
22 tend to spend money at the tail end of a project and
23 not early on.
24 The following slides are just specific
25 slides related to each of the issuances. This is the
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1 '98 issue, on a 12 million-dollar issue back in '98.
2 The slide suggests that we've done $10.8 million to
3 date. That's the number that the comptroller
4 recognizes. We've actually spent about 11 1/2 million
5 to date, and the difference being the fact that there's
6 a 30- to 60-day delay in the time that we complete the
7 projects and the comptroller gets the paperwork. It's
8 a paperwork phenomenon.
9 So this -- we essentially -- this shows
10 that we've completed 92 percent; 8 percent are still in
11 construction. That number is even -- looks better
12 than that now. This is about a three-week-old chart.
13 We have actually only three projects that are in the
14 completion phase and will be completed before the end
15 of the year. So this -- this issuance is essentially
16 completed and will be done before the session starts.
17 And the '99 bond issue was an
18 18-million-dollar issue, and 132 total projects. We
19 spent $9.4 million, roughly, at this point, and have
20 about $2.4 million encumbered. You can see the
21 breakdowns there where we've completed 28 percent of
22 those projects, 38 percent are in construction, 29
23 percent in design, and 5 percent in bid.
24 For the fiscal year 2000 bond issue, we
25 had 125 total projects that we launched under that
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1 issue. We've currently spent about 1.1 million and
2 have about 3.4 million encumbered. Only 1 percent of
3 those are complete; however, 69 percent are in design,
4 14 percent are in construction, 11 percent are
5 scheduled, and 5 percent are in the bid process.
6 Last, but not least, this is a little
7 bit different slide where -- because this is the bond
8 issue that's coming this February, so, obviously, we
9 don't have this money yet. We do have the projects
10 identified and, by and large, scoped. So once the
11 funds are issued, we will be scheduling those
12 projects. Sixty-eight percent of those are targeted to
13 be water/wastewater projects, twenty-one percent are
14 targeted for facility repair, and eleven percent for
15 ADA. There will be 87 projects in this next issue.
16 I slipped -- skipped a couple of slides
17 up there.
18 I thought this might be interesting to
19 include here to emphasize the fact that we don't just
20 manage bond dollars in these capital projects. In
21 fact, if you look at this particular graph, it will
22 demonstrate that we actually spent more money, in the
23 last three years, on non-bond capital projects than we
24 have in bond projects. And those are things that are
25 Wildlife Fund 9 type projects: The marsh renovations
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1 at Galveston, the San Jacinto monument, which, I had a
2 separate line item allocated for that.
3 Next we wanted to demonstrate to you our
4 expenditure strategy for this -- this year, which, we
5 are ahead of the game. You can see the yellow line
6 there was what we targeted to be spending as the year
7 goes forth. Of course, we're only two months into the
8 fiscal year, but we're $700,000 ahead of schedule in
9 terms of our ability to spend the money appropriately.
10 And then the next few slides kind of
11 demonstrate some of the reasons we have been able to --
12 to increase the productivity. A couple slides back, I
13 didn't really talk about the numbers, but over the last
14 3 years, we've gone from being able to spend $14
15 million a year, to spending about $24 million a year,
16 which is a significant increase in our ability to
17 expend the funds appropriately. And part of the reason
18 is because of our expanded contracting authority, which
19 is authorized by the 76th Legislature, which allowed us
20 to do design-build projects.
21 I might mention that we -- one of the
22 first things I did when I came on board was to sign our
23 first design called, Possum Kingdom, so we're in our
24 first experience with that model. And I think things
25 are coming along pretty well with it.
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1 Next, somewhat familiar with, this is
2 our Project Management Information System, which was
3 developed with Carter Burgess. This system has been up
4 and running for a couple of years now. We're very
5 committed to continuing this system and to being able
6 to refine it and tweak it a little bit to make it a
7 more powerful management tool.
8 Last, and certainly not least, is our
9 Facility Management System. This is a system which
10 will allows us, in the future, to be able to predict,
11 with -- with a high degree of accuracy, our capital
12 needs for the future. And we think we'll be able to do
13 this for quite some time out, up to a decade out, in
14 the future, and we just started piloting this with
15 several of the parks. We hope to, certainly, within
16 the next year and half, have the system completely
17 operational so that the -- during the next session, we
18 will have some hard numbers and -- to be able to use to
19 ask for funds.
20 And, in summary, I guess, one of the
21 things that's important for us is to understand that
22 this backlog, which was identified in the
23 infrastructure task force process, will, hopefully,
24 assuming we get $15 million more this session, be wound
25 up, and we will then be looking for a system to be put
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1 into place that will prevent us from falling into the
2 same kind of deep hole that we seem to have fallen in
3 historically here. And we are asking, over the next
4 two years -- I think Suzy mentioned it earlier -- $8
5 million a year in funding, for major critical repairs
6 to the system, in addition to the $3 million which has
7 already been appropriated for ongoing maintenance and
8 minor repair.
9 And with that, I would certainly
10 entertain any questions.
11 CHAIR BASS: Well, I would say that
12 that's -- I understand everything, and that's -- that's
13 excellent.
14 On these slides where you -- where we
15 show what we're going to do with the fiscal year 01,
16 with so many going to wastewater treatment and some to
17 facility repair and so forth, it might be good to go
18 back to the others and put them in that big generalized
19 category so -- with the legislature coming up, when --
20 we all ought to know, because it was -- it was critical
21 repairs, so how much of that was, you know, life safety
22 and wastewater, and I know a lot of it was.
23 Okay. And then -- then they -- we may
24 not need the -- certainly the Power Points, but then,
25 finally, the specifics for each one. And we can get
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1 together on that, because they're going to -- they're
2 going to want it -- the legislature is going to want to
3 know where in my district, what was it.
4 MR. MURPHY: Yes, sir, and we -- we
5 have that prepared --
6 CHAIR BASS: I think it --
7 MR. MURPHY: --- already. We didn't
8 include it in here just for brevity's sake, but I'd be
9 glad to --
10 (Simultaneous conversation.)
11 MR. MURPHY: --- we can make sure
12 that -- that we've got what you think is appropriate.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: Very good.
14 MR. BORUFF: Thank you.
15 CHAIRMAN BASS: I think that concludes
16 our business for the day.
17 We stand adjourned until in the morning.
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1 THE STATE OF TEXAS )
COUNTY OF BEXAR )
2
3 I, STACI D. SLAYDEN, a Certified Court
4 Reporter in and for the State of Texas, do hereby
5 certify that the above and foregoing pages constitute a
6 full, true, and correct transcript of the minutes of
7 the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission on November 8,
8 2000, in the Commission hearing room of the Texas Parks
9 and Wildlife Headquarters Complex, Austin, Travis
10 County, Texas. I FURTHER CERTIFY that a stenographic
11 record was made by me at the time of the public meeting
12 and said stenographic notes were thereafter reduced to
13 computerized transcription under my supervision and
14 control. WITNESS MY HAND this ____ day of
15 ________________________, 2001.
16
17 ________________________________
18 STACI D. SLAYDEN, Texas CSR 7290
19 Expiration Date: 12/2001
20 7800 IH-10 West, Suite 100
21 San Antonio, Texas 78230
22 (210) 377-3017
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1
2 _______________________________________
JOHN AVILA, JR., CHAIRMAN
3
4 _______________________________________
CAROL E. DINKINS, VICE-CHAIR
5
6 _______________________________________
DICK W. HEATH
7
8 _______________________________________
NOLAN RYAN
9
10 _______________________________________
ERNEST ANGELO, JR.
11
12 _______________________________________
LEE M. BASS
13
14 _______________________________________
ALVIN L. HENRY
15
16 _______________________________________
KATHARINE ARMSTRONG IDSAL
17
18 _______________________________________
MARK E. WATSON, JR.
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