20110805Vol I Boise.pdf

ORIGINAL.BEFORE THE IDAHÒ PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION
IN THE MATTER OF THE APPLICATION
OF BRIAN WATER CORPORATION rOR
AUTHORITY TO INCREASE ITS RATES
AND CHARGES.
HEARING BEFORE
CASE NO.
BRN-W-11-01
COMMISSIONER PAUL KJELLANDER ~ Presiding)
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PLACE:Commission Hearing Room
472 West Washington Street
Boise, Idaho
DATE:August 3, 2011
VOLUME I - Pages 1 - 18
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COURT REPORTING
POST OFFICE BOX 578
BOISE, IDAHO 83701
208-336-9208
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1 APPEARANCES
2
3 For the Staff:KRISTINE SASSER, Esq.
Deputy Attorney General
472 West Washington
Boise, Idaho 83702
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For Brian Water:TONY BOWAR,
Brian Water Corp
5120 Overland Road, Suite C #228
Boise, ID 83705
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HEDRICK COURT REPORTING
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APPEARANCES
.1 I N D E X
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WITNESS EXAMINATION BY PAGE
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Paul L.Holland Ms.Sasser 4
4 ( Public)Statement 5
5 Charles C.Andersen Ms.Sasser 10
(Public)Statement 11
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12 EXHIBITS.13
14 (No exhibits were marked.)
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INDEX
EXHIBITS
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1 BOISE, IDAHO, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 3, 2011, 7: 05 P.M.
2
3
4 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Well, good evening,
5 ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Idaho Public Utilities
6 Commission. My name is Paul Kj ellander. I'm the president of
7 the Commission and the Chairman of this case. This is the time
8 and place in Case No. BRN-W-11-01, which is also referred to as
9 the Application of Brian Water Corporation for authority to
10 increase its rates and charges.
11 This evening, the sole purpose is to take
12 testimony from members of the public who wish to testify in
13 regards to this rate increase request, and before we get
14 started, the procedure will be -- is that we will call your
15 name. We'll have you move forward I believe up to this set of
16 chairs there. There's a microphone and hopefully the red light
17 will be on. And we'll just ask you a couple of questions to
18 get your name officially on the record, where you live, if
19 you're a customer. And then we'll allow you to provide your
20 comments.
21 Then there's an opportunity for we call it
22 cross-examination but it's really just an opportunity for the
23 parties to the case -- the Staff legal counsel, as well as
24 representative from the Utility -- to ask any follow-up
25 questions. It's not meant to be intimidating in any way,
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1 shape, or form. If it does go off in that direction, I'll
2 quickly call them on the carpet and tell them to be nice
3 people. So, again, it is a formal proceeding, but I don't want
4 you to be intimidated in any way, shape, or form as it relates
5 to the comments you provide.
6 What we do with those comments then is we have a
7 court reporter here who takes down everything that we say. All
8 three Commissioners -- Commissioner Redford and Commissioner
9 Smith will also review that testimony, along with the other
10 material filed in the case; and then as soon as the case is
11 deemed fully submitted, we'll render a final Decision.
12 And just as a matter of course, once that final
13 Decision is provided, there's an opportunity for
14 reconsideration. If the parties don't like the resolution of
15 reconsideration, they can actually appeal it, our Decision,
16 directly to the State Supreme Court. And that's why we go
17 through this process and it's very formal: So that we have an
18 official record so that if it does go to the Supreme Court, the
19 Supreme Court Justices will have official documentation that
20 they can reference that's officially a part of the record.
21 So, again, that's the process that we have this
22 evening.
23 As we move forward, we start first with the
24 appearances of the parties, and why don't we begin with legal
25 counsel representing the Staff of the Public Utili ties
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1 Commission.
2 MS. SASSER: Thank you, Chairman. Kristine
3 Sasser, representing Commission Staff.
4 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Okay, thank you.
5 And our representative from Brian Water.
6 MR. BOWAR: Tony Bowar.
7 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Tony Bowar.
8 And do you have all the spellings that you need,
9 Wendy?
10 (Indicating. )THE COURT REPORTING:
11 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Excellent. Good.
12 All right, would anyone like any opening comments
13 from the Staff for the Public Utilities Commission?
14 MS. SASSER: No, sir.
15 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: And how about from
16 Brian Water?
17 MR. BOWAR: No.
18 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: No. At present, we
19 have one witness who signed up to testify, so we'll call
20 Paul L. Holland.
21 And, Paul, if you'd be willing to come forward up
22 here, Kris will show you where to sit and I will swear you
23 in.
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25
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1 PAUL L. HOLLAND,
2 appearing as a public witness, being first duly sworn, was
3 examined and testified as follows:
4
5 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Thank you. Please be
6 seated.
7 MS. SASSER: The mike's on and it's sensitive, so
8 you're good.
9 THE WITNESS: Oh, good. Okay, thank you.
10 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: And, Ms. Sasser, as
11 protocol I think determines in public hearings, don't you
12 typically ask a few initial questions of the witness to get
13 them officially registered on the record?
14 MS. SASSER: Yes, certainly.
15 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Okay. Then please have
16 at it.
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18 EXAMINATION
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20 BY MS. SASSER:
21 Can you please state your name and spell yourQ.
22 last name for the record?
23 Paul Lee Holland, H-O-L-L-A-N-D.A.
24 And your resident address?Q.
25 6043 Brian Way, Boise, Idaho, 83716.A.
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HOLLAND
Public
.1 Q.And are you a customer of Brian Water?
2 A.Yes.
3 Q.Thank you.
4 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Thank you.
5 Mr. Holland, if you'd like, the microphone and
6 the floor is yours.
7 THE WITNESS: Well, I came here tonight after
8 receiving the Notice in the mail that there was going to be a
9 hearing, and after looking over the paperwork and speaking to
10 Tony, I just thought that -- I see nobody came here before, and
11 after talking to Tony and stuff and I got to thinking this is
12 like in today's economy and me being a senior citizen on Social.13 Security, we haven't had a rate increase in three years, and
14 for anybody to ask for a 50-percent rate increase in one shot,
15 to me, just seems totally ridiculous. I mean, it's -- I don't
16 know. Anybody asking for a 50-percent rate increase in
17 anything, to me, is ridiculous, you know, whether it's gasoline
18 or water or anything else.
19 Now, I know Tony probably has, you know,
20 expenses, but I've been living there almost eight years and if
21 I look out on the street that I go up and down every day, I
22 only see two places where there's any disturbance in the
23 roadway, because I live there, you know. And I think there's
24 one up above me, but I never go that way, I always -- because.25 we live on a one-way street, you know.
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1 So I'm thinking, you know, when you have a --
2 when you're selling a product that you don't pay for, I don't
3 see -- you know, if you buy -- if somebody buys something and
4 then they sell it to me and they have to pass it -- and they
5 get a rate increase and they have to pass on the cost; but like
6 water comes from nature and it's like it's going through these
7 pipes which rarely ever have to be any maintenance on. Like I
8 say, I've been there eight years. You know, when you live on a
9 small street, you actually know what's going on. I go past the
10 water building seven days a week because I go for a jog over on
11 the Greenbelt, so I know what's going on. And I'm thinking,
12 you know, if you haven't had any overexpenses more than that
13 over eight years, I just don't see how that correlates with a
14 50-percent rate increase.
15 And, basically, that's all, you know. That's
16 what the part that was bothering me was the large amount. I
17 know we have a water problem, but it's like from talking to
18 Tony and then reading this, I don't see any -- I don't see
19 the -- understand the business model. It's like almost any
20 business should have some kind of contingency fund to offset
21 any kind of emergencies or something like that, but it seems,
22 to me, that if we have an emergency on our street with our
23 water system, the contingency plan is to come down here to the
24 Public Utilities Commission and ask for another rate increase.
25 And I just -- I don't -- I don't know. There's a
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1 lot here that just confuses me as far as the business model,
2 you know. And I say it seems like a business model is to come
3 down here and get a 50-percent rate increase, and I don't think
4 it's fair to the ratepayers, you know. That's -- like I say,
5 I'm on Social Security, we have a lot of elderly people on our
6 street, and I know none of us have received any kind of Social
7 Securi ty increase in three years. And then, like I say, for
8 somebody to come along and want a 50-percent increase in their
9 money, it just doesn't seem -- whatever the word is, I don't
10 know.
11 But that's basically all I have to say. And, you
12 know, I thank you guys for letting me have my say, and I thank
13 Tony for his good service to us and our community. He's a good
14 guy, so I have no animosity towards anybody or anything. I
15 just, you know, when I saw the 50 percent, when I first got the
16 figure in my mind, I'm going, How much of a rate increase is
17 that? Then I looked at it and I'm going, 50 percent? I mean,
18 first thing, you know, you want to come over and drink my free
19 beer.
20 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Where do you live?
21 THE WITNESS: He knows.
22 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Oh, okay. Just
23 kidding.
24 THE WITNESS: One thing about Tony: We are
25 friends because he comes to my house every time he comes to our
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1 neighborhood, so like I say, there's absolutely no animosity.
2 He'll probably be over to my house tomorrow.
3 But, you know, that's a good thing about a
4 democracy and that's what I told him before I came down here.
5 It's like if you don't speak your mind and come down here and
6 take an opportunity of what the Public Utilities Commission has
7 gi ven us to have our say in a democracy, if you don't come down
8 and speak your two cents, shut up. You know what I mean? I
9 want to be able to say that I came down and I had my say, and
10 no matter what happens now, it's in your hands, you know.
11 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Well, we appreciate you
12 taking the time to come down, especially --
13 THE WITNESS: Well, I appreciate the job -- you
14 actually, guys, are looking out -- you're between us and Tony.
15 I mean, Tony's a nice guy, but somebody else might not be. So
16 if you guys weren't being the watchdog and protecting us, we
17 would be in pretty bad shape, you know.
18 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Well, Mr. Holland,
19 again, thank you for coming this evening, and thank you for
20 your comments. And if we can have you wait for just a
21 moment--
22 THE WITNESS: Okay.
23 COMMISSIONER KJELLLANDER: -- to see if there's
24 any questions.
25 THE WITNESS: Oh, sure.
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1 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Let's move to
2 Ms. Sasser. Any questions?
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3 MS. SASSER: No, thank you, Chairman.
4 COMMISSIONER SMITH: None. And, Mr. Bowar, any
5 questions?
6 MR. BOWAR: Nope.
7 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: No. Okay.
8 Well, Mr. Holland, thank you again.
9 THE WITNESS: Thank you.
10 (The witness left the stand.)
11 HEARING OFFICER: We don't have anyone else
12 signed up, but I see a few more people in the room. If you'd
13 like to testify, we could have you come up and take a seat.
14 It's fairly painless.
15 MR. HOLLAND: She's my neighbor across the
16 street, but she just come down to watch.
17 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Okay. Would anyone
18 like to provide any testimony?
19 MR. ANDERSEN: My wife said I could say a few
20 words, I guess.
21 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Come on up then. It
22 might work. We're all here, we have a court reporter.
23 MR. HOLLAND: That trumps the Public Utilities
24 Commission right there..25 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: And we're more than
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1 eager to hear what your thoughts are.
2 MR. ANDERSEN: Well, my name is Charles Andersen.
3 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Mr. Andersen, before
4 you get started, why don't I have you get sworn in. Just raise
5 your right hand.
6 MR. ANDERSEN: Oh, okay.
7
8 CHARLES C. ANDERSEN,
9 appearing as a public witness, being first duly sworn, was
10 examined and testified as follows:
11
12 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Thank you. And if you
13 could be seated, I' ii have Ms. Sasser just ask you a couple of
14 questions officially for the record.
15 THE WITNESS: Okay.
16 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Ms. Sasser.
17
18 EXAMINATION
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20 BY MS. SASSER:
21 If you could state your name -- full name for theQ.
22 record, spelling your last name?
23 Okay. Charles C. Andersen, A-N-D-E-R-S-E-N.A.
24 And your resident address, Mr. Andersen?Q.
25 6191 South Brian Way.A.
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1 Q.And are you a customer of Brian Water?
2 A.Yes, I am.
3 Q.Please proceed with your testimony.
4 A.I've lived in my house for almost 40 years and
5 the -- when I moved in, the water system was about five years
6 old. They had a lot of trouble. When the subdivision was
7 first formed, it was a privately-owned system by the contractor
8 that developed the subdivision, and he didn't pay the water
9 bill -- not the water bill, the electric bill, and left the
10 subdivision sitting with a substantial debt to the Idaho Power
11 County, which in order to be able to sell land there and to
12 build houses there, and to sell houses there, somebody had to
13 take responsibility for that and they formed a small
14 corporation called the Brian Water Corporation.
15 They paid the electric bill and they operated the
16 Company with a hired meter reader and three men that cooperate
17 with each other to assume the responsibility for the management
18 of the corporation. It went along pretty good for a long time,
19 but eventually two of the men died -- well, they're all dead
20 now -- but the water system was turned over to Tony. His
21 father-in-law, as I recall, was the last of the originators of
22 the ownership, and Tony ended up with the responsibility of
23 running that Company.
24 I've known Tony for as long as he's been in the
25 picture, and he's done a wonderful job as far as being the
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1 superintendent of the one-man water Company. He reads the
2 meters, and he's available to contact the maintenance people
3 that have to come when there's an emergency, and there have
4 been quite a few of them over the years. And I just can't say
5 that we could be fortunate enough to have anybody that could be
6 as good or better than Tony as a manager of that corporation.
7 I'm aware of the fact that the Department of
8 the DEQ environmental people measured the nitrogen content in
9 the water and it's a few points over the maximum that they will
10 permi t, and he i s been faced with something like a $ 60,000
11 investment in two new wells to be able to comply with the
12 Federal law as to the purified water content of nitrogen. I
13 know that from talking to Tony, that it's more than a hardship
14 for him to be able to borrow that kind of money.
15 And I read the letter that came to me to invite
16 me to come to this meeting, and as I recall, the increase that
17 was asked for was the difference between 12 and a half dollars
18 for the first 4,000 gallons of water that's pumped into your
19 house, through the meter, and $18, and that's five dollars and
20 a half. You multiply that by 46 people that are going to be
21 served by that increase and it comes to $253 a month. And for
22 the kind of -- the kind of demands that are being placed on
23 Tony, I don't think that's very much money. I think that we
24 should be grateful for the kind of leadership the corporation
25 has and hope that he will stick with it, because a lot of
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1 people would just run away from that thing.
2 And that's about all I can say. I just want to
3 say that he's a -- really a good water superintendent, and I
4 trust him.
5 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Well, Mr. Andersen,
6 thank you for your comments. If you could stay seated for just
7 a moment.
8 THE WITNESS: Sure.
9 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Ms. Sasser, do you have
10 any questions?
11 MS. SASSER: No, Chairman.
12 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Mr. Bowar, any
13 questions?
14 If not, then Mr. Andersen, thank you very much
15 for your testimony.
16 THE WITNESS: You bet.
17 (The witness left the stand.)
18 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Is there anyone else
19 who would like to offer any testimony this evening? If not,
20 there is something I'd like to say:
21 Mr. Bowar, I've been with the Commission for
22 about ten years now, and I can honestly tell you that the water
23 Company cases that we've had have been some of the most
24 contentious; and very rarely do we have customers actually come
25 in and praise the owner of the water Company. So, you know,
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1 I want to offer up some congratulations on the fact that you
2 had two people come and testify, one that not so excited about
3 the increase, the other that thinks they can live with it, but
4 they all came to one conclusion and that's that you're doing a
5 decent job. So I certainly want to commend you for doing an
6 excellent job in maintaining customer relations. That's
7 fantastic. So, congratulations to you for that.
8 And, again, as a reminder as we wrap up this
9 session this evening, the Commission now has a fully-developed
10 record. I believe there likely will be a short window of
11 opportunity if others would like to provide additional written
12 comments, but I think it's our desire as a Commission to get
13 this fully submitted.
14 Ms. Sasser, as a point of clarification, do you
15 envision ten days as a window of opportunity before this is
16 fully submitted, or do you see that as a shorter time frame?
17 MS. SASSER: I can work with whatever the
18 Commission and/or customers for Brian Water wish to do. If
19 you, Chairman, would like to wait an additional week to give
20 any customers an additional opportunity to comment on the case,
21 then I can certainly do that before having it fully submitted
22 before your deliberation.
23 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Okay. What's the
24 earliest it could be fully submitted?
25 MS. SASSER: Monday.
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1 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Monday. All right.
2 Why don't we look at the calendar, but it would be my desire to
3 try to move this as quickly as we can to resolution.
4 MS. SASSER: Monday is the 8th.
5 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Is the 8th and today is
6 the 3rd. That gives us roughly five to six days. Why don't we
7 use that as our gauge then so that the next Decision Meeting we
8 could have this fully submitted, so that would give us a window
9 of roughly five days.
10 MS. SASSER: Certainly.
11 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Good. Thank you.
12 So with that then, again, I appreciate the
13 attendance of everyone this evening, Mr. Bowar from Brian Water
14 and Ms. Sasser in representation from the Staff of the Public
15 Utilities Commission. And with that then
16 MS. SASSER: Chairman
17 MR. BOWAR: Can I ask you
18 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Certainly.
19 MR. BOWAR: Not to sound greedy, but I've got a
20 billing due or coming up, getting ready anytime. Do I have to
21 wai t for -- or, how long do I have to wait?
22 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: We actually have to
23 have a Decision that's official before you can change your
24 billing, but we will do our best to move that. Our earliest
25 meeting in which we could accomplish that would be next Monday.
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.1 So if we have that fully submitted, my sense is that we could
2 have a Decision perhaps even rendered by Tuesday?
3 MS. SASSER: An Order could certainly get out
4 next week with an effective date attached to it. What is your
5 billing cycle and what would that time frame look like for you?
6 MR. BOWAR: Well, it's really about -- normally,
7 it's about this time, but I can wait, just because of the
8 seasonali ty of it. The first half of the season, the revenues
9 are the lightest, and then they start picking up when I need
10 this time of year, so
11 COMMISSIONER KJELLANDER: Mr. Bowar, I appreciate
12 the scenario that you're facing. I'm just one of three.13 Commissioners so I can't make the Decisions by myself, as much
14 as I'd like to think I have that authority and power. But what
15 I will say is that my sense is that Ms. Sasser will be working
16 very closely with you so that we, as a Commission, are fully
17 alerted to what your billing cycles and needs are so that
18 we can move this through as quickly as possible. Thank you.
19 And if there are any further issues that you need to discuss
20 along those lines, please feel free to contact Ms. Sasser and
21 we'll move from there. Thank you.
22 We're now at the point then where, again, thank
23 you for your attendance tonight, for your thoughtful comments,
24 and we look forward to issuing a Decision as quickly as.25 possible. And, again, thank you, and we are adj ourned.
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1 (The hearing adjourned at 7: 25 p.m.)
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.1 AUTHENTICATION
2
3
4 This is to certify that the foregoing is a
5 true and correct transcript to the best of my ability of the
6 proceedings held in the matter of the Application of Brian
7 Water Corporation for authority to increase its rates and
8 charges, Case No. BRN-W-11-01, commencing on Wednesday, August
9 3, 2011, at the Commission Hearing Room, 472 West Washington,
10 Boise, Idaho, and the original thereof for the file of the
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11 Commission.
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WENDY J. MURRA , Public
in and for th e of Idaho,residing at Me n, Idaho.
My Commission expires 2-8-2014.
Idaho CSR No. 475
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AUTHENTICATION