BCWA Residents Paying Too Much?

I attended the tri-town meeting between the town councils and B&E Consulting
on April 26th, along with several other residents of Bristol, Warren, and
Barrington.  The purpose of the meeting was to discuss a time extension for
the completion of the B&E Audit of the Bristol County Water Authority.

At the onset of the meeting Councilman David Barboza announced that that
this was, for all practical purposes, a private meeting between the town
councils and B&E and that no comments would be accepted from the public.

Mr. Walter Edge, President of B&E explained that there were three reasons
for the delay.

1.  He had received the RFP in October and did not receive a signed contract until January. At this point his firm was too busy with tax preparations and could not make the March date.
2.  The scope of the review changed to include a rate study and was revised to meet Yellow Book standards. (Government Auditing Standards). 
3. The third reason related to the rate study portion of the RFP.  Apparently the BCWA computer system is archaic and there is no way to pull out the information for the five different rate blocks (rate categories). B&E will  have to reconstruct everything manually which has greatly increased the man-hours that are required to complete the project.

When asked by Councilman Scott Lial of Warren if it was peculiar that BCWA
could not provide rate information on blocks, the answer was an emphatic
"YES!  Very abnormal."

Mr. Edge made reference to several areas of concern that will be addressed
in the report, including unusually high overtime payments and that the BCWA
contract itself is very different from other contracts.

He also stated that the rate structure is "wrong.. just plain wrong!" and
that it was "ADVERSE TO RESIDENTIAL CUSTOMERS"!

It was agreed that the final report would be presented by June 15th.

One of the many reasons that the Citizens Watch Group has been calling for
new directors to be appointed directly relates to the antiquated computer
system.  It is feasible that a new face on the board would most likely
notice the archaic computer system and data collection methods and suggest
upgrading to one that handles block rate findings.  The incumbent directors
are so set in their ways that they just keep on doing things the way they
have always been done... which we now know is not working!  The BCWA does
not even have e-mail!!!!  For this reason alone, it was very disturbing to
see Barrington and Warren re-appoint the same directors who have been part
of this problem for years and years!  What will Bristol do?

As Councilman Halsey Herreshoff from Bristol asked, "Do they know what they
are doing over there?"

Hopefully we will soon find out, and even more hopefully, residents may soon
see some financial relief with regard to their extremely high water rates!