PERFORMANCE PROFILE, Lincoln County, Missouri

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1: INITIAL OPERATIONS CHALLENGES

2: PROJECT BACKGROUND

3: ALLIANCE ACHIEVEMENTS

1: Initial Operations Challenges

• Despite the passage of a $2.9-million bond issue, an additional $450,000 would be needed to fund the District's new pressurized sewer collection and treatment system.
• As part of the new pressurized wastewater treatment system, more than 300 separate easements and property acquisitions would need to be coordinated.
• On-site system start-up assistance would also be required at a majority of customer locations to ensure that pressure grinding pumps were working correctly.
• Built more than three decades ago, the District's water system lacked the capacity to accommodate growth, and customers often complained of low water pressure and volume.
• Both water and wastewater systems suffered from the lack of formalized general and preventive maintenance plans, advance planning, and customer service.

2: Project Background

Since Alliance came on board in 1995, numerous water and wastewater system improvements have occurred. These include: a new pressurized sewer collection and treatment system which uses individual two-horsepower pressure grinder pumps located in underground chambers adjacent to each customer's home; upgrading the water distribution system by replacing or adding more than 17-miles of larger-capacity pipe in a single year; and substantially increasing water supply and storage capacity by adding a new deep well and an elevated storage tank.

3: Alliance Achievements

• Alliance has helped the District transform itself from a family-run effort into a sophisticated business operation. Alliance has implemented numerous operational and maintenance procedures to effectively guide day-to-day operations to accommodate future growth and system improvements.
• Alliance was instrumental in securing for the District a $450,000 grant from the Environmental Improvement and Energy Resource Authority (EIERA) to help start one of the few truly rural wastewater systems in Missouri. Alliance's experience allowed the District to comfortably expand into this new area of service.
• Financially, the District is now stronger then ever before. It has restructured fees so that the burden of expanding services is assumed by new customers rather than the District itself or existing customers. Other Alliance cost saving measures include bringing meter reading services in-house rather than paying an outside resource.
• Low pressure and low flow areas were scattered throughout the District. Alliance operators determined that by isolating a few valves in the system, water could be forced to take different routes. This simple but successful manipulation raised pressure and flows in the needed areas. Alliance then recommended that the Board upgrade from an older booster station design that caused the initial problem. The board agreed, and output was further increased by more than 20%.
• Alliance facilitated a meter replacement program using radio read meters. Now 500 meters can be read in less than five hours, a job that would previously take several days. The Alliance-negotiated contract has saved the District more than $113,000 to date.
• In 2003, Alliance worked with the district to establish a wholesale agreement to provide water for the City of Winfield.
• A newly installed float system resulted in major problems with exhisting grinder pumps. Alliance established that the issues were the fault of the manufacturer and worked closely with the supplier to negotiate a settlement. In the end, the manufacturer paid project completion costs for both parts and labor to complete the project, a cost savings of $27,000.

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