November 30, 2016 at 8:30 AM - Operations & Education Committee Meeting

Rationale:  Nothing to consider.

Rationale:  There are no payments.

Rationale:  The O & M Crew placed type B rip-rap on the handicap jetty at Czechland to help protect the sidewalk and also added rip-rap adjacent to the Homestead boat ramp. Spent some time cutting Autumn Olive at Czechland with the turbo power saw. Road repair at both Homestead and Czechland. Equipment maintenance.

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Saunders County replaced the culvert and redeveloped the drive off of County Road O and cleaned the ditch from County Road 17 to the drive. Staff moved dirt to the parking area.

Staff sent a letter of support and NRD cost estimate for the project to Game & Parks for their grant application.

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Paul Gifford did not accept a cash settlement based on the estimated bids received from two contractors that the NRD and Fremont obtained.  The NRD and City of Fremont can hire a contractor and have the drive constructed for less money than what Paul Gifford is asking for.  Attached find the request for informal bids and the responses from Collins Contracting and Thompson Construction.  The item we are required to build is the 4' X 6' X 125 ' box culvert.

Fremont requires a P.E. approval and stamp for public improvement projects such as these that normally runs close to 15% of the construction cost.  We are attempting to get the additional cost for Collins to perform a design-build as they did for the Wanahoo Entry Road contract prior to the committee meeting.  A design-build Haddon for Thompson's bid is also being requested.

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At the November 10th Lake Level Advisory meeting, a motion was made, It was recommended by Jim McDermott, seconded by Don Veskerna, to advertise for “Requests for Proposals” from Engineering Firms to complete the Army Corps of Engineers 408 application for lowering Lake Wanahoo.  Recommendation passed by voice vote. The next meeting as set by the Lake Level Advisory Committee is January 31 at 8:00 a.m.  RFPs for the Section 408 will be opened and read aloud at this January 31st meeting. It is anticipated the resulting recommendation for interviewing selected firms will go to the LPNNRD Operations, Education and Rural Water committee on February 1, 2017.  The O, E & RW committee recommendation will then go to the full LPNNRD Board for consideration on Feb 13, 2017.

Attached are the minutes from the November 10th meeting and the Wanahoo 408 RFP Letter.

Rationale:  Thompson Construction finished the Rawhide Ditch repairs placing 12 sheets of piling, adding a culvert to the crossing and fixing three bank erosion spots on the Diagonal Ditch. The original estimate was $10,500.  The final invoice is $11,360.  The add in's were the used 24" concrete pipe and fixing the bank erosion on the diagonal ditch. Photo's attached.

Rationale:  JEO will re-survey the Sand/Duck Creek Dam 15 property lines and place permanent markers on the west line between our property and Ourada's. The cost to re-establish the survey and set permanent markers is between $2,100 and $3,000 this is dependent up on establishing a point located in the water. The survey can then be used or passed along at auction.

Rationale: 

The Corps of Engineers and our non-federal partners met on Nov. 10 in Fremont. The COE has informed us that the cost of the project is now estimated to be over $150 million causing the cost benefit ration to go below 1:1. The Corps has stated the best way to ensure federal funding is to have a ratio of 1-1.5:1. By the Corps estimates the project cost would have to be around $90 to be 1:1. It will be difficult to cut $60-65 million from the current design.

FYRA Engineering has performed a Hydrological and Flood Frequency Analysis on the Platte River for the Papio NRD from the Louisville area to the confluence of the Missouri River. As part of this study, the previous flood frequency analyses were investigated to ascertain the nature of the large divergence in the most recent flood frequency analysis. They are estimating that discharges are of lesser value which in turn could affect the entire Platte River corridor, therefore affecting the Fremont Study.  FYRA suggests a two-step approach; first we have to spend 3-4 days to figure out if the number is wrong.  This involves data/report review, model and gage analysis.  If we do find that the number is wrong, it will take another 3-4 days to calculate the new number…so each step w/ Bob’s time would be conservatively estimated at 32 hours at $125/hr = $4,000.00.

The potential benefit is huge.  The summary of the work we did on the Platte River study pertaining to the Louisville gage analysis and this was reviewed and accepted by the USACE and we are now working w/ FEMA, but they have seen it and know it’s coming.  If we can get a similar reduction in the Fremont area, what Bob says is now some very shallow flow depths in the project area may be able to be reduced to significantly narrow up the floodplain/floodway width.  While he has not looked specifically in this area yet, Bob is confident that since this was all done as part of the same study, we are likely to see similar errors from the study in the Fremont area as well…

We will also look at the seasonal vs. annual discharges.  If we were able to use the annual discharge the reduction would have been even greater.

Our non-federal partners would like to meet and discuss all the above situations.

Rationale:  To date the Czechland camping revenue is $8,306.70.

Rationale:  Kay Poppe owns property adjacent to Skull Creek in Saunders County. Her tenant Randy Kremlacek advised her to repair a break in the levee on the north side of the creek. Standing C Excavating has given them a bid of $4,100 to repair her levee and extract another snag from the creek upstream.  Mountford, Heimann, Directors Ruzicka, Kavan, Hilger, Birkel, Clausen and Feala were on site to see the situation.  This project can be assisted with our Stream Bank Stabilization Program, 50% cost share up to $2,000.

Rationale:  Our District's revised Erosion & Sediment Rules & Regulations have been sent to DNR for the Commissions review in December.

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The KTIC radio ad and the Wahoo Newspaper eAd for December are promoting tree sales for next spring.  

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Staff have been working on updates for the FY 2017 Long Range Plan.  Completion is expected by the end of the year.

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Butler County Government Day was held Friday, November 18^th.  TePoel attended to represent the NRD and presented to approximately 20 students with FSA.  Butler County NRCS also usually attends, but was unable this year due to schedule conflicts.

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TePoel presented 2 wildlife educational activities to a Girl Scouts group in Newman Grove on November 8th.  Approximately 15 students in grades Kindergarten-4^th grade attended.

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All sponsorship payments have been received.  Design and printing will be begin for the sponsor logo decals for the baskets.  8 of the 9 holes have been flagged and mowed.  Hole 9 is pending design and layout. An example of the mowing is attached.  After considering budget and further projects details, we have decided not to move forward with Kids in Parks.  Educational information and sign designs will be completed by NRD staff and printing will be considered locally.

Rationale:  It appears the remote read upgrade through The Phoenix Group may turn out to be more expensive than initially thought.  In order to continue moving forward with our necessary meter reader upgrade, I am contacting several sources for a new handheld and software pricing.  Once I have complete bids, I will bring them to the Committee.

Rationale: 

November samples were collected and delivered to Lincoln and billings are being sent out today.

All Colon fire hydrants were exercised as per our annual plan.

I met with the Village Board of Colon and informed them of our intention to discontinue including their sewer billing with our monthly bills.  They have requested we continue to include their sewer bill with our monthly billing for a monthly fee.  Staff has discussed issues and rates for the continued billing and are recommending a charge of $.75 per customer per month to continue this service for Colon.  This fee will be deducted from our quarterly billing reimbursement payment to the Village.

Rationale:  November samples were collected and delivered to Lincoln and billings are being sent out today.