Twilight Acres Project hotly debated by Wall Lake City Council

WALL LAKE, IOWA – SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

What you are about to witness is how government is supposed to work.

The following conversation took place in the context of approval of the bills:

1. It is reported that bills seem to be in order.
2. Councilperson Morrow claims to not have received a copy of engineering contract for $14K + for Twilight Acres Nursing Home.
3. Councilperson Morrow reviews engineering contract.
- Mapping.
-- Found to be in order.
- Length of wire.
-- “who made the decision about how many feet would be purchased?”
4. Morrow questions decision to order materials prior to receipt of the spec book.
- “We’ve already spent, what? Seventy thousand dollars or something?”


5. Argument regarding need for upgraded, lengthened line erupts.
- “This whole project’s upside down!”


6. Need for 4 aught line disputed.
7. There is no cost estimate for this project.
- Cost of the project is I spec book received after purchase of the following:
--$30K for wire, $39K for 3 switches, $12K for transformers, and $30K for the engineer.
8. Motion to approve bills passes 4 to 1 against.





The following conversation too place later in the meeting during the actual time set aside for discussion about the Twilight Acres project.

9. City spent $28K+ for wire.
- Approved by the council earlier in the evening.
10. Survey to establish an easement has been completed and will be finalized “very soon”
11. The council has committed $108K to this project already, this in spite of the fact that there has not yet been project cost estimate.
12. “You expect us to go back to the people of this community and say we’re trying to keep out electric rates as low as possible, and then you take on a project like this.”
- “I think it’s a waste of money.”
13. A conversation justifying Twilight Acres project ensues.
- Point: If it is completed as currently planned, there will be two ways of getting power to a large portion of town.
14. Local businessman questions the purchase of the wire prior to getting bids to actually bury the wire.
- Councilperson claims that it makes sense when you consider that twilight acres doesn’t have enough electricity to run their heater this winter due to changing over there panel system.
- Local businessperson suggests an alternative method for supplying Twilight Acres with enough power that would cost less.
-- “Is there enough power coming out of [THE CITY’S] transformer to power [TWILIGHT ACRTES]”
---“Used to be.”
15. Councilperson doesn’t understand how CPS can run off the line that is being called inadequate for this project.
- Cookies can also run off the same line that is being rejected for this project.
-- Owner of Cookies confused about why the city would do a $200K job without getting two or three bids. He also expressed wonder at the concept of buying materials for a project without knowing what it will cost.


16. Who dropped the sixth street proposal?
- nobody cops to this questions, though German does defend the action suggesting that there was a decision made not to bore under sixth street due to the time it would take as evidenced by the project where they bore going south of town.
-- Morrow suggests the reason it took so long for that project is because the city was held up while trying to acquiring the right of way under the railroad, and not because of the boring process.
17. It is asked if it would be acceptable to look into boring under sixth street to save a few hundred thousand dollars.
18. According to Morrow, the engineers didn’t look at Sixth Street as an option.
19. What did twilight acres do for heat for the last 40 years?
20. Riedel expresses interest in taking “a lot stronger look” at going up sixth street.
21. Citizen expresses confusion about by voltage drop is being discussed and planned for at the cost ove $100K+ when it is not even known how much voltage drop there actually is.
22. Will we still be able to use the equipment we have purchased down the road if we switch the project to sixth street?
- The answer is mostly yes.
23. Cookies rep suggests that it would be asinine for him to expect the city to spend $150K to bring electricity to his business the way it is being brought to Twilight Acres.
- twilight acres didn’t reconfigure their system until after the city promised to bring in the specific kind of electricity that would allow them to reconfigure in the first place.







Thinking about how to get this project done, (or started, really.)

24. Why didn’t the city get multiple bids for the project?
25. Why didn’t the city start taking bids last winter at the same time as Twilight Acres?
26. Morrow reiterates that there is a question about why the council is considering the far more expensive option of running the electricity around the outside of town; calls engineers “pretty pathetic”
27. “Of course ‘Cost Effective’ doesn’t seem to come up much.


28. It is admitted that Twilight Acres doesn’t need the special lines to go to the transformer.
29. Will Twilight Acres have heat for the winter if the council waits and gets bids going up sixth street?
- Maybe faster, but a new piece of equipment may have to be purchased.
30. City Clerk directed to look into cost of boring up sixth street with conduit.

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