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Attachment 1 Orange County Commission for the Environment IIIIIIIIII'� VIII " " " "' "" "11111 "" Meeting Summary September 11, 2017 Solid Waste Management Administration Building, Eubanks Road, Chapel Hill Present: Lynne Gronback (Chair), Bill Kaiser (Vice Chair), May Becker, Jeremy Marzuola, Matt Crook Absent: Peter Cada, Bill Newby, Jeanette O'Connor, Alan Parry, Sheila Thomas - Ambat, Marshall Gray Staff: Tom Davis, Brennan Bouma, Kim Livingston I. Call to Order Chair Gronback called the meeting to order at 7:34. II. Additions or Changes to Agenda None III. Approval of Draft Minutes from April 10, 2017. Bill Kaiser motioned to approve the minutes as written. Marshall Gray seconded. Minutes were approved unanimously. IV. Guest Presentations — OWASA Water Emergency - Ed Kerwin Key Lessons: Ed Kerwin presented on the key lessons OWASA learned in reviewing what happened during the water emergency. Among these lessons were: Be prepared locally and regionally for the "what- ifs ", Interconnection of drinking water systems is essential for resiliency, the National Incident Management System (NIMS) and your local and regional partners are essential, Communications should be open, honest and transparent. This is essential for maintaining /restoring trust and confidence. Beyond OWASA's communications to their 21,000 customers, OC Alerts was a key resource for communications. So was the local news media. Water sources and redundancy: OWASA has several redundant sources of water including reclaimed water, but only one drinking water treatment plant. Jordan Lake and other interconnections are there for long droughts and other emergencies. For the rock quarry reservoir, mining will stop in 2030 and then the quarry will be available as well as a small backup source. It can take 2 -3 days to bring in water from Hillsborough since the 8 miles of pipe is rarely used and they need to test for chlorine residuals and bacteria before it can be used. OWASA can almost bring in the whole daily winter demand from Durham /Jordan Lake if needed. Water efficiency and conservation techniques have also been an important factor to consider in long -term water supply planning. OWASA is selling roughly the same amount of water now than they did 20 years ago even though their customer base has doubled. Overview of what happened: The source of the fluoride was a malfunction of equipment not responding to the plant's controls even though it said that it had. There was someone who could have caught the issue 1.5 hours earlier than they did, but it would probably not have changed the result of the decision to stop the plant.