The Soldotna City Council passed a resolution authorizing the city manager to enter a sole source professional services contract with HDR engineering, Inc. for water and wastewater rate studies in the amount of $43,731. According to the city, water and wastewater services must be provided by autonomous and financially independent facilities and setting the rates is deemed an important task that must be refreshed periodically to ensure prudent cost of service fees.
City Manager Stephanie Queen told council:
“The Council has seen several different pieces of legislation related to this topic both authorizing us to apply for the grants for the two rate studies with the water and sewer components as well as to appropriate those funds. We have received the grant agreement paperwork. This resolution would authorize us to enter into a contract with HDR (Engineering) as the firm that has provided a proposal to move forward with that work. HDR is very familiar with our system. They have analyzed the technical aspects of our system. They provided a previous rate study to the city and we felt that those qualifications and that knowledge and potential cost savings justified bringing forth this request to seek authorization to execute a contract directly with them.”
Kyle Kornelis, Public Works Director, told council that HDR developed the city’s utility master plans in 2016, which include the building-block data necessary to conduct rate studies. In addition to developing the two previous rate studies in 2009 and 2015, they reportedly are an industry leader in rate setting and have extensive knowledge of Soldotna’s utility.
The combined amounts for the Water Rate Study and the Wastewater Rate Study total $43,731.
The Resolution unanimously passed the Soldotna City Council.
