Conference Agenda

The Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) program is a government bank operated by EPA headquarters that provides supplemental, flexible, low-cost credit assistance to public and private borrowers for all types of wastewater, drinking water, and stormwater projects. The WIFIA program offers long-term loans that can be combined with State Revolving Fund assistance, municipal bonds, and federal and state grants to help communities deliver more critical water infrastructure projects for a lower cost with less impact on rate payers.

In this session, we will provide an overview of the WIFIA program and describe WIFIA’s water infrastructure-related eligibilities and priorities. Additionally, we will discuss the benefits and flexibilities of WIFIA financing, including customized repayment schedules, coordination with other types of debt, the option to fund multiple projects through a single loan, and the ability to finance a combination of staggered projects, like those in a capital improvement plan, under a “master agreement”. Finally, we will demonstrate, through case studies presented with current borrowers/utilities, how WIFIA loans are providing financial benefits to borrowers across the country, including over $5 billion in savings.

The Bellevue Utilities Capital Investment Plan is a seven-year $317M capital plan for the water, sewer, and stormwater utilities that is updated every two years. In the past four years, Bellevue Utilities has made great strides in developing a successful collaborative budget process that is structured with input from the Utilities Leadership Team, Engineering Division, Operations and Maintenance Division, the Finance Group, the community. This collaborative process has been significantly boosted with process improvements in project identification and scoping, project cost estimating, project prioritization, staff resource analysis, and community engagement In addition, asset management risk information has been used to budget for asset-based rehabilitation programs such as pipe rehabilitation and water main replacement programs.

Prior CIP budgets were successfully developed internally by engineering management; however, retirements and departures of management responsible for developing the CIP. and the challenge of finding supporting documentation, provided new opportunities for successor positions to develop the CIP. A collaborative budget framework was developed approximately 8-months prior to the Preliminary Budget deadline. The framework included the process improvements and the collaborative engagement of Utilities staff in distinct phases of the budgeting process, specifically Operations and Maintenance and Engineering staff in the project identification and prioritization, and the Engineering Project Management Group in the cost estimating elements of the budget. Over two budget cycles, the process improvements have become foundational and standardized in the budget process. The benefits of a collaborative budget process include the support and buy-in from staff at all levels of the organization; in addition, the transparency in the budget development process helps the entire utility and provides a sense of teamwork and collaboration across the Utilities Department. Although the collaborative budget process is a once every other year investment of time and energy from many staff and Bellevue Utilities Leadership Team, it results in a significantly improved capital plan that increases the department’s ability to support a high level of service to Bellevue Utilities Customers.

An ongoing challenge for municipalities and public agencies is developing long-range capital project cost estimate projections during early planning and conceptual design phases. All too often, initial estimates cannot fully consider the large number of project variables and potential future changes that may impact the completed project. Estimators in the early phases of a project must rely on limited and conceptual scope information that is often subject to speculation, influenced by prior project experiences, and affected by unpredictable market forces.

Historically King County’s Wastewater Treatment Division (WTD) used project request forms to collect project needs and anticipated costs. A review of those projects, from initial budgetary request through preliminary design, revealed cost fluctuations of at least 200% by the time the capital project was constructed and operational, sometimes higher for large complex projects. Further investigation revealed that costs increased due to a combination of limited project definition and unforeseen scope changes, assumption of lowest cost technical options, and lack of inclusion of future external cost and schedule drivers (e.g. environmental permitting, regulatory changes, community relations, constructability). This fluctuation and discrepancy in cost made it difficult to forecast capital borrowing, set utility rates, or better manage the larger project portfolio.

To improve capital project budgeting, WTD developed the Project Formulation Program (Program) and later a Portfolio Planning and Analysis unit. The Program uses a dedicated team and consistent approach to develop a defined project need and objective that can be the basis for a Class 5 estimate. The intent is to identify and evaluate a feasible technical approach and consider the external inputs needed to develop more informed initial, pre-funding estimates. The project’s current scope, assumptions, opportunities, risks, and basis of costs are consistently documented in highly defined cost estimate tools and basis of estimate documents.

Large capital projects move slowly, and few formulated projects have been implemented since the program’s start in 2016. However, recent project estimates appear to be closer to expected actual project costs, leading WTD to consider how best to expand the Program.

The City of Tacoma, like many wastewater utilities in the Pacific Northwest today, is facing big decisions about investments that are needed to meet new regulations, address aging infrastructure, and adapt to changing conditions; the scale of which haven’t been experienced in decades. These decisions will impact the utility, its ratepayers, and the surrounding community for decades to come. However, they also present opportunities to foster understanding of the importance and value of wastewater services, bolster support and buy-in for continued delivery, and prioritize investments in a way that meets broad community values and utility goals.

To support decision-making, the City is developing a Comprehensive Wastewater Plan to balance concurrent investment needs, achieve success in its goal areas, and meet the expectations of internal and external stakeholders. In this presentation, we will review the plan development process and how we are taking broad community values and incorporating them first into utility goals that align with City initiatives and resonate with the community and, second, into measurable technical targets that demonstrate success and can be used for capital planning. At its outcome, success for this planning process means not only developing and implementing a capital improvement plan, but demonstrating to the community that the utility is meeting its commitments in a responsible way that supports broad community values and continues to provide an essential community service.

We will present the comprehensive planning process, the big decisions the City of Tacoma is facing, and the opportunities they have to solve them using transparent and repeatable methods that produce defendable and supported solutions. We will make the case for incorporating broad community feedback into the planning process and show how it sets us up for a sound future.

Public agencies and technical teams are being tasked with integrating equity into the planning and design of infrastructure projects. Even with good intent, teams often struggle to identify how a project interfaces with vulnerable communities and what changes can be made to improve outcomes for those communities. Equity in Design provides a process for identifying a project’s equity interfaces and developing a solid plan for integrating these interfaces into the planning, design, and delivery of the project, resulting in positive outcomes for vulnerable communities.

The Alderwood Pump Station Replacement project, which is a current task order for Brown and Caldwell (BC) under the Price Agreement for Pump Station (PS) Improvement master services contract with the City of Portland (City), is the pilot project for the City to develop an Equity in Design framework. Our subconsultant, The Formation Lab (TFL), identified potential equity interfaces for this project, including minimizing conflicts with the houseless community, supporting pedestrian access, and supporting bicycle access. Based on these interfaces, equity criteria were developed for use in the site selection process. These interfaces are the foundation of the Equity Plan, identifying key actions and milestones for fostering equitable decisions during the design and construction phases, as well as supporting COBID (Certification Office for Business Inclusion and Diversity) certified team members during project delivery. The Equity Plan is a living document that is refined during the project to guide the Consultant team, led by BC, in meeting the City’s equity goals.

This presentation will share the Equity in Design approach, and lessons-learned through the pilot application of this approach, to the Alderwood Pump Station Replacement project.

Decisions that operators, engineers and managers make are typically financially constrained. An intuitively good project idea can prove difficult to justify when using only net present value and similar financial tools to demonstrate return on investment (ROI). This is where the concept of “Real Options” comes into play. By identifying the characteristics of an option and assigning a financial value and probability to its selection or rejection, the decision maker gains insight into the decision that would otherwise be missed.

During this presentation, you will learn:

• What is a financial option, and how does it relate to a Real Option
• Types of Real Options and how to spot them
• Three methods to value a Real Option
• A rigorous approach to calculating probabilities of outcomes
• Case studies to support where Real Options have been used to support project decisions
• Case studies showing where Real Options could have been used for more favorable outcomes.

You’ve read the management books that tell you a key to your team’s success is empowerment, but what is staff empowerment and how can you implement it? In their research on leadership, Kouzes and Posner identify ‘Enabling Others to Act’ as one of the five practices of exemplary leadership. In this presentation, we will describe what empowerment is, why it matters, and what the benefits are. We will talk about some of the barriers, what happens when something goes wrong, and lay out a guide on how to get started. The presentation will also include other elements of exemplary leadership, such as creating a shared vision that produces a climate for enabling others to act.
We’ll explore enabling your team to act through fostering collaboration, creating a climate of trust, facilitating relationships, strengthening others, enhancing self-determination, developing competence and confidence, and organizing work to build competence and ownership. But what if you do all these things and someone you empower and enable makes a mistake – what do you do then? It’s the moment of truth – reminding ourselves and our team members that this is a journey and that the focus is on learning and long-term improvement in a supportive environment. We will talk about how all of these elements combine to create empowerment that not only delivers greater job satisfaction for you and your team, but they also deliver better business results.

A passionate and consistent workforce is critical to ensuring a “Sound Future for Water” (and the success of other utility and professional industries). Leadership development is an essential component of the success and retention of the water and engineering industry’s workforce. But what else? How do we get there? Engaged employees lead to quality work, collaborative teams, and can result in staff that are eager to stay with their employers, and “at least” within the water or wastewater sector. This presentation will offer insight on the importance of leadership and effective training, what works for actual employees, continual personal and professional growth, career development, and additional topics. This presentation will offer information from two differing, but direct personal primary perspectives: Molly’s insight as a seasoned engineer in the public sector and Kathleen’s experience as a rising professional in the private sector. In addition to their own experiences, they will be conducting a careful survey effort to their colleagues and peers in both the public and private sectors, across gender, diversity, career status, and equity groups, to add to this discussion. We will ask ourselves: What is most important to employee continued growth? How did they develop leadership skills? What factors motivate them to stay? Either at their employer? or in their industry? And even, “What is the biggest challenge in their day-to-day work?” Or, “What do employees feel they need from their work to be successful?” These surveys will be anonymous but collected with meaningful data such as age, career length, gender and race self-identification, and education/experience type. This will help show how these different demographics, personalities, and strengths can be best utilized and fostered in any industry for success. The presentation will provide the audience with insights into what could help lead to the success of the water and wastewater industry's workforce and benefit agencies and employers of all kinds.

To thine own self be true

Leaders develop when adversity is turned into learning opportunities. Knowing yourself is essential: what is your passion; what are your goals; what are your guiding principles?

Many leaders in operations and maintenance positions have achieved leadership roles due to sheer perseverance and an ability to turn adversity into opportunity. They have relied on educational experiences that come in the form of hard knocks, setbacks, and exhaustive overachievement. It is these experiences, when viewed as opportunities, that provide for growth. Norman Lear once said, “Everywhere you trip is where the treasure lies” (Bennis 149). This is the focus of the panel discussion.

The discussion will focus on those trips and how to turn them into treasure. How the trips may provide for personal growth and eventually leadership recognition whether formal or informal. Warren Bennis stated, “More leaders have been made by accident, circumstance, sheer grit, or will than have been made by all the leadership courses put together" (Bennis 42).

The panel will offer suggestions to help anyone struggling with adversity, to persevere with optimism, and progress toward career goals. Finding a support team that can offer different perspectives and insight into our blind spots is beneficial. The point is that the better we know ourselves, “To thine own self be true”, (Shakespeare, Hamlet 1.3), increases the opportunities we are presented.

Living your passion, demonstrating integrity and consistency, being curious and doing the right thing, especially when no one is looking, are an important foundational qualities that can be relied upon as you move forward toward achieving your goals.

While education builds skill, life builds character, it behooves us to nurture both.

Citations

Bennis, Warren G. On Becoming a Leader. Basic Books, a Member of the Perseus Books Group, 2021.

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Dover Publications, 1992.

The topic will be presented by a diverse panel of four individuals from various cities, roles, and perspectives, who have worked their way up the career ladder to positions in leadership. Primary contributor of the abstract is Pamela Randolph. Current panelist are Pamela Randolph, Caitlin Dwyer, and Heather Earnheart.

The water and wastewater industries in Oregon are experiencing a shortage in treatment plant and distribution/conveyance operators. According to the EPA, this shortage is anticipated to only worsen in the next ten years, as approximately one-third of drinking water and wastewater operators will be eligible for retirement. This issue is compounded by fewer and fewer young people entering the field.

The recent closure of an Oregon Community College Water/Wastewater Training Program will intensify this issue in the Pacific Northwest, and the fact that several new water treatment plants will be coming online in the coming years will only increase the need for experienced water/wastewater sector staff. This prompted a number of local utilities, consultants, and an Oregon community college to create a working group to focus on solutions to this shortage with the ultimate goal of creating a more robust water workforce in the Pacific Northwest.

The Drinking water Regional Internship Program (DRIP) is currently focused on implementing or exploring the following strategies:

• Outreach to increase awareness of water industry careers and boosting recruitment. A website was created through Regional Water Providers to highlight water operator careers: https://www.regionalh2o.org/work-in-water.
• Non-credit or other new course opportunities through other community colleges.
• Developing remote training opportunities around the state through an Oregon Community College.
• Additional grant proposal to create the paid internship program to those currently following the water works career path or for those who just might be interested in a career in water envisioned in DRIP.
• Developing a state-approved apprenticeship program.
• Monitoring grants related to any of the opportunities.
• Overall group updates/coordination.

The presentation will discuss the actions to date, partnerships formed, grants applied for, and the group’s plan moving forward. The lessons learned and other accomplishments of the group may encourage the regional wastewater industry to join the DRIP group and creating a water/wastewater industry collaboration for a workforce pipeline!

The WAVE is focused on providing opportunities in the water industry to students and emerging professionals from diverse backgrounds. This program includes a five-part workshop series which focusses on the career paths within the water/wastewater industry, networking, skills development, employment opportunities, and conference preparation. This year, PNCWA has fifteen participants in the program and each participant will present on their experiences and what it’s like entering the water industry from their perspectives.

Professional development is widely expected and encouraged in the engineering industry, especially related to technical standards, the latest process equipment, keeping up with regulations, etc. Often overlooked in professional development is leadership. Learn how Consor has embarked on professional leadership development for our water staff through the Venturi program. The cohort is called “Venturi”, because a Venturi increases velocity while reducing pressure—applicable also to a group of leaders who work together. As our emerging leaders gain momentum through the program, they pull others along with them through greater knowledge-sharing and mentorship. Our second Venturi cohort began in late 2022, and as leaders, we continue to learn and evolve with our cohort. It is inspiring to see the individuals who have completed the program, and those who are just beginning their journey, grow leadership skills that are often absent in academic curriculum, such as self-awareness, networking, and business planning. Join us to hear from the director of the Venturi program about the development process that goes into each Venturi cohort, and takeaways from the program from a Venturi graduate and a current Venturi leader.

Clackamas County’s Water Environment Services (WES) has embarked on a project to build one of the largest new outfalls in the Northwest. Once constructed, this project will provide enhanced dilution performance to meet river water quality standards, protect beneficial uses in the Willamette River, and convert the existing outfall for use during peak wet weather events.

Designed to meet projected 2087 buildout flows of 168 mgd combined hydraulic capacity, the project benefited from early contractor input to successfully address challenging design criteria; rigorous permitting requirements; construction risk; and careful sequence of schedule constraints to work concurrently in the water with a nearby bridge widening project led by others.

The new mile-long 90-inch outfall construction requires installation of a 109-inch-diameter tunnel for half of its length in challenging ground conditions with a wet recovery in the Willamette River to install the 18-port 150-ft long diffuser at channel depth. For the remainder of the alignment, the outfall pipeline will be installed in a tight corridor between an old landfill and two of WES’s major 72-inch-diameter pipeline assets that require uninterrupted use during construction.

This presentation will give an overview of how the team successfully navigates construction risks and increasing costs in a volatile market while maintaining the ability to provide design input by using the Progressive Design-Build (PDB) delivery approach. WES also hired an Owner’s Agent to assist in the design/cost review, risk management, and permitting. The PDB contract started in 2022 after careful selection of a qualified Design-Builder, allowing WES to validate the project path forward while refining the construction approach to meet permit requirements and achieve greater cost certainty. The PDB approach has also allowed WES to collaborate more effectively with major stakeholders along the corridor (ODOT, City of Oregon City, multiple regulators) regarding project impacts and opportunities. Finally, WES has been able to gain increased cost certainty with estimates prepared by the Design-Builder that account for well-defined construction risk and contingencies and design opportunities.

More public agencies are considering collaborative delivery to deliver major capital projects for water and wastewater facilities. In 2017, Silicon Valley Clean Water (SVCW), in Redwood City, CA, chose Progressive Design Build (PDB) to deliver all three of the projects making up the $580M SVCW Regional Environmental Sewer Conveyance Upgrade (RESCU) raw wastewater conveyance rehabilitation program. RESCU has stayed on schedule through the pandemic, and is in the commissioning phase concurrently on all three projects, with final completion anticipated by mid-2024. This presentation highlights the importance of Owner involvement in the entire PDB delivery process, from contractor team procurement, through design and construction, to start up and commissioning. Why PDB was selected, how PDB has been implemented over 6 years, and current status will be presented.

RESCU consists of three projects that cover the entire conveyance system:

• Front-of-Plant: new 75-foot deep 80MGD lift station, new headworks with screens and degritting, new 1000LF 63-inch HDPE transmission pipeline to the plant influent;
• Gravity Pipeline: 3.5 miles of 16-ft diameter conveyance tunnel in low strength soils and high groundwater, under a regional airport taxiway and busy residential thoroughfare. Tunnel concrete segment ring excavation support has a finished diameter of 13-ft and is lined with 11-ft diameter fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) raw wastewater conveyance pipe;
• Pump Station Improvements: decommissioned two of four existing conveyance pump stations, rehabilitation of one existing pump station, and replacement of one pump station with a new combined screening facility and wet weather pumping facility.

SVCW leadership championed the early adoption of PDB for wastewater infrastructure, including the first large-diameter wastewater tunnel to be constructed in the US using PDB. RESCU started prior to the Covid pandemic, and, thanks to the effort of the Owner’s program team working remotely using MS Teams (Teams has been used on the Program since mid-2017), and the contractors’ focus on safety, no time was lost through two years of pandemic shutdowns. RESCU is on schedule and within budget expectations, demonstrating the value of Owner involvement in supporting collaborative delivery using PDB.

Clean Water Services (CWS) is a wastewater, stormwater, and watershed management utility serving the populous of Washington County, Oregon USA through implementation of a watershed based NPDES permit. CWS operates 4 water resource recovery facilities (WRRF) with biological nutrient removal (BNR) activated sludge configurations to achieve phosphorus and ammonia nitrogen removal to low levels.

The Rock Creek WRRF is comprised of East and West trains configured in an anaerobic-anoxic-aerobic (A2O) process. On the East side there are 4 activated sludge basins (AB 4-7) that exist as pairs of identical basins. AB 4 and 5 are single pass basins tending towards complete mix reactors. AB 6 and 7 are three-pass plug-flow style basins with three swing zones for denitrification. All basins receive an independently controlled dose of volatile fatty acids (VFA) from primary sludge fermentation to effect enhanced biological phosphorus removal (Bio-P). Differences exist between AB 4-5, and AB 6-7 in the ability to step feed primary effluent to different zones within the basin. The basins are operated as discrete units with independent and isolated biomass in each basin.

Nitrification and Bio-P are sensitive processes prone to upset conditions, particularly during the colder months. To increase the resiliency and reliability of the basins to perform this biology, CWS has installed a Cross-Basin Activated Sludge Seeding system (C-BASS). This system is capable of diverting a portion of the return activated sludge (RAS) from one basin to another. The plant is required to nitrify year-round to varying levels depending on receiving stream flow, so one basin is kept in a fully nitrifying condition. C-BASS is used to rapidly establish nitrification in other basins as permit limits change. The facility faces VFA limitations even with primary sludge fermentation. One or two basins may be heavily dosed with VFA for robust Bio-P, and C-BASS used to get the benefit of residual phosphorus uptake in the other basins. Waste activated sludge (WAS) remains an independent system and can be managed to retain biomass during C-BASS.

C-BASS is a simple and effective system that many facilities could install in-house to improve resiliency and expand process control options.

Aerobic Granular Sludge (AGS) technology operates on an optimized batch cycle structure that creates the proper conditions to develop and maintain granules: large, dense microbial aggregates displaying as particles greater than 200 microns in diameter that perform biological nutrient removal and display exemplary settleability relative to conventional activated sludge (CAS). The layered microbial community of these granules enables simultaneous nitrification/denitrification and enhanced biological phosphorus removal to occur within the granular biomass. This technology therefore eliminates the need for clarifiers, carrier media, and return sludge pumping stations, as well as selectors or separate compartments for plants looking to achieve BNR. The enhanced settling properties allow the system to operate at a high MLSS in excess of 8 g/L without a loss in aeration efficiency due to the granular nature of the sludge. The AGS process can therefore provide a significant reduction in footprint requirements and energy demand compared to a conventional technology.

The AGS process has been implemented successfully for nearly years with over 100 plants either in operation or under construction globally. Introduced to the North American market in 2017, there are now over 10 plants operating or under construction in the United States. This session will present case studies of plants that selected the technology to prepare sites for future regulatory demands, population increases, and climate resiliency.