Study/ Work Session
October 20, 2025
Transcript
Describer:
2026 Budget Work Session
Monday, October 20th, 2025, at 5:30 p.m.
7404 Yorkshire Drive, Castle Pines, CO 80108
I. Call work session to order.
II. Roll call.
III. Finance.
A. Review: Monthly claims for payments made from September 10th, 2025,
to October 15th, 2025.
B. Review: 2026 Draft Budget. Eric Harris, Elevated Clarity.
C. Review: Cost of Service Study. Erik Hegelson, Bartle Wells.
IV. Legal.
A. Review Meeting Minutes.
1. August 18th, 2025, Board Work Session Minutes.
2. August 25th, 2025, Regular Board Meeting Minutes.
3. September 15th, 2025 Board Work Session Minutes.
4. September 22nd, 2025 Regular Board Meeting Minutes.
V. Adjourn.
Board President Jason Blankaert:
All right. good evening and welcome to the Castle Pines North Metro District 2026 budget work session. Today is Monday, October 20th at approximately 5:45 p.m.. We're running just a few minutes behind. We'll call this to order, and then we'll start with the roll call.
Board Member Director James Mulvey:
Jim. present. No conflicts.
Board Member Director Tera Radloff:
Tera. Present.
Board Member Director Jana Krell:
Jana. Here. Leah is, available remotely.
Leah, can you hear us?
Board Member Director Leah Enquist:
I can present.
Jason:
Okay, great. We heard that. Yeah. Okay. And I'm Jason. present. No conflicts. We will go ahead and open up item number three, which is finance. And we have, couple items under there today. The first one we we will review monthly claims for payments made for September 10th, 2025 to October 15th, 2025.
Financial Director Eric Harris:
Thank you Board. Thank you for your time this evening. Starting on page five, you have a listing of all the disbursements that were issued by the district. Just want to call your attention to a couple items. We don't have material budget items here, but, that, check number 29361, which would be that fifth disbursement for approximately $277,000.
Describer:
On screen. Castle Pines North Metro. District Bank Register Report - Citywide Bank
Packet Page # 5 and continuing. Eric describes.
Eric:
That's the City of Castle Pines for the Monarch expansion. We also have our second to last, check for to Community Resource Services, which performs a billing services for approximately $17,000. Further down on the list, I'm going gonna keep going down this list, so I'll refer to that dollar amount. Further down you have Kennedy Jenks two checks issued to them for one for approximately 126,000, one for $108,000.
This is for multiple projects and multiple scopes of work, in addition to reimbursable engineering projects in general engineering. So, I can speak to that further here in just a moment. And then you have, further down, you have some, scopes related to for Myers and Sons, which is for the wastewater treatment plant as well.
So just, and then, Semocor as well, your regular monthly Semocor invoice, Semocor was trending slightly up right now, and that's an addition to, for primarily due to overtime, not too much, but just wanted to call attention to that. And, then we had some, disbursements for the reuse project as well for Mountain Peak controls for equipment.
I just wanted to bring your attention to. Other than that, nothing material from a budgetary standpoint to call out, that we don't already have reported to, to you as a board, referring back to Kennedy Jenks, if you go to on your big 11 by 17 color pages, and if you go to pages. Page nine.
Describer:
On screen. Castle Pines North Metro. District
Cash Disbursement Journals Financial Control
September 10, 2025 - October 15, 2025 (Continued)
Packet Page # 9 Eric describes.
Eric:
What you will see is the the checks to community, Kennedy Jenks with all the project breakdowns. So essentially all the invoices that are being paid here. So you can see, all the different scopes of work associated that the district is undertaking right now. So just wanted to, you know, bring that and bring that attention to the board.
Are there any general questions or detailed questions for the disbursements?
Tera:
So I have a couple, the one for Plum Creek Water Reclamation Authority. I, I just curious why that one is to have to obtain prior approval. It seems like that would be a contracted amount or something.
Eric:
A $66,523 invoice? If you recall the full standard monthly.
Molly Janzen, Accountant:
That's just the standard.
Eric:
Okay. That's just the standard monthly. So that should just be a, the same amount, roughly the same amount every single month.
Tera:
It just seemed like it was marked in the wrong column. Oh, that's what I was curious.
Eric:
Perfect. Thank you.
Tera:
And then,
I think Semocor was kind of the same thing as it just because it's turning up or.
Eric:
Yeah, it's just a little bit higher this month.
Tera:
That was that.
And just a quick question on the core and mains, it looks like we're buying a lot of, water meters. Is that part of the project or?
District Manager Nathan Travis:
So the water meters that we've been getting through Corning are replacement meters for, the sizes above one inch. So we've got a fairly limited set in that range. They were just aging out and we had a bunch of, of the wrong model number that have been installed for the years, too.
So we're missing out of some revenues so we're swapping them.
Jason:
All right. Great. Any other questions regarding the monthly claims for payments?
Jana:
None for me.
Jason:
Okay. We'll go ahead and close that item A and move to item B. Review the 2026 draft budget with Eric.
Eric:
Wonderful. Thank you very much. Well, we're finally here. We're through the 2026 budget season. So appreciate your time this morning. All right. This evening rather, we're going to Molly and I are generally walked through, different sections of the budget that we've compiled over the last two months or so, gone through iterations in review between Nathan, myself and other stakeholders, engineers, like, as we look at project cost and things of that nature.
And then we'll tie it together with, Eric Halverson with Bartlett Wells to discuss our cost of service as well. So we're going to take it through. Molly and I are going to kind of divvy this up. We're not going to go necessarily line item by line but we'll dive into any detail that we want to with you this evening.
And then, just one that we appreciate your time to do this during this work session. So hopefully the conversation that we're having right now lends itself to everyone being open to provide comments. So, from a high level standpoint, property taxes right now on page 16 of your packet, what you'll see is property tax revenue.
Describer:
On screen. Castle Pines North Metropolitan District Property Tax Summary
Packet Page # 24 Eric Describers.
Eric:
We received our assessed valuation. We've capped the three and a half mils for next year discount with the temporary credit of three and a from seven mills to preserve that authorization. The assessed rate actually went down. and you'll see this further on page 24 of your packet. I provided an oversight overview of this. The residential assessment rate for this year is 6.7, percent with with the exemptions amounts granted, next year, the residential assessment is 6.25%.
And you can see that, and that's in the middle of this packet on page 24, if you look at the top, as we've kind of talked about over a period of time, the majority of the district is made up of residential valuation, which makes sense. We have a component of commercial, assessed valuation. One important thing to note is you're starting to see that difference with the URA with the shopping center right now.
So you see that discount of that property tax value is being frozen for the period I think about approximately 20 years. So that's going to continue to grow. And so the district if this district continues to tax next 20 or 25 years, we won't see that influx of valuation for any redevelopment that may occur in that shopping center.
So that that's a discount of approximately $716,000 in assessed valuation. And that's commercial valuation. So just wanted to make sure all the taxing agencies are aware of that, that URA does affect. So if there's any questions on that we can certainly talk about that a little bit more detail.
Leah:
I have a I have a high level question.
But did I mean, is the URA in a in effect, I feel like after we voted on it, I didn't I haven't heard anything. yeah.
Nathan:
And it passed and is in effect South Metro took the, special district board seat. So they kind of represent all of us. hat we haven't been getting is a lot of updates.
I don't know that they're really doing much with it than it is.
Leah:
Okay, that was it. Thank you.
James:
Is that something that we can, encourage them to come speak to us periodically? Yeah, absolutely. All right.
Eric:
Great. So moving back to page 16, what we've done is layered in all else equal, that three and a half mils for property tax valuation, for tax revenue for next year and the specific revenue streams that we've seen year over year. And what that would be is, you know, projection on oil royalty revenue, cell phone lease right now, which will be which will transfer to the city.
So it's just a pass through. So you're seeing those same type of revenue streams coming in, including the indirect cost revenue that we've introduced this year as well. So that's more or less the revenue bucket from property taxes and other revenues that are filtering into our general fund.
Tera:
So then where's the corresponding? since there's an estimate for cell phone lease revenue.
But we'll turning that over to the city. Where's that corresponding.
Eric:
That is further down at the bottom, where you see the firm commitment section of $70,000 down at the bottom, on the far right hand side. Yeah. So backing up a little bit more, this budget is the best case of, information we know today.
There's certainly a lot of items that are up for, that are changing constantly. What we, we're talking about when the, when the final transfer in for all these properties are going to be done, it's not going to fit quite, you know, in a calendar year. So we're trying to figure out when that is going to happen.
But bar none like we have this revenue at least, papered up and shown in this budget if, if it comes in, we coordinate the revenue transfer quarterly with them to occur, the cash transfer with that, and same thing for, any other items with the CTF fund. So we'll talk about it here in a few minutes.
So that's the revenue side, if you will. So, revenue is roughly, you know, almost the same with a slight discount to property taxes. What we have and salary and wages. I work through a, that calculation with Nathan, Nathan looking at what salary and wages and headcount are gonna look like over the next year.
I don't believe anything is different from what has been conveyed to the board date. Yeah. And I can certainly provide details of staff and all those for, you know, pay and things of that nature if requested. Kind of moving down. We have several different categories of professional services and insurance, office and other staff support and operations support.
Describer:
On screen. CASTLE PINES NORTH METROPOLITAN DISTRICT STATEMENTS OF REVENUES AND EXPENDITURES WITH BUDGETS BUDGETARY (NON-GAAP) BASIS December 31, 2024 Actuals
Actuals, Projected Actuals, Budget and Variance through July 31, 2025
2026 Proposed Budget. Packers Page #16 Eric Describes:
Eric:
Strictly as it relates to professional services, what you have is our firm elevated clarity, the audit, communications, engineering, legal going you know, not to dive, you know, speak line item, line item. I met with Nathan this last month, and I kind of I brought up a slightly increased scope of work for several projects that are going to be occurring next year.
Between Molly and myself, we've identified like a good monthly compliance rhythm for the district. But some of the projects that, you know, we've we've conveyed to Nathan is, additional efficiencies within FE & XT the accounting system the UB4 implementation, which will require some work from an accounting and finance standpoint and, a big item that we identified for Nathan is electronic records with the district and just organization that needs to occur.
At least in, you know, from my opinion, you know, a lot of this is kind of like just branched off to the last 30 years of, you know, different file structures and things of that nature. The district has done the same thing on the paper side. But as I think, Nathan, we need to do a little bit of coordination on organizing the electronic records of the district.
So it could be introducing SharePoint or something like that as a, as a tool. So just working with Nathan on that is something we're doing, as a proposal, moving forward. On the audit, we're going I noticed that this morning. What we're going to do is we had some audit savings this last year, just from less work being required, and we got the audit done efficiently.
So that's that line item for 75 six. Should go down to like under $60,000. So I'm going to make that change in the budget that you have right now. Other items here. We have a legal allowance in here. As far as the scope of work for district council, we have minutes preparation spell special matters and IGA related costs within here as well.
So they do all minutes for the district. So that's, a piece of that, that's being done. And then, of course, a couple other allowances associated for Ames improvement, which is going to be estimated costs for, continued, items for assessing, let me make sure I say this correctly, Nathan. Tying cost to what has been identified is, the assets in the district.
So that was what that allowance for.
So that is the professional services that we have in here.
Nathan:
And then one quick note on the professional services, this was actually an idea that Eric brought forward. But so we're going to be looking at bringing at least some of the larger call like core function contracts. And you can correct me if you're wrong, I'm on here.
But elevated Semocor and then probably similar, for approval at the November board meeting leading into next year, rather than waiting until January to kind of approve old slightly retroactively. And so January, that'll be more of a review of kind of the other contractors that we use. But we'll have gotten the contract approval done prior.
Eric:
And that's typically what you see is what you first districts, once you have a budget approved, you go ahead in of us, for the next year, review all your professional services contractors annually. So we'll bring those to you in November.
Tera:
So can I just, quick question on up on the revenue. So I noticed the, the revenue, the, for oil that that's almost double what we've are actual.
So what was the rationale on pumping that up, looks like?
I don't know if we just haven't done that because it looks like we projected it similar to that in 2025, but our actuals are half of what do you recall projecting?
Eric:
I don't recall.
We'll investigate that and make sure it's in trend with what we've talked about over the last couple of months. Thank you.
Moving down to, office and other. This is where you have, you can see the items listed here. It's pretty, pretty straightforward. It's building utilities, items associated with this building, office furniture, telephone and alarms. So we see those basically in line with what was in the, what was in the prior year.
Staff support. We see those same in line as the prior year as well as the the last category is operations support as well. In the comments associated with that, I'll tie up the firm commitments and then, just kind of open it up for if anyone has any questions, down to firm commitments.
These are items such as like treasury fees that are automatically withdrawn or these contract arrangement associated with it, the cell phone lease, revenue or partial transfer transfer costs are a portion of those partial transfer costs shared with the city. With that kind of leaves an accrued fund balance of $415,000, closely married to cash, as I've mentioned before.
So this is essentially cash that we would receive either in the bank account or we would receive it within 60 days that you will see. So, so yeah, that's that's where that's where we're at from a general fund perspective. And so I will, we'll go back to the drawing board and update oil and gas and continue to refine a couple of these items unless the board has any other, anything we'd like to add to the budget for the general fund?
Leah:
I have a quick question. page 17. Under revenues, it has the lottery proceeds. I wasn't sure what that was.
Describer:
On screen. CASTLE PINES NORTH METROPOLITAN DISTRICT STATEMENTS OF REVENUES AND EXPENDITURES WITH BUDGETS BUDGETARY (NON-GAAP) BASIS December 31, 2024 Actuals
Actuals, Projected Actuals, Budget and Variance through July 31, 2025
2026 Proposed Budget. Packers Page #17 Eric Describes:
Eric:
Yes. moving to page 17. So, this is, the conservation Trust fund. so lottery proceeds, these are quarterly distributions from, the district receives from the state just to be a part of, open space programs.
And by our in agreement with the city, we just have to remit these back. So it's a complete pass through right now, and we will continue to be a member of that program until we have our service plan and then amended, as long as we capture, and certify correctly around this time of every year, we actually have to certify that the and, be a part of the program for this upcoming year, if that makes sense.
So, we will do that, and then we will send those funds over to the city to be part of the Parks and Open Space program. Thank you. Of course, in the past, just being familiar with the district, those have been, quite great. I think it, I think it built a, a basketball court, maybe some pickleball courts, some storm drainage improvements as well.
So, and so those are over the last ten years, from at least my recollection, those are what those proceeds are funded, which been which have been great. Great.
Tera:
Again, just a general question. If I look at our actuals through July, we look like we are having more cash available than what we're proposed to have in 2026.
Curious about that. And then just an overall question that so the increased revenue rates are those included in those, should they be voted on in past just or would you have to go back once we do the rate study in, if we passed the rate study, you'd have to go back and adjust those.
Eric:
So the preliminary revenue numbers from our cost of service today, of what we're recommending are within this budget today.
And then your first question as it relates to the revenue in the conservation Trust Fund.
Tera:
Is just on your general fund on page 16. Okay. But ending funds available through July is when more than we're projecting in our 2026 budget.
Molly:
The 2026 is a whole year. And this is just through July,
Tera:
Right, which is through July. We're projecting to have more in the funds available than we are for our entire year of 2026, is my question.
Molly:
The projection for 2025 is actually.
Tera:
So I'm looking at the actual number, which is 649 144, which is more through July of this year, which says actual and we're projecting to have less cash for all of 2026, which is 415,324.
Eric:
And yeah, and that is due to we recognize all of our property tax revenue basically up through July or so.
And we won't see much property tax revenue just keeping expenses for the rest of the year. And so that's where that 211 matches to that up to the two eleven down at the bottom. But yes, I do understand what you're saying with the 649 at the bottom. Thank you. So with that that's walking through our general fund and CTF, with the kind of arithmetic that we've came up with, the indirect costs allocation.
So I'm going to pass it over to Molly to start walk you through the enterprise revenue.
Molly:
So starting on page 18, taking a look at the Water Enterprise Fund, you can see that the beginning funds available for the 2026 proposed budget is, just slightly lower than what we started 2025 with. and then coming down into of revenue, I'm going to let Eric, talk more about the cost of service study and, and how we how he arrived at the recommendations for the, the rates.
So I'll just focus on the other revenues, which are minor, but in comparison to the customer fees. Nathan, do you want to talk about that new line item of revenue that we have in here? Cross control. Gotcha. Yeah. Yes. 30,000.
Nathan:
Yeah. So we do have a new group like Molly just mentioned new line item revenue highlighted here.
Right now. We've got it earmarked at $30,000. this is a the cross connection control program is one that we've had in place for a while. That's an existing contract that we have through Backflow Secure. They do all of our backflow testing. We have to do surveys, clerical work. There's, you know, documents need to be produced for the state.
So they handle all of that. What this line item is looking to do is start to capture some of those costs. And specifically for testing and what we call soft repairs that we're currently paying for, but also, recapture those from the direct users that they impact. And so that's non single family taps, primarily commercial HOA irrigation.
We do have some homes that we need to actually identify. And so the way that that that looks it's $150 annual charge to those residents. There will be a pretty heavy communication piece to that. This is something that they're already required to do. So it's not a new expense. We're just we have a lot of them that are currently also paying outside testers to come in and take care of it.
So if we weren't going to do it, they would have to have somebody else do it. It's got some pretty heavy metrics on that program. We have to have 90% compliance, or we'll get a violation. And so it's just almost every utility has moved those in-house. And so that 30,000 is really just trying to capture those like actual testing fees, and then hard repairs so that it's new this year so that dollar amount may fluctuate.
You know, when we look at it again next year, up or down, but that was about the average that we're spending per account right now.
Tera:
So basically passing along right costs that we haven't done before. Correct. Right.
Nathan:
Yeah. We've been paying it just out of our normal operating expenses.
Eric:
And that's something that we can accomplish with our water rules and regs.
Correct. Without amending them at today. Yeah.
Describer:
On screen. CASTLE PINES NORTH METROPOLITAN DISTRICT STATEMENTS OF REVENUES AND EXPENDITURES WITH BUDGETS BUDGETARY (NON-GAAP) BASIS December 31, 2024 Actuals
Actuals, Projected Actuals, Budget and Variance through July 31, 2025
2026 Proposed Budget. Packers Page #19 Molly Describes:
Molly:
All right. So moving down to for over to the next page. So we were able to skip the next section because those were the expenditures that moved to the general fund that I just talked about. so starting on page 19, for your water upgrading expenditures direct, we have different categories, annual charges and assessments. Again, just lining that up aligned pretty closely with 2025 projected operations.
You can see that in operations, the significant budget difference is in water meters. and Nathan, I don't know if you want to talk about that a little bit.
Nathan:
So the water meter, expense actually may shift a little bit, right now than the capital plan we're looking to move forward with replacing all of our outdated radios.
I've actually met with a different with a vendor that has a new product. for water meters. That would be a fairly high upfront cost, but to reach the same objective over like five years and be significantly cheaper. So rather than one of the things we're looking at is rather than upgrade these independent, these individual radios and then have to go find 800 water meters and replace those, we may move directly to replacing the water meters.
So there's a new water meter available that's cell phone driven. It does a lot of different things. I'm sorry I wasn't as prepared for this slide, and I apologize. That question.
Jana:
Can you point to where it is on the sheet that you're looking at? I can do it. Sorry.
Or just give me an idea of where you want my I...
Tera:
It's like third from under operations. It's third from the bottom of water meters.
Jana:
Yes okay okay. Thank you. Tera. So that 175 K is for the cell phone thing.
Nathan:
So that one isn't captured. So this the way the budget is set up now is kind of with our original plan, which is upgrading some meters and then phasing in various upgrades on other components over time.
The different modality that I'm evaluating is doing a mass scale replacement of all of our water meters one inch and under. And so that could have a pretty significant impact on that line item in the short term. the biggest thing I'm evaluating is basically as a cheaper to do this kind of scaled out over time upgrade, or to just move directly to meter replacement, that would accomplish the same thing.
So I'm just waiting back on some vendor numbers to see which is cheaper over like a five year period.
Jana:
The replacement of the radios is moot if we do the cell phone, correct? Yeah.
Tera:
And those are the water meters that would allow people to read their own liters.
Nathan:
Correct? Yeah. So you could get the ones that we're looking at do an update, every six hours on your water usage.
They also send usage alerts. There's a lot more advanced customer customer portal that we can put in place. the cost break point just for the meters isn't that different. So a meter and a radio for a three quarter inch right now cost us about 400 or $380. just these cell phone activated meters are $400 each. It's just a lot more than we were planning on replacing, than upgrading.
the total cost was right around, like, what it was like. I don't want to guess, but the total cost, it seemed like it was going to be about, on balance, the biggest integration there's the biggest difference is those cell phone meters will communicate directly, obviously with cell towers. The existing technology that we use would require us to upgrade all of the radios to a modern technology.
There's about 900 of them that would be done, and then we would have to install somewhere between 3 and 5 fixed base towers to read those. And so that's the cost that I'm currently waiting on, is how much those big space towers cost. but they could be several, several million dollars. So it might be cheaper and faster and better to go with.
Next is the meter brand that we're looking at. So more more to come on that I've got a lot of information I need to fill in,
Jana:
But what is it? So ultimately the 175 is for what, the 175. And so what was the plan for that when it was put it this is for radio up the remainder of the first one at the 380 the.
Okay. So 175.
Nathan:
Yeah. One said, 175 upgrades all the radios so that we could move to a fixed base.
Jana:
Okay. Thank you.
Molly:
Okay. And then moving down to professional services again, just, aligning pretty well with the 2025 projected actual repairs and maintenance. You'll see, we lowered that budget just a little bit, thinking that 2025 might have been a, higher year. You can look at 2024 was under a million. this this year we're projecting about 2 million. So the 2026 proposed budget is about 1.5 million. Salaries and benefits that are water specific.
This is for, 80% of the field services technician, at a full year. So we know he started mid-year this year. That's why that's significantly different. Utilities remains, a substantial portion of the water budget. it's about 20% of the budget budgeted, 1.1 million. And then we have the new line item that we've talked about, that indirect cost, the general fund 732,000.
There, for a total operating of 5.6 million. Any questions on any of those line items before we move on?
James:
Just talk to me about the indirect costs. Just remind me what that is. Yeah.
Molly:
So, when we recommended moving the general overhead, administrative costs to the general fund, in order to have the water and wastewater contribute to their portion, it's 15% of direct costs, gets applied and then moves to general fund as a revenue, to help offset those costs.
Okay.
Any other questions before we move to the non-operating
Tera:
for the, centennial delivery charges? Why are those. Increased. So let's propose 350 for projected actuals as 150.
Eric:
Yeah. So I'm going to Nathan, jump in here in a second with me. We've not taken many deliveries from Centennial yet this year. and we're expecting to take the full delivery allotment for October through April.
So even though we did budget for there was a timing difference associated with we were only we were originally the original budget call for $315,000. And, we we preserved 150,000 there, namely just for the, you know, basically starting in October, that $50,000 per month, roughly. But we do anticipate seven months of delivery or for next year.
So that's what that is, specifically, that'll help offset the filter bed project that we're going to take in the off window as well.
Nathan:
So yeah. Exactly. Small point. We should probably go through and change Centennial delivery to Highlands Ranch. Thank you.
Tera:
Thank you I just wrote HR.
Eric:
We have it still in the accounting system as, yeah.
Perfect is
James:
the only other question I had was a reduction in, like, repairs and things like that. And, I don't disagree with that since we did, I guess replacements and things like that. But, I mean, just looking at you, you agree with all that and you think that. You mean it's roughly $500,000 reduction ish?
Nathan:
And I mean that that number was effectively eaten up inside of one waterline break that we couldn't contain, basically.
And so it wasn't it the direct repair cost, it was that we had to leave this waterline running for four days. That will be taken care of with the capital project next year. The really over the past three years, the, the like really large budget impacting breaks have all been ones that will be mitigated by capital projects, large scale pipe, transmission lines.
And so I think that that's accurate. I would be, even tentatively hopeful that we undercut what we budgeted.
James:
Okay. Yeah. I mean, the question really goes to and it's nice to hear you say that, but we did talk about things like the water treatment plant and the way we're delivering chemicals to the water now, and those upgrades, as well as the waterline replacement should start, quote unquote, paying us back.
And I just didn't know if we were actually tracking that or that's in your head to kind of see what we could save and what we did save kind of thing so we can project. Now it just goes back to capital projects and improvements and how we look forward, you know, a year to five years to ten years kind of thing.
You know, it just helps us make decisions on what's the most cost effective place to spend our money that's going to yield the best results, you know? So
Tera:
So it looks like especially in the wells, you're feeling a lot more confident in the wells.
Nathan:
The wells are looking okay. For now we do. That is an area we've identified next year to do a comprehensive condition assessment, especially on the aboveground assets of the electrical cabin.
And stuff like that. to fold that in our capital project. And so, we do getting ahead of ourselves a little bit, we will have, you know, annual updates, especially as we get tighter and tighter on those dollar amounts of projected capital. One of those big pieces of that is like Jim was just talking about integrating our asset management, our expenditures, our work order system will be directly integrated with our capital improvement plan.
And so we'll be able to in real time as we input that information, see the impact that it has on various categories and cost projections over 50 years, really.
James:
I mean, ultimately it should start reducing the workload. Yeah, exactly. well, All right. Yeah, I'll bring my questions later.
Eric:
So, while we're still in the water fun, I want to talk about capital, the capital improvement plan.
Describer:
On screen. Capital Improvement Plan 2025 – 2030
Water Activity Enterprise Fund Packet Page # 27
2025 / 2026
Water Treatment Plant Filter Rehabilitation
Rehab of filters to extend useful life and maintain regulatory compliance.
2026
Well Electrical Equipment Replacement
Booster Pump Station Condition Assessment/Preliminary Design
The booster pump station has been in service for 20 years now. We need to do an assessment to determine the current condition, as well as identify a timeline and cost for any capital improvements.
Interconnect Pump Station Surge System Upgrades
Existing Surge protection system is in a state of disrepair. We are looking to abandon the existing system in place, and put a much more cost-effective alternative in service in 2026. Design work for this project is substantially complete.
Ongoing condition assessments and Asset Management development
With priority on well site condition assessments, followed by distribution system assessments, to include Consequence of Failure analysis. We will then focus on the vertical assets at the Water Treatment Plant, as well as the Lift Stations as those projects near completion.
Castle Pines Parkway Phase 2 Waterline Replacement
Replacement of aging infrastructure along Castle Pines Parkway to improve reliability and reduce risk of main breaks.
Monarch Waterline Rehab – Phase 3
oFinal phase of rehabilitation of the Monarch waterline corridor.
Water Storage Tanks 1 & 2 – Rehab Project Design
Engineering design phase for rehabilitation of Tanks 1 & 2.
Water Storage Tank 3 – Preliminary Design Review
Initial review and planning for Tank 3 improvements.
Meter Radio Replacement: Approximately 883 of our water meter radios need an upgrade from an older technology (MXU) to “M Radios” (VGB)
Eric:
We've introduced drafts of this, report starting on page 26 for you all before this is, something that Nathan's been working on over the last several months. And what we did was we took the outputs associated with that, met with the engineers, developed a plan. I think he met with 1 or 2 of you all regarding this plan.
And then we embedded this within our budget as well, and then into the cost of service study as well. So those are, you know, just that link all the way through, we're talking about right now, the only difference associated to the budget is the timing right now. So we'll be making updates over the next 30, 30 days or so just to account for, you know, procurement costs for the lift station projects.
So if we're going to accelerate some of those costs, that's going to that's going to affect obviously the contract use, but not all, but it's going to affect our expenses for this year. We'll discount that for next year's budget. So with that, are there any general questions on the capital improvement plan, right now? And you can either, review, look through page starting on page 26, or you can look at the numbers that are within the nonoperating expenditures associated with, that, once again, this is from a high level standpoint, installation allowance associated with the sampling stations, which is kind of, a project that can be
very much piecemeal throughout time and discussion with Nathan. We have one re drill associated with this, of a well, we have, let's see, we got the the finish of the, monarch water line project. We have the filter bed project as well. At the water treatment plant. We have the condition assessment, work on the booster pump station.
And then, let me make sure I can. I can see this appropriately, just as well.
We have, well, electrical equipment quitting the replacement, the redesign of the surge protection system at the interconnect pump station, and then phase two of the Castle Pines Parkway. Water. excuse me. That's not, Excuse me. Phase two of the Castle Pines Parkway water line replacement project. So those are kind of the projects that are scoped to least for next year that we have within the 2026 budget.
Nathan:
So the phase two water line replacement and moderate water line rehab phase three are essentially the same project. They're just two different plans.
Tera:
And I was happy to see the consequence of failure analysis in the capital improvement plan.
James:
And so that one to I was looking through that day, so just. I just heard you say in phase two and phase three, essentially the same thing, different. I mean, just break that down a little bit for me, if you wouldn't mind.
Nathan:
Yep. So Castle Pines Parkway phase two water line replacement is going to go in conjunction with the City of Castle Pines, basically the same way that we've done the monarch projects. So that is Castle Pines Parkway from Castle Pines Parkway and Monarch West to Forest Park Drive. So we'll replace our water line the length of that roadway.
And there's a a couple of little things we have to do. We have to get that section in place. That's what's going to reinstate what we've been calling the Sherman Street Street Loop, which prevents us from having to take out that entire neighborhood of 140 plus residents. So that'll be phase one of that. Well, the first step in that project and then the, Monarch waterline rehab phase three is from that same intersection moving south.
And so that one isn't actually replacing any pipeline. It's replacing valves that we need to be able to effectively isolate that. So it's placed in several valves. And then that one also includes the full replacement of our utility work inside of the intersection of Castle Pines Parkway and Monarch. One of the big drivers for breaking those into two separate projects was, for simplicity, tracking the different scopes with the contractor when they're doing the work.
So we'll have scope A, B, and C scope A will be 100% of the city or will be the city's responsibility that we participate in a little bit for the roadway component, replacement scope B will be the waterline work and then scope C will be the entire intersection waterline work and then the valve replacement replacements moving south.
Eric:
Thanks. in the last item you'll see is a transfer to the wastewater enterprise fund of $2.2 million. So we're going to talk about this in the cost of service study. And so essentially this is to this is going to be a loan to the wastewater fund that we papered up and documented for the substantial capital that will be done.
And we'll get to the capital here shortly.
Jana:
Nathan, I have a quick question. Yeah, I know the in maybe last year, early this year, we talked about getting rid of a pump station or is that one of these, system upgrades?
Nathan:
We will cover that when we go through the. It is it would be covered in the, wastewater fund.
Jana:
That's not this pump station. Okay? No.
Nathan:
Oh the booster pump station condition assessment. No. So that's water. Yeah. So the booster pump station sits right next to the range golf course. That's right In between their main building and the driving range On the driving range side. It supplies fire flow pressure and a little bit of an additional pressure boost to residents at the top of the hill.
So Buffalo Trail
Jana:
Then you can disregard my question since it's not related to that. So that that's the water capital. Yep. Great.
Eric:
All right. I'll I'll pass it back to Molly.
Nathan:
I do have maps for that. I'm going to be implementing in this topic. Thank you for
James:
the surge system upgrade repair you got. You said you're going to gonna leave it in place.
What's your idea for that fix?
Nathan:
So we, Level Engineering did the evaluation on that this year. It will abandon the existing system in place. Will cap that, and then with a relatively minor modification, we're going to be installing a, a small clay valve or a pressure release valve that's kind of designed to handle that kind of pressure surge.
It's not going to be that expensive. It's going to cost. I think I have to go back and look, I think it was like roughly like $85,000 to be able to completely replace that,
James:
sort of like a blow off valve. Effectively. And where does the water go to?
Nathan:
It'll get it'll go to ground outside the building.
James:
Okay. All right.
Yeah. It's it's going to be interesting if that thing ever goes off of this.
Nathan:
It's. Yeah it's redundant anyway. So the with the size of the pipeline and the, amount of water that we're pumping through there, the velocities on that, on the sudden failure like that were nearly as high as we thought they were going to be.
Black and Veatch was kind enough to share all of their initial modeling with us until we were able to verify a lot of it. But it was a severely over-engineered system.
Next.
Describer:
On screen. CASTLE PINES NORTH METROPOLITAN DISTRICT STATEMENTS OF REVENUES AND EXPENDITURES WITH BUDGETS BUDGETARY (NON-GAAP) BASIS December 31, 2024 Actuals
Actuals, Projected Actuals, Budget and Variance through July 31, 2025
2026 Proposed Budget. Packers Page #21 Molly Describes:
Molly:
Okay. All right. Moving on to the wastewater fund starting on page 21. You can see that we're estimating the beginning funds available for 2026 to be just slightly lower than they were at the beginning of 2025. Again, Eric will talk more about the revenues. We do have the golf course, water delivery, revenue, moving to the wastewater fund.
I think we've talked about that beforehand. Yes. We have. Okay. So that is new to the wastewater fund in 2026, formerly accounted for in the water fund. If you then moving to the expenditures that start on page 22. You can see the estimate for PCWRA sewer fees, which is about 40% of the wastewater funds budget, operations, professional services, repairs and maintenance.
And then the wastewater specific salaries and benefits. This is 20% of the field services technician and then utilities, utilities. You'll see an increase related to that reuse pumping, coming into the wastewater fund. So the water, the revenue comes in and the reuse pumping comes in to the wastewater fund. Any questions on any of those items?
And then you can see the wastewater Nonoperating revenues transfer in that Eric just referred to, that you'll be hearing more about, from the water fund to help cover the capital. And then Eric, do you want to talk about the capital?
Eric:
Certainly. So, same picture as the wastewater fund. Very briefly. The district does have, a debt service rate, for next year.
So that's for the expansion that was funded several years ago. 300 and proximally, $345,000. important note in 2026 that debt is callable. So we could make an advance payment if we want to On that. It's a pretty good rate. I can't remember what it is off the top of my head but if interest, if we can get that back to you, it's roughly just slightly discounted from, I believe, investment earnings rates.
Right now. So and plus we are at kind of a deficit right now in The water fund is from. So I would expect at least we can revisit that annually to see if that makes sense or not to, pay ahead on that debt as well. And then another item is at the bottom. You have a number for 104,155.
That is for that, PCWRA golf course, debt service that we've been talking about for the lining project. Our portion of that project, which would be pass through the rates that we'll talk about in the costs study. So those are just important to nonoperating expenditures. But two items associated with that, we just wanted to highlight, in addition there are three projects listed.
Right now, we of course have the next phase, the lift station renovations projects. and of course, that number will be updated for timing. that we have, we have, the, a another pond lining for a reuse system. And this will be a cost share associated with an HOA. And, Nathan, do you would can you speak to this a little bit more?
Nathan:
Yeah. So it's the, rather than the HOA. It's, the it's another golf course pond. So the reuse pond at PCWRA that we are relining pumps to another pond that is owned by the Castle Pines Country Club golf course. We need to realign it for the same reason. It's a clay bentonite lining. It needs to have an actual lining, the, golf course is going to have to do that with all of their ponds.
Describer:
On screen. CASTLE PINES NORTH METROPOLITAN DISTRICT STATEMENTS OF REVENUES AND EXPENDITURES WITH BUDGETS BUDGETARY (NON-GAAP) BASIS December 31, 2024 Actuals
Actuals, Projected Actuals, Budget and Variance through July 31, 2025
2026 Proposed Budget. Packers Page #22
Nathan:
So this is just 50% of the one pond that's impacted. 200,000 is a number that I got from their grounds director Lance, this one is will also require an IGA. So we'll we'll see that coming down the pipeline. It'll be a three way or an agreement at least between us, ourselves, Castle Pines Metropolitan district and the golf course to just kind of clean up some long standing O&M
Costs. Cost allocations. Excuse me. associated with that system.
Eric:
And then the next item is for a flume replacement associated with the Daniels Gate neighborhood as well, to help alleviate, some fumes, I suppose.
Nathan:
So the the flume is the this is the primary measurement device that exists downstream of all of the district, with the exception of Legae.
So, it's down past Forest Park Drive on Daniels Road. All of roughly 500,000 gallons, a little bit less of wastewater. Go through that flume. The flume as it sits is just not all of that. All that very accurate. The water, the wastewater that's going through it is going way too fast. It's also very intermittent, because it's directly fed through a little station.
It's been a long standing problem and it really directly impacts the rates that we pay at PCWRA. So the amount of wastewater that we send them is a pretty heavy component of that. And so we measure all of our wastewater at that flume. Again, we have another one that measures our outfall coming down Happy Canyon. And then they measure the total amount of wastewater going into the plant.
So they take our measurements and then subtract the village use from them. And that's how we differentiate, at least the flow. There's also a loading capacity portion of that. So the actual like what's in the wastewater has a pretty heavy impact on our overall rate structure and what we pay a PC rate. The current flume as it sits is not a valid sample point.
So we can't really use that for loading. And so for the past really ten plus years, we've used this kind of like three year rolling average to determine the rates for the individual ratepayers. And it's just something that needs to be taken care of. So we'll hopefully look at that next year.
Eric:
And the final item associated with our 2026 budget is, you will see Molly and I are starting to track our components of reserves.
Describer:
On screen. CASTLE PINES NORTH METROPOLITAN DISTRICT STATEMENTS OF REVENUES AND EXPENDITURES WITH BUDGETS BUDGETARY (NON-GAAP) BASIS December 31, 2024 Actuals
Actuals, Projected Actuals, Budget and Variance through July 31, 2025
2026 Proposed Budget. Packers Page #22 Eric Describes:
Eric:
So you'll see those restrictions for capital unrestricted. For the wastewater fund it will look very odd because what we're looking at right now is we're borrowing money from the water fund. What we see first is it's going to, reserves are going to replenish those restrictions for capital first, and then it will start working on our unrestricted, essentially the working capital for the wastewater fund as well.
You'll see that same breakout, like I said, in the water fund above. So that is the extent, at least for our 2026 presentation, as it relates primarily to all the the revenues in the general fund, expenses in the general fund and the expenditures associated with, each of the enterprises. I would like if there's I can certainly take any we can take any questions right now or we can go directly into, Bartle Wells presentation for the cost of service study.
James:
Just reiterating, this includes an adjustment includes
Eric:
It does include the current recommendations when the cost of service study on the revenue side. Thank you.
Wonderful. We're going to make, we've taken notes. We've, will implement those changes that we've talked about, including nomenclature changes as well. And so we have that same method, those, same language as it relates to what's actually happening. So what's going to be the financial statements, from here, what we'll be doing is, making updates.
We will have a budget hearing this next month. we'll have an official time to time to comment next, next week for the public meeting at both meetings. And then we'll have the budget hearing the Monday before Thanksgiving as well. And the consideration for any rate changes at that time. So that's what where we will go over the next 30 days.
Tera:
So is it going to be a public hearing or the public hearing is on until November.
Nathan:
But we posted them both as part. So both the October and November regular board meetings have been posted for public hearings. Yes. Thank you.
Eric:
All right. with that, we can move directly into the cost of service study.
Jason:
All right.
Describer:
On screen. Castle Pines North Metropolitan District
2025 Water and Wastewater Cost of Service Rate Study
October 20, 2025 Slides
Benchmarking Survey
We are performing a benchmarking survey of neighboring agencies to provide context for the
District's costs
How Much Does It Cost?
• $ per 1,000 Gallons
• § per Account per Month
Why Are There Differences In Cost?
• 1,000 Gallons per Account
• Pipe Miles per Account
• Asset Value per Account
• Full Time Emplovees
• Debt Service per Account
Estimated Average System Age (Years)
• Water Source and Age of Rights
Speaker's style makes dictation difficult, there are errors which were spoken and which indicate other words than what is expected.
Eric Helgeson, Principle at Bartles Wells Associates:
Well, thanks for having me. See everyone again. my name's Eric Helgeson, ... And, I'm principle at Bartles Wells Associates, and, I, worked on this, service study project this year. so the next slide, So I'm going to be talking about the process, like going through the individual plans for each enterprise.
The. Next slide please. Sorry. Sorry about that. No worries. I don't know if it'd be better for of us. The first thing I want to touch on is this year, we're also working on doing a benchmarking survey, some of with some of the other agencies, to kind of also give you an idea of, you know, in addition to what you heard from, Eric and Nathan and Molly on the budget and capital plan that just kind of give you a more context for how you can compare to those agencies.
we're going to look our plan is looking at, operating cost per thousand gallons. And, operating cost per account per month to kind of give two different ones more stable and one is more based on flow. looks at what look at with, system cost to run. and then also, some questions to provide some more context because there are a lot of things that influence the castle system, such as density, age of the system.
the, the amount of use per customer, can change the cost quite a bit. so trying to ask some questions accompany those two cost questions to kind of paint a part, add more color to the picture that we're looking at. so we're halfway
Tera:
just is that to more kind of normalize the cost because it's a neighboring one.
So it doesn't sound like you're comparing to same sized systems or whatever
Nathan:
We are. So I, I went through and we identified which utilities we want to do. So we did cover just that for good measure. We did cover all the neighboring utilities. So Parker Highlands Ranch, Castle Rock for similarly sized systems. We're also looking at binary, Roxboro, Dominion, several others.
I can't remember the entire list. But we reached out, I was able to get really great feedback of every utility. We reached out was more than happy to fill out our survey for us in exchange for the results.
Tera:
So, because I'm, you know, the residents are obviously going to look at all the neighboring agencies, but that's not necessarily, you know, apples to apples, right?
Leah:
Okay. And, I have a question. Is there a way to normalize the data so that we are comparing apples to apples across the different districts?
Eric Helgeson:
Well, I think we're trying to do that with the just focusing on operating costs and per account. But to, to normalize it, it, I don't think there's a easy way to normalize for age because it's kind of a qualitative, and cost per, per, you know, density can, can range a lot.
And topography plays a big role in that. So I guess, the short answer is it's not an easy way to normalize, but we're normalizing right, with who we choose. And then, by taking the costs on a per account or per per unit of, water use cases and everything else is just provide some additional context, for some of the more harder to normalize questions that do influence cost.
James:
So obviously you're talking about like elevation changes are you're talking about how spread out or both both variables as they directly relate to pumping cost,
Eric Helgeson:
pumping costs and you the amount of infrastructure you need per customer. yeah. Yeah. So hopefully that'll add a little more context to, to the, the, the what you're paying for and, and how your rates are comparing to other agencies.
Describer:
On screen. Castle Pines North Metro District
Historic Operating Costs per 1,000 Gallons Sold. Eric Helgeson explains.
Eric Helgeson:
Next slide please. So this is just kind of a initial snapshot of cost per thousand gallons. and you can also see that the cost is significantly influenced by the volume, because you have about 20 about 75% of your costs are fixed. And the so in 2023, when you have very what is your cost per thousand gallons went
Way up. So but just kind of giving you time showing what that metric looks like for for castle pines North. next slide please.
Rate Study Process
Data Gathering, Demand Analysis, Ten-Year Financial Plan, Cost Allocation, Rate Design, Adoption and Implementation
Eric Helgeson:
So we're and we're going to finish putting that together and have that ready as a whole packet. Before November I believe, since the target. so moving on to the rate study process, for in study process, we, we pull the all of the data, including the financial plan, the budget capital, and then the water demand, together.
First of all, the long range financial plan where we identify the amount of revenue, overall level that's needed to fund the enterprise, we then, did, full cost allocations here. So we took all of the all the costs and looked at what drove those costs and allocated them to the different customer classes, based on how they have how their use drives cost.
And then the final step is to turn that into, into rates. We didn't make a lot of changes. We actually didn't make significant changes to redesign mostly focus on for for years. But I'll touch on some options with that. And then, then the final step is adoption. implementation.
Describer:
On screen. Ten-Year Financial Plan
Develop 10-year financial projections to the identify rate revenue necessary to:
•Fund operating & maintenance expenses
•Fund capital improvement needs
•Maintain adequate fund reserves
•Meet debt service coverage requirements
Financial plans serve as roadmaps for funding operating and capital programs and maintaining
Eric Helgeson:
Sorry, already touched on the capital planning.
If we want to maintain a strong, financial health involved in both enterprises and so part of that is making sure that the rates keep pace with costs and, and you're able of a preventative and cost savings type activities instead of being, behind and having to kind of, patch things.
Describer:
On screen. Cost Allocation
Costs are allocated between functional categories
• Costs are allocated to customer classes
Water Functional Allocation Example
Capacity, Base, Extra/Peak, Customer, Costs
Eric Helgeson:
Cost allocation, as I was saying, we looked at know what drives the different cost for the different classes.
On the water side, you have certain costs that are on a per customer basis. you have costs that are related to, capacity. There's fixed capacity and variable capacity. So fixed capacity is we allocate on a on a meter equivalent basis. So the a larger meter has more than capacity could take, could require more to serve than a smaller meter.
That there's based demand and average demand that, that, customers use and then peak demand. So, you know, if you're your to serve peak demand on a different level, you need to have water supply adequate to meet your, your demand. So, those type of costs being allocated to that category. So it's kind of taking on your cost between the different buckets and seeing how, much, how many units related to each category, each customer class, uses.
And that's how we shift the cost.
Describer:
On screen. Castle Pines North Metro District
Historic Operating Costs per 1,000 Gallons Sold.
James:
In Place of Castle Pines, If we can go back , you know, it's a simple chart. But at this point, since the town's essentially built out to a really just, you know, perfect information as far as, you know, sizing and peak demand and things like that. Or is it something I don't understand or know. I mean, we have new, homes down here that were built up in the in the other stuff across the highways is serviced by Carver.
So I'm just saying, like, you know, we should have pretty good information at this point.
Eric Helgeson:
Well, as far as your meter towns. Yes. you do, you know, you know, it's pretty stable, and we're not anticipating any new connections. but, you know, water demands different change, and, and your cost change and what, your funding changes.
So that's kind of where we update that. So, you know, your, cost of electricity goes up more proportionally than other things and probably, you know, maybe I'll take more on a moment as you
James:
Maybe rephrase the question, what are the things that, we can we can understand about peak demand at this point? I mean, I understand sizing it for peak demand and all that.
But at this point, don't we understand what our peak demand is? I mean, obviously we have summertime and a lot of irrigation type wells and things like that. I'm trying to understand what peak demand means here.
Eric Helgeson:
So it's more how we're allocating costs. So between the different customer classes. So, so if one customer class like irrigation for example, peaks a lot more in the summer, costs in that category.
They get a higher proportion because they use more, then they have more peak demands. Then. So how much they use like in the peak month, they use a greater proportion of that than say indoor commercial. So we're just like a factor that we're calculating based on how they're using and appointment to the that bucket of costs. So so based on that is this be allocated evenly on to each different cut each customer based on their on a per unit basis, cost related to serving peak demand or allocated on a on a based on a peaking factor to give a firm make it proportional to the peak use rather than just that base load.
Nathan:
So it's based on it's based on our historical demands that we do now. So like I said, we do know what those numbers are. We're applying those to this cost. We're not necessarily trying to project or guess what, those demands are out into the future. We're just using the historical data to inform the rest.
Eric Helgeson:
This is why your Irrigation rates are a bit higher than your residential rates, so the, cost is allocated based on their proportional peak demand.
James:
What is the irrigation rates?
I mean, again, I'm just not understanding we we're mostly residential ones. So yeah. So irrigation means like somebody's garden and or lawn.
Nathan:
Oh I see you're saying so there's we do have actually a fairly complicated rate structure. And so inside of that we have this different customer classes. And so when we talk about irrigation rate irrigation rate is a specific type of an account.
So we know that this account is only used for irrigation. That's pricing primarily. So HOA is things like that. So there's a different rate that applies specifically to those types of accounts versus the residential. So the residential all gets billed out at the same rate, whether or not you're using it for irrigation or it.
James:
So it's it's a two year making adjustment for HOA for common space.
Right. Okay. That's why I wasn't getting started. Can make any sense to what you're saying.
Eric Helgeson:
Sorry, gotcha. Whereas my mind was in the weeds. yeah. If you have, residential customers, it's commercial customers. It's a commercial indoor. So commercial commercial customers that don't have any irrigation and you have irrigation only in towns. So once we go to the allocation process, the final step, is the rate design.
Describer:
On screen. Rate Design Considerations
Rate Policy Considerations
Revenue stability, Ease of administration, Impact of rate changes to customers, Equity, Conservation incentives, Affordability
Revenue stability is balanced against Conservation and Affordability with Equity as the basis for both sides. "Develop rates which strike the right balance for CPNMD" Eric Helgeson explains.
Eric Helgeson:
And rate design is where and this is more for, you know, just, for future awareness if you want, if you feel your objectives are changing and you want to use rates to support those objectives, you know, some, some things you can consider are, you know, if you want to increase revenue stability, you can increase fixed charges.
However, that's every everything you do with rates is a balancing act because likely reducing your conservation signaling or your low user affordability, know, but there are some different, policies that you can use rates to kind of support. Another one could be ease of administration right now, as you said, you know, pretty complex rate structure. It achieves certain goals by encouraging conservation and having in a little bit more affordable for lower use customers.
But it is more complex to administer. So you you could reduce tiers or have tiers calculated differently. There's a number of rate structures from uniform, which is kind of simple and or fixed. Fixed rates with no no biometric portion is the simplest all the way to kind of where you are, which is on the far end, which is water budgets.
individualize each customer. So there's a spectrum of things you can look at. and it's just important to, if, if you change one thing, it's a balancing act easily and it's just finding and rates that strike the right balance for the district. currently, you know, I think your rates do that for the type of district you have to achieve that pretty well.
But I just wanted to make you aware of it for future future rate studies. next slide please.
Describer:
On screen. Water Enterprise
Water Demand Data
Castle Pines North Metro District Historic Water Use (Million Gallons) Eric Helgeson describes:
Eric Helgeson:
So going use the water enterprise. it does your use over time. which is kind of the inverse to the cost per, thousand gallons graph showed earlier. 2023 was a extraordinarily low, low year. And, before that, you have your highest year.
So you have that you can have quite a bit of, variability in, demand, which translates to revenue as well. next slide.
Describer:
On screen. Water Demand Data
• Highly variable, between low and high years (2023 v. 2024)
Potable Water Usage by Class (1,000 Gallons) including Accounts like Irrigation, Commercial-Indoor/ Townhouse, Commercial, Residential
Potable Water Use by Month Million Gallons)
Eric Helgeson:
And just looking at those two recent kind of very different years actually, 2024, which is also a pretty high year. The you know, just showing how the your customers actually use water on a monthly basis and how, you know, those hot summers can really drive that, that demand.
Also thinking Colorado, the it's not showing as much in this chart, but your, those kind of shoulder months in October, especially October, September when you have your first freeze can really impact revenues as well as well. Customers stop irrigation at that point. and so if you, you miss that the slope can be a drastic drought. So you can have some pretty significant shifts from year to year.
And and one thing on the previous slide, classes with irrigation definitely have larger services like the irrigation class and the residential classes, you know, residential had about a 20% change in use in irrigation, had about a 40% change between those two years.
Jason:
On this slide, could we illustrate the average temperature per month that was in those two years, so that we can kind of see why these spikes so heavily?
Nathan:
Yeah. add it. Yeah. Yeah.
Eric Helgeson:
And probably precipitation is the also. You know,
James:
that's why the usage goes down with the cost of that per gallon. It's starting to pop up back in. I mean, that wasn't it's totally clear that like almost these two charts should be put together, you know, I mean, because you see the rate per thousand gallons go up.
Because as you explained it was 75% of your costs are fixed. And that's actually low, lower than a lot of utilities. But you have a lot of pumping cost because of the groundwater source. Which is another point of context for other agencies. And so, you know, where your water comes from too much. Yeah. Yeah. But, your electric costs are.
Yeah. Other, other utilities. some have a lot actually of fixed costs that are 90% or higher fixed. but yeah, it's still significant. next slide, please use I'm sorry.
Describer:
On screen. Water Capital Plan
• Key Proiects
• Renewable Water
• WTP Filter Rehabilitation Program
• Waterline replacement
• Well rehab & redrills
Castle Pines North Metro District 10-Year Water Capital Improvement Plan (S Millions) includes
Distribution, Source of Supply, Treatment / Other
Eric Helgeson:
And, so this is a graph for the capital projects. Talked about the short term projects that, are underway. There's a, you know, fairly significant amount that you're, working on right now.
The big bar in 2030 is the, potential renewable project. we put it in as a placeholder. but just to make sure we're accounting for it in the longer term plan, for that project, you will need to finance it. so, yes, I put in assumed debt service for that amount as well. but that's one of the, drivers of the financial plan.
Next slide please.
Describer:
On screen. Water Financial Drivers
BWA developed updated financial projections to identify funding needs & evaluate overall rate revenue requirement
• Aging infrastructure & capital improvement needs
• Water system upgrades, repairs & replacements needed maintain safe & reliable operations
• S45.1 million over the next 5 years
• Renewable water project $20 million placeholder in 2030
• Operating cost inflation
• 4.0% per year over next 5 years
• Annual rate adjustments needed to keep rates in line with escalating costs (electricity, staffing, materials, insurance, etc.)
• Loan to sewer enterprise for lift station upgrades
• $9.2M, 30-year repayment with rate tied to interest on reserves (Colorado Trust)
• Maintain Prudent Reserves
• Emergencies, demand fluctuation, cash funding capital, etc.
Eric Helgeson:
And so along with the capital, we assumed, 4% inflation. And we also, assumed the loan to the sewer enterprise. our, discussion, our recommendation was to make it a variable rate, based on what, your interest. What your reserves would be earning each year. So be tied to the Colorado trust rate you have right now.
It's four and a quarter or around there. so, to do a third, do it on a 30 year basis and tie it to that. And, also include the, the widening amounts as of just in even nine, 9.2 so that, that could be worked into the re-use rate for a more consistent, portion of that rate that's passed along as well.
And also for the wastewater fund, is in a less strong position that the water fund. And since you're already doing that, it seems like it makes sense to just kind of make it all the same. And then, just maintaining for your reserves is another, another objective. next slide.
Describer:
On screen. Water Financial Plan
Recommended annual 4% rate revenue increases
Castle Pines North Metro District
Water Cash Flow ($ millions) including 0&M, Debt, Rate Funded Capital, Loan to Wastewater, Revenue
& Reserves
Eric Helgeson:
So this depicts, wastewater fund. the columns are your total expenses in each year.
And, so you have no debt currently in the water. And so the water fund, you've no debt. You have, your capital is kind of variable, but it normalizing, the loan to the wastewater is a light stream. And then, the, the dark green line is your is your total revenue. It goes down because, you do have, capacity or connection fee revenue in 2025.
But going forward, we were assuming that you're not receiving it. We we tried to make our, demand projections pretty conservatively largely given the, variability, and you're volumetric meter, volumetric revenue. So we want to always try to keep it on a I conservative on the conservative side. but we did, feel, you know, you've had some stronger water year in 24, 25 looking pretty reasonable.
So, we're recommending basically it's an inflationary increase. just to keep pace with your costs. backed off a little bit from where we anticipated you would need last year. Part of that is also, maybe with a review of the budget and, you know, the numbers are a little bit more dialed in on the operating spend side.
And, so we felt comfortable with that. This this projection is using, like you, a more conservative, a more conservative outlook. And, you know, you have very strong reserves. So it's basically just getting to a point where the, the Green Line eventually is above your annual capital and operating expense, but, you know, you have a cushion to get there in ten, 15 years and you might get there sooner.
Well, depending on what kind of water year you have. So, you know, I think, you know, in, in a few years, it's good to revisit where you're at and just also decide as a board, and what kind of level of reserve do you want to maintain? Because it's much harder to build back reserves and draw them down.
And, you know, when you have reserves, you're also earning interest income on those reserves and then some for some other benefits as well. But, you know, at what point do you want it to normalize? And if you want to keep it at a higher level, you know, you you just slightly increase the, slope of your revenues.
And so maybe 4% to four and a half or five to normalize, you know, to have a stable as a higher level, as far as our recommended recommended reserve level, we for most agencies where we recommend having at least a year of operating costs and reserve, for you, that's not a challenge right now on the water side.
So it's just deciding do you want to get down to that level, or do you want to stay at 2 or 3 years? You know. There's a real range amongst and our utilities, you know, looking at S&P ratings, you know, the highest rated, utilities, some of them have three years in reserve on average, down to, you know, more like a rated or about a year.
But, you know, there's utilities kind of a pretty wide range of reserves. It's not uncommon to have 3 or 5 years in reserve as a, as a, as a kind of price, because you are very capital intensive operation.
Describer:
On screen. Proposed Water Rates
This is a detailed slide. Eric Helgeson describes.
Eric Helgeson:
The proposed rates. So we as I said, we did an updated allocation process. So the rates are not matching the 4% revenue recommendation.
Exactly. some rates, I think the residential rates are actually going up 5%. The other, like the commercial, indoor townhouse is going up closer to 3%. and that was just updating it a the rates haven't been updated, looking at them in that way since before I have worked for the agency. So it's been a long time since that's been looked at.
So, yeah, we looked we wanted to reflect the, the current cost of the agency in a, clear way. So that's what the update looks like. but on the whole, I think, no rate is changing more than plus or minus, like 1.1% of the 4%.
Describer:
On screen. Bill Comparison
Residential Bill Impacts (Fixed charges per 3/4" meter plus 9,000 gallon monthly average use) for existing rates and proposed rates including Volumetric Rates, Capital Maintenance Charge, & Service Charge
Eric Helgeson:
So this is the typical, typical bill. we also routines that the typical bill is for.
This year, we went through all the customer data. That's like just your average use for, residential customer is about 9000 gallons. So, we updated this to reflect that, and, that bill will be going would go from $93.69 to $98.02. but the change that we're, recommending
Describer:
On screen. Single-Family Residential Regional Water Bill Comparison
Monthly Fixed Service Charges Plus 9,000 Gallons Consumption
• Fixed Charge
• Variable Charge
Eric Helgeson:
And then this is the, the rate survey.
So seeing how you fall, I apologize about the arrows, the, just seeing how you fall relative to a bunch of agent surrounding agencies, the, you know, on the water side, you're in the in the middle of the range. And as we talked about, there's a lot of different factors that can influence whether it's a good thing or tough thing.
You know, some agencies are in the middle because they haven't been, rehabbing their old aging systems. some agencies in most of their newer system, you know, to, you know, there's a lot of factors that influence it, but at least, you know, you're not an outlier. and, next slide please.
Describer:
On screen. Wastewater Enterprise
Sewer Capital Plan
• Key Projects
• Lift Station Upgrades
• Compliance advisory
• Asset Replacement Program
Castle Pines North Metro District
10-Year Wastewater Capital Improvement Plan ($ Millions) including Asset Replacement Program, Pond Lining Reuse System, Lift Station Renovation Projects, Flume Replacement
Eric Helgeson:
So going into the wastewater enterprise next slide please.
The, the wastewater has a significant capital projects underway currently. The. The. After after the this period of, the mostly the lift station projects, we did assume a, base level of kind of ongoing, repairing replacement and, you know, have that build over time as funds allowed for, for that, to kind of get more of you're trying to get closer to the industry standard is about 1% replacement a year.
So just trying to work and work on that and you're eventually will get there. But right now it's, it's tighter. next slide please.
Describer:
On screen. Wastewater Financial Drivers
BWA developed updated financial projections to identify funding needs & evaluate rate increases
• Aging infrastructure & capital improvement needs
• Sewer system upgrades, repairs & replacements needed maintain safe & reliable operations
• $13.9 million over the next 5 ears
• Loan from water fund for lift station upgrades
• Aim to cash fund $900,000 per year by 2031
• Operating cost inflation
• 4.0% per year over next 5 ears
• Annual rate adjustments needed to keep rates in line with escalating costs (electricity, staffing, materials, insurance, etc.)
• Maintain Prudent Reserves
• Emergencies, demand fluctuation, cash funding capital, etc.
Eric Helgeson:
So 13 or 14 million over the next five years, trying to get up to catch higher amount. same, same inflation assumptions and then receiving that, that loan and paying for the repayment of that loan. next slide please.
Describer:
On screen. Wastewater Financial Plan
Recommended 6% annual rate revenue increases
Castle Pines North Metro District Wastewater Cash Flow ($ millions) including 0&M, Debt, Rate Funded Capital, Loan to Wastewater, Revenue & Reserves
Eric Helgeson:
So this is, the figure for the wastewater fund. ...there for the expenses.
And, you know, the reserves are, you know, just above that one year mark, and the wastewater funds and reserves are much tighter. and really, the goal is to keep the revenues, paid, at pace with the annual expenses. and so that's what the 6% a year, what we, have in the model and what we're 6% is what we're recommending for next year.
And we're just having, you know, just that just keeps keeps pace. And so you don't you keep your reserve at that. Not quite a year with debt service, but you're having maintaining a year of operating costs and slowly building out very gradually starting to build those up, depending on, you know, capital costs won't be necessarily as even, like you may have lower in some years of higher than others, but, trying to, trying to just maintain that, that level of reserves and, and to not have your rates start to deplete reserves at this point.
next slide please.
Describer:
On screen. Proposed Wastewater Rates
Wastewater Customer Class. Eric Helgeson describes.
Eric Helgeson:
So we also did that, through the exercise, on the sewer side as well. The main allocation difference was just we shifted some costs away from the fixed per connection. and because on the sewer side, you know, a lot of your costs are more related to the magnitude of the flow going into the system.
And so that would, just reflects that, that change. So the fixed per customer rates are going up about 5%. And then the and then the, volumetric rates are going up just a little bit over, 7%. but not a significant change, but just a slight realignment with your cost structure.
James:
How you do volumetric rates on the wastewater side of that?
Nathan:
Right. So we take the average rate of consumption for December, January and February and use that as the base rate.
James:
That's at a system wide type.
Nathan:
We do that at the individual meter. So each individual account gets a three month average every year and in that sense usage rate for the wastewater for the rest of the year.
Because there is no way to know.
James:
Well that's what I was getting that. So you just do, is it a factor of the input water into the house? Yeah. Okay. That's that's good.
Nathan:
Yeah. Average water consumption over those things.
James:
Okay. And that kind of eliminate in the what months was it.
Nathan:
I think we do December, January, February so that
Jana:
there's no irrigation and.
Nathan:
Right, you know, December, January, February.
James:
Okay. You know, that makes sense to not get penalized for what you're throwing on and. Right, exactly. And. yeah.
Describer:
On screen. Single-Family Residential Regional Sewer Bill Comparison Monthly Fixed Service Charges Plus 5,000 Gallons Winter Use Fixed and Variable rates
Eric Helgeson:
So your sewer rates, also, near the middle, a little on the higher side. and, yeah, this also doesn't reflect, you know, I think other agencies are also moving up, but, you know, you're at a point of heavy capital investment as well, having to replace most of your lift stations.
So once you, and gone through that, you know, your, you know, I've gotten past this point here of, you you're going to be at a. Not you're not going to need to do that again for hopefully kind of what's the life cycle like 25 years or 25 years? Yeah. Yeah. So you're this is a more expensive time, for the enterprise.
next slide.
Describer:
On screen. Regional Comparison: Single-Family Residential Monthly Combined Water & Sewer Bills
Sewer Charge, Water Charge
Eric Helgeson:
And this just shows the combined, water and sewer rates. So, still have and so the
Nathan:
correct me if, along with the proposed arrow on the right is effectively our 20 proposed 2026 rate against 7% since 2025.
Eric Helgeson:
Yes. So that's. Yes, that's yeah. We don't know what their rates are necessarily going to be. So you're yeah you probably are really figuring fair at least seven inflation everyone else's.
Nathan:
But yeah. Yeah. So we will have that information update this with as we complete that rate survey with some of these comparisons. Will have that information to compare more apples to apples. So at least be looking at 2026 to 2026.
Eric Helgeson:
And you know going back to last year you you you are you know, you did have the three years at that rate increases and you're coming into this this period double three years, three years is during a large inflationary period.
And so you're coming in here. I think we were projecting seven. And I think it looks like based on our revenues of comments, it's sufficient that that six the whole period, you know, things could come out better or worse and come across the projects or not. But, you know, it looks like 6% is a pretty stable number for this enterprise for the next several years.
and, you know, it's really important to keep revenues increasing at that or even pace. it allows it's more predictable for customers and, and for the agency. And, you know, it's a healthy place to be. I worked with a lot of agencies that don't do that. And then we did do, actually the city of our state, the water side is doing you last and raise rates about 44% in the next two years.
So, you know, it's a you're on a really nice trajectory with both enterprises. And so I would say, yeah.
Describer:
On screen. Proposed Reuse Rates
Recommended rates pass through costs, reducing risk for the District and the customer
Reuse Revenue Requirement 2026 Nathan describes.
Nathan:
And Eric can kind of do some overhead or a quick overview on this one. Yes. so the reuse rate requirement, this is the one where we're looking at both a structure change and a fairly significant increase. This is the only customer that we have under this category is the Ridge Golf Course.
So currently our current rate is $3.04 per thousand gallons. The main driver behind this is the Reuse Reservoir project at PCWRA. And then the other reservoir that we need to line with the Castle Pines Country Club. So the biggest shift that we're looking at is rather than charge them $3.04 per thousand gallons, which we currently do, is actually dropping that down to $0.51 per thousand gallons, which is obviously a substantial change.
And then to recover the costs of those projects, that I just mentioned, we'd move to a $12,141.54 fixed monthly charge. So that would get that amount every month. The main reason for doing that is to provide both of our organizations some level of protection. So if we had an extremely dry year, the ridges and paying absolutely out the nose on a much higher rate to cover their cost, or if we have a wet year, we're not eating all of those costs because the ridge isn't allocated or isn't using as much water.
The primary downside to the structure is that it, really kind of removes any conservation rate driving that. The ridge that the ridge might have. There's not really a large incentive for them to severely reduce their water rate because they're all at that lower number. they have already basically done every conservation method that they're willing to do since we started charging them for their water in 2016 anyway.
So there's not a lot of not a lot of meat left on that bone either way.
Jason:
Well, we know yeah, we know how much water they're using typically in an average year. Right. So can't we put a cap on the $0.51 to say up to that usage. And I think beyond that we're going to charge you. yeah.
Tera:
Kind of like we do the residents.
James:
Yeah. That were kind of resistance to, to make sure that they don't take advantage.
Nathan:
Yeah. I mean we could restructure that. So you're saying that there would be a so if we roll that into the current per thousand gallon rate then we have x number of gallons are you know, we'll call it whatever it is, 100,000 gallons.
Significantly more than that will be at this rate until we recover our cost. Anything above that would be at this current rate. The only thing that that doesn't accomplish then is if we have an extremely low usage year, if we have another 2023, they use half of what they normally use. Then we're eating all of that extra cost from not capturing average demand.
Jana:
Could we still keep that flat rate though. Like isn't it, isn't it...
All speak:
That's that's all we're saying is keep the keep the fix. Keep it like it's a mix.
James:
And all you have to do is say the last five years you use this many thousands of gallons and we're just going to give them a little power to that. So we're not going to be, you know, you know, totally.
Jana:
And cap it so that it's not a waste when you see.
James:
Yeah. Yeah. You still want the guy turning the thing on and oh we're going to use, you know, 50% more water because if possible. So just tell him here, here's your rate up to this number. And it a little bit. And you know, you see you're being a good neighbor and you're still meeting the agreement here.
And then you guys go crazy and start really overwatering because that of course is a lot of water that, you know, you have some protection on the high side. Yeah.
Eric:
I think one challenge here is the type of infrastructure we have for delivery to this customer, because it's actually metered going into the pond. Is that correct? Nathan.
So they're they're drawing off their system from the pond. Is that is that correct? Correct. Yeah. Yes. So they're essentially maintaining their level within the pond. So they could just use all the water in there to kind of manage that structure. If you don't mind.
Jason:
I know we're charging them by the gallon now. So we have to have an idea of how much how many gallons or it's a different.
James:
So yeah, yeah, we can so put a guardrail on there so that, you know, something they can just go crazy after usage.
Jason:
Like you know that swimming pools on every hole.
James:
I mean, yeah, I mean it meets the intent of what you're trying to do. Okay. And a place is a high end guardrail so that, you know something doesn't you.
They don't want to sort of use an excessive amount.
Eric Helgeson:
Okay. Yeah. Maybe we can. We are there. Just so I mean, costs associated with, you know, group well responsibilities and other things that maybe we can talk about that.
Nathan:
Yeah. We can talk about that, about that. afterward we do this, we this one, we do have, a tighter timeline to figure out at least what we're proposing the rates to be.
I have to provide them that information contractually, give them and that information by November 1st so we can make some adjustments this week. but we'll need to have that pretty dialed by the board meeting. and we won't be voting for it. Doesn't change the approval timeline, so we'll still approve it at the end of November.
As part of the normal rates and fee structure. We just have to tell them what we think that's going to be. We can always back down, but we can we can lower it, but we can't go up from the number we told on that.
Jason:
During your conversations, you can just email the board and let us know what's going on this week.
Nathan:
Yeah, yeah, that can do.
Eric Helgeson:
One other site also just with their use. you know there it is. Very also see, you know, but you may maybe you look at like excessive you can look at their hot year and what they use kind of under these higher volumetric cost situations. And if you look at having a rate that kicks in over kind of normal, like normal, you're summer irrigation and just not just caution against factoring in like 2023 into their average.
Yeah, as far as that, if it's more of a conservation oriented rate. but yeah. And the other thing with the fixed charges also focusing on the they have a lot of debt now. And just to make it so you're not on the hook for that and those annual costs the main the other part but yeah definitely. So we'll look at the conservation element.
Nathan:
And then one thing just for the board to be prepared for a likely eventuality, there's a good chance that the ridge will come to either of the next two meetings to speak during the hearing portion. What they are indicated to me, they're likely to ask is that if the board would have any interest in defraying, some of the golf course costs into the other rate structure.
So having less of an impact rate impact to them, more of a rate impact to, you know, residents, commercial or some other class. Their logic behind that is that the guard, the presence of the golf course has a some level of value to the community, either in property taxes or whatever. So I told them that, you know, where Eric and I were, that we, you know, historically, we want the user to pay for their own rates and that that would be an argument that they needed to make directly to the board.
And so they indicated they might do that. But I just wanted to give you guys a heads up to that question. Could be, okay.
Eric Helgeson:
All right. and I think that's the last slide.
Describer:
On screen. Summary
Revenue increases needed to support each utility's operating, debt service, and capital needs
• Interfund loan assists phasing in sewer rates
• Increases now reduce future increases
Eric Helgeson:
You know, the rate increases, our need to continue to fund the utilities, operating costs, debt service and capital. and the loan is going to assist, with, phasing in those sewer rates and keeping those rates and, and predictable and, not having to pay for financing costs.
And, you know, as I said before, you know, keeping the rates increasing at a regular, interval, reduces the need, the chance of having to have a larger and more shocking increase in down the road. That's everything I have. So any other questions?
James:
is there any benefit? It's more of a accounting thing. And that understanding the debt service side, is there any benefit, do we get any kind of lower rates or benefit by carrying, more money?
I mean, as far as rating and things like that,
Eric:
I would say we probably have the issue is actually going to be Plum Creek water is going to be the issuer for this project. So it's essentially, whatever financing that they secure. We have their board meeting Wednesday actually, where we get the final numbers associated with that is actually pretty very good financing.
They get through the state revolving fund. So we're pretty excited about that.
James:
So I mean, I bring in, how much, you know, basically there's no real benefit to carrying a lot of correct.
Eric:
That is correct. And so oftentimes and this is the instance with, the existing loan through the wastewater service fund, it's actually collateralized with your the rate covenants, not only with the wastewater fund, but also with the Water Enterprise fund.
So you're allowed to kind of combine balance sheets for that at the end of the day, which basically they require the district has entered into a covenant to raise rates to cover that debt service at the end of the day. And so but from the standpoint of this issuance, it's just going to be, we've had this issue before this, situation before with Plum Creek Water is that debt service is just very streamlined and just basically amortized over a 12 month period.
They send the district invoice on top of the annual or the monthly invoice, and we just remit those funds.
Eric Helgeson:
One of the, I would say is the only instance where we'll potentially impact is with your on the when you get to the point of doing and if you do the water renewable water project or whatever, you know, that 20 million down the road if you have to, if they're if you aren't able to secure SRF, then it would have an impact.
But it's it would only be a and SRF will always be in a better opportunity. And so if you're not able to do that it could help you get a slightly better rating. But you really beyond that your threshold. There's kind of de minimis impacts to the you know yeah. To the liquidity score. You're going to get a pretty high score at that point already.
So but it could help slightly with your rating if you do need to issue debt at that point.
Eric:
As far as a product that Eric has prepared for us, it's, this, this report as well as the rate tables that were forwarded on earlier. And so this is, like I said, the best estimate we have of the ten year forecast going forward.
Right now, the timing is going to change. We talk about this, you know, low water project. We don't know the parties that are involved. We don't know the timing associated with it. But what we have done is retained fee revenue associated with renewable water over the last several years as well. So we want to make sure that is applied to the proper project as well.
So hand in hand with what, Molly has prepared with from our reserves, what is our capital reserves with our working capital that has been factored in to the cost of service study? And we expect that's going to change over the next 30 days, like, those things are just going to keep changing. So, even today, Nathan has identified, he had a proposal and for one of the capital projects as well.
So we're going to be updating our capital plan for that. but with that, that that was the the recommendation from Bartle and Wells.
Jason:
All right. Well, thanks, Eric and Eric. A Lindsay, do you have Leah? Do you have any questions before we close out the finance session?
Leah:
I do not thank you for checking. Thank you.
Jason:
All right.
We will then go ahead and close out the finance section and move to item number four legal. Do we still have Kim with us?
Legal Counsel Kim Seter, Esq.:
Yes you do. Hi, Kim. you you have a copy of the legal report in your packet. Then there's a couple, sets of minutes for you to look at, which you can do now or, or at the meeting, whichever you prefer.
And you can answer any questions you may have.
Tera:
Just had a question on why, hidden point hesitated on the agreement.
Kim:
You know, I don't I don't know that there have been any real hesitations other than the delays that have gone on from the beginning, then just to respond, okay.
All right.
Tera:
Oh, and thank you for clearing up the, Castle Pines Town Center, MD. I am okay,
Jason:
And great. Does anybody have any questions for Kim?
Nathan:
Yeah, as you guys, you know, review this if you there, you know, get further into the minutes. If there are any changes that you'd like to see, you can forward those to me and we can include them.
We can pack it for Monday.
Jason:
Great. Thanks. We'll go ahead and close out the legal section and, we'll move to number five. Adjourn.
Thank. Thank you Everyone.
James:
I feel bad we should have should ask him a question or something. zBut it was pretty straightforward.
Jason:
And, Oh, I forgot. Leah, did you have any questions?
Leah:
I don't, thank you, though. I.
Jason:
Very good. Have a great evening, everyone.
Kim:
Good night everybody.