6.1d ERMUSR 12-12-2017 Elk River
Municipal Utilities UTILITIES COMMISSION MEETING
TO: FROM:
ERMU Commission Mike Tietz—Technical Services Superintendent
MEETING DATE: AGENDA ITEM NUMBER:
December 11, 2017 6.1d
SUBJECT:
Staff Update
ACTION REQUESTED:
None
DISCUSSION:
• In November, the Locating department had a total of 263 locate tickets consisting of four
emergency tickets, 6 cancellations, 5 meetings, 205 normal tickets and 38 updated tickets.
This is a 37% decrease in volume of tickets from the previous month.
• Electric Technicians continue with the meter reading, power bill, substation checks,
hanging red-tags, meter read-outs, disconnects, reconnects, dealing with meter and off-
peak issues, as well as delivering and installing new meters to commercial customers.
• Staff collected oil samples from all of the substation transformers for the annual testing.
We still need to collect a sample from 1 regulator bank before we can send in all of the
samples for analysis; we're just waiting on the ground to freeze to allow access to the
site.
• Staff continues to perform meter audits throughout the system. Field and office staff has
begun test runs of multiple billing cycles in preparation for the transition at the end of
December. Metering department staff has begun reprogramming demand meters that are
not presently subject to demand rates.
• The power plant staff did the monthly engine run on November 29. All engines ran well
with no problems.Notes were taken on what maintenance and repair needs staff will
work on over the winter months.
• Mapping department continues to enter GPS points and attribute points for all of our
systems assets within the ESRI ArcView GIS system. In December, Mapping staff will
be evaluating new GPS equipment that should save enough time over using current
equipment to pay for itself. The locators have started receiving training on how to GPS
points. They have also been receiving instruction on identifying specific equipment in the
field.
• The Engineer has been focused on setting up the MV-90 software. We should have it
completely functional by the end of December. This will replace the outdated legacy
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software/hardware that is no longer supported by Itron. This will also streamline
processes used for checking the accuracy of the power bill.
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