Five in race for three seats on TUD board
Voters will have the chance to help reshape the future of Tuolumne Utilities District in the Nov. 3 general election with five candidates vying for three open seats on the water and sewer agency’s board of directors, a controversial grand jury report to consider, and potentially historic decisions looming.
Incumbent TUD directors Barbara Balen and Ron Kopf are seeking reelection, and current Board President Bob Rucker is not, so the TUD board of directors will look different than it does today when the three winners are sworn in this January.
The challengers in the race are Columbia College adjunct professor Lisa Murphy, retired engineer-consultant and former TUD board member Jim Grinnell, and recently-retired TUD wastewater superintendent David Boatright.
The district has 12,911 residential ratepayers, 1,181 business or commercial ratepayers, 196 institutional ratepayers, and 652 raw-water/ditch ratepayers, for a total of 14,940 customers, according to numbers provided by TUD communications staff on Wednesday.
The district’s budget for the current fiscal year includes a total of $18.1 million in expenses.
All of the more than 30,000 registered voters in Tuolumne County will be voting for three of the five TUD board candidates on the ballot, who spoke to The Union Democrat in phone interviews this week.
Barbara Balen
Balen, a retired resource manager for the Stanislaus National Forest, has served on the TUD board for three four-year terms – from 2003 to 2012, when she took a break, and from 2016 to present.
“I’m dedicated to my community, and I’m dedicated to keeping water local and in the county,” she said Tuesday. “The goal as a director is to balance providing affordable, reliable water and sewer, within the increasing regulatory and cost-of-doing-business environment, in a county with a population that’s stable or declining.”
Balen said the district can improve in the areas of transparency and accountability. She cited how she helped bring in the current Granicus system more than 10 years ago.
Board meetings were recorded on tape and the board clerk had to turn the tape over and transcribe everything prior to the Granicus system, but video is now streamed live and archived on the district’s website.
The district also got a new accounting system last year that Balen said has provided better technical support for the finance director.
Balen believes the Tuolumne County Civil Grand Jury report that examined TUD’S finances and potential conflicts of interest involving Kopf, released in July, is relevant for every board member.
“I think all TUD board members can improve, there’s always room for improvement,” she said. “People get a little lax at times. The grand jury is there to help us achieve our transparency. It doesn’t have to be a negative thing, it’s a positive thing.”
Balen also said she believes the county is at a crossroads of water, fire, land use, and health and safety. It’s going to take all elected leaders and sover
eign tribes to make sure the community remains in the green, doesn’t burn, and has an adequate water supply, she said.
David Boatright
Boatright retired from TUD on Aug. 12 after 32 years and by 5 p.m. that day, he had turned in paperwork to run for a seat on the district’s board.
He started working for TUD in 1988 as a utility one worker in reclamations and earned certifications in wastewater treatment. His last 12 years with the district were spent as wastewater superintendent, overseeing a crew of up to 10 workers.
“It may have started as a political splash, a last minute introduction to the ballot,” Boatright said. “Like ‘OK, I’m done as a worker and I’m going to run for the board and work for the betterment of TUD.’ My decision to retire was in part seeing an unfavorable contract. I could have gone forward another two years. My intention, seeking and taking a seat on the board, is to ensure the betterment of TUD.”
As a former TUD employee, Boatright said, he will side with current TUD employees. Being in charge of a water and wastewater district, from a maintenance-labor worker position, he said it’s important for the people who control the system to have good education.
“The only way to have that is to maintain open and fair negotiations,” he said.
Boatright said the district can potentially do better at managing the public’s money by managing current project costs through grouping some projects, making orders larger in quantity as opposed to piecemeal, and ensuring operation and maintenance costs are actually covered by revenue from ratepayers.
“I don’t believe our operation and maintenance costs were actually covered on rates,” Boatright said. “It was reliant in part on connection fees and future growth.”
Jim Grinnell
Grinnell has been on the TUD board two times in the past. He was first elected to a four-year term in November 2012, but served only five months before voluntarily stepping down due to an injury.
He got elected again in November 2014 and served out the full term, but lost his seat to current TUD Director Jeff Kerns when he ran for reelection in November 2018.
Grinnell said he has the best education to qualify him for the TUD board, including a bachelor’s of science degree in engineering, a master’s degree in industrial administration, and a master’s degree in health care administration.
In addition, Grinnell believes his role for the past two years as chairman of the advisory council for the Area 12 Agency on Aging makes him a good candidate.
“That gives me a perspective of the needs for seniors in Tuolumne County,” he said. “About 40 percent of our population is seniors, and we have a huge need to be cognizant of TUD ratepayers’ ability to make their payments. Many seniors are struggling.”
Grinnell said he believes TUD needs more efficiency in its operations, in addition to a more aggressive pursuit of grant funding to help upgrade and replace miles of infrastructure. He also advocates for the district to get into the business of selling bottled water.
The district is currently seeking a contract for 6,500 acre-feet of water annually from New Melones Reservoir that it was originally granted when the reservoir was built, which Grinnell believes the district should bottle and sell.
“If we get that, we can sell it and make $6.5 million a year at wholesale,” he said. “We could be selling bottled water and make even more. We need to think of ourselves as more than a water and sewer agency. We should be thinking of getting into the retail sale of bottled water.”
Ron Kopf
Kopf has been a member of the TUD board the past six years while simultaneously being employed as the executive director of the Tuolumne County Business Council, a private nonprofit organization. He’s also currently the government affairs director for the Tuolumne County Association of Realtors.
A grand jury report released in July found Kopf’s role with the council created a conflict of interest, an assertion denied by both Kopf and TUD General Manager Ed Pattison.
“I think people should read that grand jury report and read TUD’S detailed response to the grand jury report,” Kopf said Tuesday. “TUD felt a lot of the information given to the grand jury did not make it into the grand jury report. People can read that and they come to their own conclusion. The grand jury findings I don’t think were appropriate.”
Kopf said the district has some huge issues coming up, including attempts to secure water rights at New Melones Reservoir and the acquisition of PG&E assets and water rights in the South Fork Stanislaus watershed.
In a recent letter to the editor, Kopf characterized his land planning and business background as a benefit for TUD ratepayers and not a conflict.
“My land planning background will help as we consolidate and update our water treatment plants,” Kopf said. “TUD is in the business of providing water, and the county is in the business of entitling and permitting projects and future economic development, and where growth goes. My land planning background helps me understand where the county is going with the general plan, zoning and ordinances, to help guide TUD in those endeavors.”
Kopf said he believes the grand jury report’s focus on him stemmed from the fact 2020 is a political year and issues were taken to the jury by a disgruntled board member, Ron Ringen, who was seeking political payback.
Ringen denied taking anything to the jury and said he had no knowledge of what the report was going to say until it was released when asked for a response on Wednesday.
Lisa Murphy
Murphy teaches forestry and natural resources at Columbia College and is a former ranger in Yosemite National Park.
“I think it’s important to come into this with a thorough understanding of the complexity of water issues in California,” Murphy said Tuesday. “The decisions we’re going to be making the next four years, like acquiring water rights and infrastructure from PG&E, on the surface that may seem like a no-brainer. But in reality it is very, very complex when we think how we’re going to do this without saddling the ratepayers with new costs of maintaining all this newlyacquired, aging infrastructure.”
Murphy said her work as a park ranger and naturalist has helped her understand a variety of water systems in the Golden State, and she understands how TUD’S water systems fit into the bigger picture – the South Fork Stanislaus River watershed.
The grand jury report speaks to the issue of transparency, Murphy said.
“It’s important that the board of TUD does not have financial interests that create a situation where individuals on the board of directors need to recuse themselves from voting on issues because of their financial involvement,” she said.
Voters for three elected members of the TUD board should select candidates they feel can look out for the best interests of the ratepayers, taxpayers, and the community as a whole and are not motivated by special interests, Murphy said.