Albany City Council held a lengthy first meeting of 2025 last Tuesday, January 7, with all council members on hand for the one hour and 10 minute session. An array of topics were discussed, the audit report was reviewed and department head reports were given.
The meeting was also the first for the newest member of the council, James “Eric” Smith.
Following approval of the previous meeting minutes, there was a brief discussion on bids for the new generators for the water treatment plant.
Commonwealth Engineer Toby Church told the council the sole bid received had come in over the budget the city had to expend, but the engineers and city were negotiating with the company and should know something further by the middle of this month.
The cost to purchase and install the equipment would be around $950,000 and it was noted the city has $670,000 on hand and has applied for grant money toward the generators.
Under “new business,” Albany Mayor James Bray said that 2024 had been a “planning year,” with the city seeking funding for new master meters and residential meters to generate revenue on metered loss of water, as well as the new generators.
The city is also in the early stages of applying for grant funding to begin what will hopefully be the construction of a much needed new water treatment plant.
Councilman Junior Gregory then said that while campaigning people had questioned where city funds had gone over the past year and questioned whether or not the city should have a forensic audit conducted.
Councilman Reed Sloan also said he agreed with having such an audit.
During the audit report by the city’s auditor, Sammy Lee, he noted that if such an audit would be needed, it would primarily pertain to the water and sewer, which generates most funds for the city.
He also noted a forensic audit may cost up to around $30,000 to complete and that auditors may find the same results during the city’s annual audit of city funds.
Council members Rene York and Randy Speck also opposed action on such an audit at this time, noting legal advice was needed and City Attorney Jeff Hoover was not present at last week’s meeting.
Auditor Lee, of Lexington, then reviewed the most recent year’s city audit with the mayor and council, which took up much of the session, as he went over the financial status of city operations in the general fund and water and sewer departments.
The auditor started out by saying the city had received a “clean opinion,” prior to going over the city’s assets, liabilities and equity amounts.
Lee said the city is starting to be “liquid and solid,” compared to prior years, and predicted the city would be in a better financial position this time next year, and that they should have back taxes paid off within the next six months.
Following the audit report and review, Albany Fire Chief Robert Roeper gave AFD monthly report and discussed other issues with the council.
Roeper, in noting the much higher cost of equipment over the years–which has almost doubled– told the council the fire department has applied for a $358,000 grant for new safety equipment. The grant is an 80/20 matching fund grant, if approved.
The city has been in the process of using a Fire Recovery program to help recover costs of fire runs made by the department.
The fire chief, in relation to the fire recovery program, said he had talked with officials from Burkesville, Monticello and Somerset about how they do their insurance related billing in determining how they would need to bill and what type runs they could bill for.
Roeper said he felt the city and fire department could do their own billing “in-house” and noted there are federal guidelines that tell how much can be billed and what can be billed for.
Chief Roper recommended the city form an insurance billing committee to put together a program to do the billing, saying he already had a couple of people, Bozie York and Todd Pillar, who had volunteered to serve and asked for council member’s input.
Councilmen Gregory and Smith volunteered to be on such a committee, with the mayor also serving in an advisory capacity.
Finally, the fire chief noted that the department currently has 22 active members, but needs more good, new, dedicated people to serve on the fire department.
Water distribution/treatment plant and sewer department reports were also given.
During those reports, it was noted that 38 water leaks were discovered and repaired over the past month and eight new water meters were installed.
Water treatment totals from Plants A and B were also given for the month and for the past calendar year of 2024, some 1.6 billion gallons of water–practically full capacity–were treated through the water treatment facility.
Discussion then turned to water meters, as Mayor Bray noted 33 new master meters would be installed sometime this year.
Currently, there are only a dozen such meters in the county, of which only three work properly.
According to estimates given during the meeting, at one point, almost 70 percent of water that ran through the system was lost, which is now down to around the 40-plus percent range.
It was also noted the average loss should be less than 20 percent.
Part of the problem, other than major leaks not being detected sooner, is water running through older meters that do not actually detect the flow of water going through the lines, a problem that will hopefully be remedied with new up-to-date meters.
Church then gave a brief engineer progress report, noting it had been a slow period through the holidays and currently the city is awaiting word on various funding sources and grant applications.
He also noted three new tap plate filters, at a cost of $65,000 each, were needed at the sewer plant and a grant application has been filed for those filters.
Church added if the grant did not go through, the city may have to do something on its own to get them replaced.
Following the engineer’s report, the meeting was adjourned.
The next regular meeting of Albany City Council is scheduled for Tuesday, February 4, at 5 p.m.