The EPA mandated completion and final submission date for the Risk and Resilience Assessment (RRA) for public water systems serving between 3,300 and 49,999 persons is June 30, 2021.  There is no funding allocated in the current FY 19-20 or upcoming FY 20-21 budget for the completion of this hazard assessment; however, we have funds available from other line items in the current FY 19-20 budget to cover the cost of this project.  We will transfer available funds from other line items into the technical services line item budget account as part of a future budget amendment.

The RRA involves an assessment of all hazards present within our service area which would impact our wells, distribution, reservoirs, employees, contractors, and consumers; including hazardous chemicals, transportation, natural disasters, pandemics, economic workforce impacts, cybersecurity threats, financial stability and funding during and after a crisis, power generation, emergency response, etc..  As such, the scope of this work and the broad cross section of industries and agencies that this RRA needs to account for, is beyond the training and expertise of our staff.

It is estimated by the engineering firm who has expertise and professional level tools and software related to this task to have 1,058 hours utilized in completing this project.

Burns & McDonnell performed our original RRA in 2004 under the original mandates from EPA, which at that time was mainly focused on terrorism vulnerabilities and physical security of water assets.  It is anticipated that this RRA would provide similar lifespan of regulatory compliance of 15-17 years, with COG staff able to update the Emergency Response Plan (ERP) internally on an annual basis following the completion of the updated document.

While the scope of this new mandate is greatly expanded, Burns & McDonnell:

• Has the original RRA documents, knowledge, and understanding of our system.
• Was the design engineer for the Gillette Madison Pipeline Project and has ready access to the engineering information on the recent enlargement of our water system assets and service area.
• Has provided promised quality of work on numerous projects with the City of Gillette on previous contracts and designs which it was awarded through competitive bidding.
• Has the availability to do this work for the City of Gillette as they recently completed the RRA process for larger systems (>100,000 served) that were required to submit their RRA sooner than smaller systems.

City Staff recommends we execute the attached agreement with Burns & McDonnell Engineering Co. in the amount of $219,667.00 to complete the RRA and update the ERP as mandated by EPA.