City hires meter reader company

With so many customers on the Holly Springs Utility Department not getting timely billing for electric, gas and water services, general manager Wayne Jones provided two quotes to hire a contractor to read the meters that the GE automated meter reading system is missing.

Ward 3 alderman Colter Teel insisted on hearing from Jones as Mayor Sharon Gipson called for a motion to close the July 16 meeting of the mayor and board of aldermen.

Teel said he was not for a motion to close.

“Not me, not me,” said Teel. “Pertaining to the utility department, you need to hear that, Mayor.” “Not at this time,” Gipson said.

From the audience the HSUD general manager said he had two quotes but didn’t get one until 5:30 p.m. When the meeting began and, therefore, did not have the quotes on the agenda.

Someone said it was not clear what the quotes were for.

“That’s why I’m still sitting here waiting,” said Jones. “I got two quotes to get so that we can have the people come in and do the billing.”

He said he didn’t get the second quote in from David Jolly until the meeting started.

He said he needs to hire someone to manually read the meters so bills can get out on time.

He asked the board to choose a company to read the meters that the General Electric AMI system misses.

Jones stepped up to the table with his brief case and rifled through papers to find two quotes.

“I wouldn’t have waited (for executive session to end), but if, if I don’t get this authorized tonight, it is going to be another two weeks, right?”

Jones was referring to the next regularly scheduled board meeting.

“We didn’t have the opportunity to get this started,” he said. “We gotta get this started. That’s why I’m waiting.”

As Jones produced two quotes, Teel and Ward 1 alderman Bernita Fountain stepped up to pass around copies of the quotes to the board members.

“I got it here,” Jones said. “I got two papers. There’s two quotes here.” He showed one quote for $3 a meter. The company wanted to begin work as early as July 24.

Gipson asked for the total amounts as opposed to price per meter.

He said there are going to be from 2,000 to 3,000 meters that need to be read manually each month.

“It’s gonna be $6,000 or $9,000,” he said. “They asked if they could do it for 90 days to see if I could work it out.”

Gipson went to Jones seated at the table and handed him a sheet of paper for Jones to write down the expense for the record.

“You say this is the one you recommend?” asked board attorney John Keith Perry Jr.

“Yes,” Jones said. “The other one was going to be $5 a meter, but $55 an hour if they installed a new meter to replace the ones that need to be replaced.”

“To read 2,000 to 3,000 a month. Correct?” asked Teel. “So that would be between $6,000 and $9,000 monthly, correct?”

“Yeah, for the next 90 days,” Jones said.

Fountain asked if Jones wanted a motion to contract with David Jolly.

“Yeah,” Jones said. “I motion to authorize Wayne Jones, general manager of the utility department, to (contract to) read gas, and water meters at $3 a meter,” Fountain said. “Is this gas and water?”

“It’s gas and water,” Jones said.

Gipson said she approves of getting someone to read the meters.

“But I wasn’t aware what it was going to cost tonight,” the mayor said. “Part of what alderman Jones is asking is the number of customers we have and the number of meters. He’s asking how are you coming with saying that there are going to be $3. But if there’s separate meters for gas, water and electric, part of the question is how are you coming up with the total amount that it’s going to be. Is that $3 per household or $3 for each meter.”

“It is $3 for each meter. That is the quote,” Jones said. “One meter, two meters or three meters. We have 12,000 electric meters, about 4,200 water meters and 3,200 gas meters. That’s almost 19,000 meters.

“We’re operating at 70 percent. That is 2,000 to 3,000 meters that we are not reading every time we go to read the meters. So, therefore, we have 2,000 to 3,000 meters that have to be read by someone. The other meters are being read automatically.”

He said that comes to about 7,000 meters, give or take, that have to be read manually.

“When we operate at 70 percent, that’s 2,000 to 3,000 meters we are not getting read that we have to read,” Jones said.

Gipson said the figure is actually about 4,000 meters that the HSUD was not reading at the last meeting because of the issues with it’s GE AMI program, as well as issues within the HSUD.

“So, we really don’t know,” Gipson said. “So, his request is to have somebody come and assist for whatever number because some days you don’t know. Some days it’s reading and some days it’s not.”

Jones said some days the GE system kicks in and gives more readings and on some days it will give less.

“This is the average,” he said.

Perry asked which contractor he wanted to go with.

“Jolly,” Jones said. Fountain began word crafting a motion. “I move to allow Mr. Wayne Jones to enter into an agreement with Jolly for meter reading for the City of Holly Springs at $3 per meter,” Fountain said. “Second,” said Teel. “David Jolly. It’s a family,” said Jones. Fountain’s motion passed by unanimous vote of the board.