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Recap of CA Cleanup Fund Task Force Meeting, 11-2-2009

It’s that time again… Task Force Meeting… we were given a little more good news today from the BOE (see below)…every little bit helps

AB1188 – Still waiting for Governor to sign Bill. Still need to wait patiently a little longer, but be thinking of questions that come to mind on the “what does it mean” when it passes. The Task Force will be a forum for the Fund to work through the details of some administration aspects to this Bill.

Status of Payments – As of 11/2/09 – All $46M from July 2009 Revenues has been processed and sent to SOC. This quarter’s revenues were due to the BOE October 25. According to BOE, the revenue collected should be deposited into the Fund’s Account within the next two weeks. Fund Staff projects to pay out additional $46M for Claims this 2nd quarter. It was disappointing to find out that the Payments Section has not started to process Priority C RR’s to date. Target date given for processing of C claims in-house is end of November.

BOE News - Lou Foletto from the BOE met with the Task Force today to explain the BOE collection process for Fund Revenues. The most interesting new fact we were told today is that starting in January 2010 the BOE will be collecting fees monthly for the 75-80 top fee payers (those with avg. throughput of 1 million gallons or more per mo). This will provide the Fund with a revenue stream of between $10 – 14M revenue per month (with the balance to follow Quarterly as usual). This change in fee collection is in direct response by the BOE from meetings held with Allan Patton and Fund Management in the past few months.

Update on Suspended Claims – stay tuned…

Ron Duff to retire – announced today that Fund Manager Ron Duff will be retiring at the end of November. No news of his replacement were provided to the Task Force. 7 members of the Cleanup Fund have retired this year.

We discussed in detail Fund processes/procedure improvements at today’s meeting and discussions will be continued next time. Please let me know if you have any specific recommendations for the CUF, especially as it relates to: Claim/RR evaluation (technical); Cost Controls; Pre-Approval; Cost Guidelines; 5 Year Review. Pre-approval of large scopes of work is being highly encouraged to ensure costs spent on a project will be reimbursable.

The next Task Force meeting is November 16th in Sacramento. DFA is presenting to the Board on November 17th to address the status of short term recommendations and the Resolution. A draft is expected to be available for Public comment no later than November 7th. It is highly recommended that you show up to be heard at this important Board meeting. The DWQ Task Force is also meeting on November 17th at the CalEPA Bldg and is expected to provide a status to the SWRCB at the Board meeting.