Every time there is a waterline break in Odessa, Mayor Javier Joven blames past administrations for neglecting the city’s infrastructure needs, but we’re starting to wonder if the current administration doesn’t bear at least some responsibility.
According to records obtained under the Texas Public Information Act, the current city council has budgeted millions of dollars to repair or replace some of the city’s 500 miles of water lines and valves. Yet, only a small percentage of it has actually been spent during the last four years.
What do we mean? Well, in 2021, $2.7 million was budgeted and $1.7 million was spent. It got worse in 2022; $3.7 million was budgeted and roughly $1.78 million was spent. Last year, $4 million was budgeted and $1.75 million was spent.
The city sat on millions of dollars during those years and water lines were breaking left and right. In fact, 263 water lines broke from 2021-2023 for an average of 88 per year.
So what about this year?
From Jan. 1 through June 30, 92 water lines broke in the City of Odessa.
That’s right. Half way through the year and we’ve already surpassed the average for the past three years.
Remember the nightmare of Mother’s Day weekend? No water for many residents for the holiday and an economic loss for local businesses.
Texas economist Ray Perryman, following that weekend, estimated the overall loss was about $4.1 million. “The direct losses were concentrated in retail outlets and restaurants, although some spilled over to other sectors and households,” Perryman said via email.
During the last year we lost 4.1 million gallons of water due to water line breaks, and so far this year we’ve lost 6.1 million gallons.
We paid water crews $194,000 in overtime in 2023 and nearly $175,000 so far this year.
Contractor Edgardo Madrid and Associations received just over $572,000 last year to work on water lines and valves, and they’ve received roughly $754,000 already this year.
The situation is bad. Really bad.
But let’s be real.
There is plenty of blame to go around.
The simple fact is our water lines are ancient by industry standards. The average life expectancy of water lines is 50 to 70 years, and many of ours are even older than that.
They’re going to break.
The fact is, however, water lines aren’t nearly as sexy as firefighters and police officers.
And we agree that some past city council members likely passed the buck on expensive overhauls for fear of losing votes.
But is it possible this city council had the same thought?
Just look at how hard Denise Swanner, Mark Matta and Javier Joven pushed to use ARPA money for Odessa Fire Rescue and Odessa Police Department raises, ringing alarm bells about the number of first responders leaving for higher pay.
Sidebar: Don’t get us wrong! We love and support first responders and believe they should all make more than they do even with the recent raises.
But, records obtained by the Odessa American show those raises haven’t had much of an impact on stopping the bleed. As of May, OFR had 42 open positions and OPD had 63.
Joven & Co. were well aware when they pushed for those raises they’d gain a lot of grateful employees and more than likely, voters. The fact that the ARPA money devoted to the raises will dry up next year is a subject for another day.
Let’s get back to the unspent water line and valve money.
We asked City Manager John Beckmeyer to explain how so much money could be allowed to languish when, at any minute, every Odessan could lose their water for days on end, as in June 2022 and this past May.
As you can probably guess, Beckmeyer said he couldn’t say. He only started last August.
“You and I are both speculating and I appreciate it. It’s a good conversation to have. I’m not at all saying it’s not, but I’m focusing on the future,” Beckmeyer recently told an OA reporter.
“I can’t give you the rationale,” he said. “I can just give you we’re doing a better job of being more attentive to what we have and we’re trying to use it smartly.”
Toward that end, Beckmeyer said he and staff did a mid-year review of the city’s finances and found $16 million. He found $12 million in an account that had been set aside for road repairs (the state of our awful roads is a subject for another day) that hadn’t been spent and he found $4 million spread throughout various departments.
Was some of the found money the same money the OA found?
“Well, it wasn’t rolled over into an account that was for water repair and replacement and I know it wasn’t because if it would have been, I would have used it right then,” Beckmeyer said.
Not to give Beckmeyer too much credit (it’s a little early for that), but doesn’t it sound like the city was in disarray before he came aboard? It sounds like nobody was keeping track of the city’s money and nobody was keeping track of projects, either. (More on this later.)
We asked Beckmeyer if it’s the responsibility of city council members to stay on top of city staff’s activities, large projects and their financial details.
He said they’re only going to know what city staff tells them.
Makes sense, right? Hmm. Seems like days without water would be enough to clue them in.
So let’s talk about Crane Avenue.
Beckmeyer said he plans to spend $5 million of the found road money on the $12 million Crane Avenue project. On May 14, the council approved a project that will replace 5,500 linear feet of water lines and 1.2 miles of pavement.
We just want to point out that the Crane Avenue project first showed up on our radar two years ago. The city council approved the project in June 2022 (clearly during the current council’s time).
It cropped up again in March 2023 when then Utilities and Public Works Director Tom Kerr and Joven got into an argument during a city council meeting. Kerr wanted to bid the water and road project at the same time. Joven thought that would be too expensive.
Oh, this was the same meeting that Kerr got so frustrated with Joven and City Councilman Chris Hanie he quit in the middle of it. He rescinded his resignation and he lost his utilities director hat three months later. He ended up “retiring” in September 2023 and taking a job with the City of Midland.
All that experience is now in Midland. What a shame.
So what’s the point of all of this?
Joven & Co. have been going on and on and on about past administrators neglecting infrastructure, dragging their feet, blah, blah, blah when they should be taking a look at all of this themselves.
Why has it taken two years or more for the Crane project to finally get to this point? Why is it being paid for with “found” money rather than the money that was budgeted for it?
Why wouldn’t this council listen to Tom Kerr?
Are there other projects that should have been completed by now and paid for with the budgeted, but unspent, money over the last few years?
We’ve got to wonder if things would have gotten to this point if we hadn’t had an unqualified interim city manager in place and if they hadn’t chased off Kerr. Not only that, but they chased off virtually their entire finance and legal departments. The finance people keep track of where the money is in the budgetary pipeline and the lawyers approve the contracts for the design and construction of water projects.
We think with the election approaching, it bears repeating yet again.
They fired City Manager Michael Marrero and City Attorney Natasha Brooks in December 2022, which led to assistant city manager/finance guru Cindy Muncy leaving and Assistant City Manager Aaron Smith turning into a whistleblower and getting himself fired.
Other key finance folks left after Muncy did and Brooks’ departure led to the majority of her staff leaving, too.
Seriously, even if other councils dropped the water ball, think about this council’s decisions over the past few years and think about those times you had to boil your water before casting your vote in November’s city election.
By the way, $7 million was budgeted for water lines and valves this year and only $1.2 million has been spent thus far.
Beckmeyer assures us the rest will be spent.
We’ll be watching.
