Changing how Birmingham Water Works is governed is necessary to avoid becoming “another Jackson,” according to State Sen. Dan Roberts (R-Mountain Brook).
Senate Bill 330 by Roberts would reduce the number of board members from nine to five. The Birmingham mayor, lieutenant governor, Jefferson County Commission president, Blount County Commission, and Shelby County Commission would each get one appointment to the board under the legislation.
Currently, the nine-member board consists of two appointments from the Birmingham Mayor, four appointments by the Birmingham City Council, one appointment by the Jefferson County Mayors Association, one appointment by the Shelby County Commission, and one appointment by the Blount County Commission.
The bill, co-sponsored by State Sens. Jabo Waggoner (R-Vestavia Hills) and Shay Shelnutt (R-Trussville), is set for a public hearing in the Senate County and Municipal Government Committee on Tuesday.
“The city has done a less-than-good job of appointing directors. There have been three directors convicted in state and federal courts of crimes related to their service on the board of directors for the water board,” Roberts told 1819 News in a recent interview.
Roberts referenced the Jackson, Miss., water crisis in 2022 when discussing the legislation.
“The water loss for Birmingham is one of the highest in the nation other than Louisville, Kentucky which is also facing challenges,” Roberts said. “We don’t want to become another Jackson.”
He continued, “The rates that the water board charges are among the highest in the Southeast and are an impediment to economic development in Birmingham, Hoover, and the entire area.”
“It’s just malfeasance in so many ways and for many years the water board has gathered information on customer water usage by sending out individuals to read meters resulting in high labor and vehicular costs and likely high error rates. For more than fifteen years, remote electronic meter reading technology has been available to reduce both costs and error rates. A delay in installing these modern billing techniques that other compatible systems have used and have adopted have seen a dramatic increase in that technology since they could’ve done it 15 years ago,” Roberts added.
“They’ve used monies for so many other things. They hire lobbyists every year and they hire marketing groups and they’ve been deemed to be a monopoly. Attorney General Pryor called them a monopoly in one of the latest lawsuits to come through years ago and yet they’re spending $50,000 to $80,000 a month on marketing to combat deserved bad publicity and hold off badly-needed governance. The water board has encouraged significant excess costs by hiring a multiplicity of lawyers, lobbyists, public relations, and other consultants. Either currently or in the recent past it has employed at the same time three or more law firms, two public relations firms, and two or more lobbying firms. This is what a failing organization does," he concluded.
Roberts was also critical of the board’s recent general manager hiring of Mac Underwood.
“We met with them in early fall. We met with their people again right before coming into session and their guarantee to us was we’re doing an ‘exhaustive nationwide search’ for the new general manager and then they hired someone who had been there before and let go. Yet, we were guaranteed an exhaustive nationwide search and that news breaks and then everybody is trying to explain some of the factions on the board. We can do better and that’s the goal. That’s why this legislation is trying to bring in five persons who can do an outstanding job. The requirements are for a finance background or engineering background. We want the board to be a board to support the general manager and help get this critical infrastructure back on track,” Roberts said.
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