DANA POINT : Water Panel Extends Management Pact

The water district for the Capistrano Beach area, struggling to find a general manager in the wake of criticism of its safety and maintenance programs, has decided to extend its contract on an interim basis with the Meadows Consulting Group.

The Capistrano Beach County Water District, which has been rebuffed twice in its efforts to find a permanent manager, recently opted to keep the Meadows Consulting Group as an independent contractor through Dec. 31, said Director Bonnie Streeter.

The pay will remain the same as during the first three-month contract--about $5,000 a month, Streeter said.

Bill Meadows, a San Juan Capistrano native and principal of the firm, is doing the majority of the work, Streeter said.

“We’ve got a bargain,” Streeter said. “This man has 20 years in the water industry. He has experience dealing with (the Local Agency Formation Commission), the grand jury and the district attorney. We are very lucky to have him.”

Streeter said the district, which serves about 8,000 customers in Capistrano Beach, Dana Point Harbor and north San Clemente, continues to search for a permanent manager with Meadows’ help. The district distributed a letter seeking applications to many districts statewide and ran an ad in a water trade publication. “The response has been very good,” Streeter said.

The contract with Meadows Consulting Group has been written so it could be terminated in 30 days, should the directors find a manager before Dec. 31, said Director Ross D. Carpenter.

Controversy within the district, including a grand jury investigation and a rift between board members, has hampered the district’s recent hiring efforts. Since March, the district has offered the job to two applicants who each, at the last minute, decided to reject the offer. One of the candidates said the district had become too political.

But directors say many of their problems are behind them. The grand jury issued a report criticizing the district for its lack of emergency, safety, maintenance and strategic planning programs, which are issues the directors have been working on, Carpenter said.

“We are under the gun to get these things taken care of,” said Carpenter, who like three other directors is relatively new to the board. The grand jury gave the directors a Sept. 30 deadline to create new plans and programs, he said.

“We have plans for taking care of all the problems,” he said.