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Anne Arundel County Department of Public Works

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
In 1996, the Anne Arundel County Department of Public Works undertook a competitiveness assessment that determined a need for change in order to compete with the best of private utilities. In an effort to avoid privatization, a program was put into place to change work practices and move to a team-based culture called EXCEL for Excellence in Cost Effective Leadership. EXCEL is led by a steering team of labor and management representatives whose goal is to achieve environmentally sound water and wastewater service with rate stability. A pilot project showed that a team-based culture could improve productivity and work practices, allowing effective operation with a reduced staff. Since1999, staff reduction through attrition and energy savings have saved the Bureau $3.1 million, reducing the competitive gap from 19 percent to 10 percent. The supervisory ratio increased from 1:9 to 1:13 through a Bureau-wide reorganization and attrition. Currently, employees are undergoing an extensive training program to develop multiple skills in the fields of mechanical, electrical, instrumentation and operations as part of a flexible workforce program that increases efficiency and productivity.

Chicago Department of Water

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
The Chicago Department of Water (CDOW) owns and operates the world's two largest purification plants, 12 pumping stations, 4,323 miles of mains, 47 miles of finished water tunnels and over 47,000 hydrants. CDOW purifies and distributes more than one billion gallons of water daily to over 5 million people. CDOW has earned an AA+ bond rating while maintaining the third lowest water rates in the nation. The department shortened its water main replacement cycle by 16 years and implemented a SCADA system for six of its pumping stations, reducing costs by $30 million. In addition, electricity costs are being lowered through a cooperative bulk purchase; a new billing and collection system was implemented to improve collections management; response time to water quality inquiries was reduced by almost 70 percent; over 23,000 engineering drawings were computer-archived; and the department received the GFOA Financial Accounting Award. CDOW is embarking on a department-wide review starting with a thorough analysis of water treatment, billing and collection, and procurement processes. The department will compare these with other utilities to maximize operational efficiencies without negative impact to employee morale. With a five-year, $620 million infrastructure investment, including 50 miles of annual main replacement, CDOW will continue to be competitive and maintain the high level of service its customers expect.

City of Atlanta Department of Water

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
From the early 1990s, the City of Atlanta Department of Water has made significant efforts to improve operating efficiency and reduce costs, while providing excellent service to customers. Staff positions were reduced from 863 in 1993 to 480 at the end of 1998. A one-stop call center, initiated in 1997, has vastly improved customer service. Aging steam powered pump stations are being replaced with new electric powered facilities, and a new $42 million, 200 MGD pump station for the downtown area will be on line by the end of 2001. Energy incentives with the electrical utility and new operating patterns have saved over $1 million annually in energy costs. Back-up electric power generation projects, totaling $22 million, will be completed by the end of 2001 for the two major treatment plants and all the most critical pump stations, ensuring operational reliability. Atlanta is also promoting water conservation education by providing a summer xeriscape program to customers. In 1999, Atlanta entered a 20-year contract with a private firm, United Water Services Atlanta, to manage water system O&M. The agreement will save the city $20 million annually and $400 million over the term of the contract. The Atlanta Water Department continues to maintain a small staff to oversee and manage the firm's performance and to manage the capital improvements program, an aggressive five-year plan with more than $502 million in facility and distribution improvements.

City of Austin Water and Wastewater Utility

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
The population in counties served by the City of Austin Water and Wastewater Utility increased more than 40 percent in the last decade, with a corresponding 36 percent explosion in average water demand. The challenge has been to meet both this increased need and higher customer expectations through a strategy of continuous process improvement and a customer satisfaction philosophy. Using benchmarking, competitiveness assessments and employee involvement, the Utility systematically created and implemented systems, processes and programs to increase efficiency, effectiveness and competitiveness. Major accomplishments include: accommodating the increased demand for products and services with fewer employees; increasing the capacity for water production and delivery; stabilizing water service rates over the planning horizon; upgrading the Utility's bond rating to an A+; winning the Greater Austin Quality Council's Significant Merit in Quality award for two years; and, becoming a model for other utilities for the treatment plant operator and mechanic cross-training program, which resulted in a 20 percent reduction in operators. Not only has customer satisfaction with water quality increased by 22 percent, but internal customer (utility employee) satisfaction also increased by 11 percent, with labor and management successfully partnering to resolve mutual issues.

Des Moines Water Works

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
For more than 100 years, the independently operated Des Moines Water Works (DMWW) has been committed to supplying a safe and sufficient supply of drinking water to the residents of central Iowa. The largest drinking water utility in the state, DMWW currently services approximately 350,000 people. Through the years, changes have been implemented to improve water quality, increase water production, enhance and beautify the properties' landscape and provide educational opportunities for all ages. Some of the DMWW programs and projects include: a 1,400-acre park system used for watershed protection, picnics, walking, jogging, bike trails, flower beds and fishing; the Arie den Boer Arboretum; 200-acre Maffitt Reservoir, educational initiatives including a Water Wisdom newsletter for teachers; a DMWW Museum; an Urban Environmental Partnership to educate the public on the importance of water quality protection; a Volunteer Monitoring Project in the Raccoon River watershed; development of the Lime Sludge De-watering Facility; and Project H2O (Help-2-Others), a program to assist low-income households with the payment of water bills.

Greater Cincinnati Water Works

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
The Greater Cincinnati Water Works (GCWW) is a 162-year-old municipally owned utility serving over 950,000 people in a 400-square-mile area. In 2000, the utility supplied an average day demand of 133 million gallons of water through both surface water and groundwater treatment plants using 2,800 miles of transmission and distribution mains. In addition, as the billing agent for the primary sewer and stormwater utilities in Hamilton County, GCWW operates a multi-utility billing operation of approximately 225,000 accounts. In 1995, a five-year Strategic Business Plan (SBP) was implemented to lead GCWW closer to its vision of being a utility that will serve as a standard for excellence in the water utility industry and will remain extremely competitive. Various strategies in the SBP were designed to allow GCWW to assist the southwest Ohio region grow economically by providing a reliable supply of high-quality water and outstanding services in a financially responsible manner. Results of the most successful strategies include: surveys demonstrating that GCWW customers are extremely pleased with the service received; a review of chemical treatment processes that saved $100,000 annually; utilization of real-time electric pricing that saved over $290,000; reduction of 70 employee positions; and participation in an award-winning groundwater protection program.

City of Tempe Water Utility Department

2002 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
Starting in 1997, the City of Tempe, Arizona’s water utility embarked on a major ongoing effort to improve its levels of efficiency and competitiveness. Five years later, the City of Tempe Water Utility Department can look back with satisfaction at several significant achievements. First and foremost, the utility has maintained high levels of service delivery, while containing costs. The utility achieved and maintained the Phoenix metropolitan area’s lowest water/wastewater rates for the last three years. In the same period, staffing was reduced over nine percent by attrition, and overall savings were in excess of one million dollars per year for the past four years. A focus on employee training, education and participation has been the key, and the payoff has been significant. The operating savings, combined with a financially healthy retained earnings balance, allowed the utility to embark on a needed six-year, $190-million capital construction program without significant utility rate increases.

Anchorage Water and Wastewater Utility

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
Since a devastating depression in Alaska served as a wake up call in 1987, Anchorage Water and Wastewater Utility (AWWU) has steadily worked to stabilize expenses and to increase revenues, efficiency, customer service and quality. These efforts culminated in the utility's Excellence Adventure, a competitiveness process designed and driven by employees to make AWWU a world-class utility. As a result, customers per employee increased 56 percent from 242 to 377 and the amount of plant per employee increased 144 percent from $1.3 million to $3.25 million. The last AWWU rate increase was in 1992 and since then net income increased from $203,000 to $10.5 million. During the same period, the utilities' water revenue bond rating increased from A to AA-. The engine behind many of these improvements is employee involvement on teams chartered with specific goals and deadlines. Participation on teams for strategic planning and competitiveness efforts grew steadily from 48 employees in 1998 to an estimated 106 (40 percent of total employees) in 2001, creating a tremendous synergy. The number of grievances and accidents are at a historical low while employee ideas/suggestions and employee morale are high. AWWU is on its way to attaining a lasting culture of employee involvement and continuous improvement.

City of Akron Public Utilities Bureau

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
In 1998, when its water rates were among the highest in the state, the City of Akron Public Utilities Bureau recognized the need to stabilize rates by changing the way it operated its utilities. A Blue Ribbon Commission evaluated work practices and produced a report that served as a catalyst for Akron to change the way it does business. EMA Inc., hired to perform an analysis of the Public Utilities Bureau (PUB), found a competitive gap of $10 million in annual controllable O&M costs. This led to selection of the Leading Change Team (LCT), a steering team consisting of a cross-section of the work force, including management and labor, with representatives from each division. The LCT commissioned six major core design teams, plus several smaller work teams to encourage the team concept. Notices were posted publicly to allow all interested employees the opportunity to apply. As a result of the Blue Ribbon Committee report, EMA assessment and employee design teams, Akron achieved $4.6 million accumulated savings in controllable O&M costs over the last two years. The city's PUB is becoming highly trained, flexible and efficient, using best business practices to be competitive and supplying citizens with quality services at stable rates.

City of Albuquerque's Water Utility

2001 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
Faced with significant operating challenges and opportunities, the City of Albuquerque's Water Utility is undertaking a major change initiative to become more competitive. Groundwater supply and quality issues triggered the need for water conservation and construction/operation of a new surface water treatment plant. The effects of water conservation in turn resulted in declining revenues per customer, and the new surface water plant will add to the operations and maintenance burden of the utility. Potential regionalization of water services in the Rio Grande Valley presents an opportunity to expand the service area of the water utility with a resulting increase in revenue. However, prior to expansion, the utility must be able to provide a high-quality product at a competitive price. Albuquerque's change initiative includes the Albuquerque Water Operations and Management System (AWOMS), which merges integrated information from a new Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) and state-of-the-art Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition system (SCADA). These systems work in concert with retooled O&M practices to produce a competitive and highly efficient water utility. Currently, the utility is mid-way through a five-year optimization project to apply these new technologies and practices to yield bottom-line results for its customers.

City of Scottsdale Water Resources Department

2002 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
The City of Scottsdale, Arizona’s reputation for innovation and creativity is based upon its receptiveness to employee initiatives. The City of Scottsdale Water Resources Department shares the City’s values and its many recent achievements are due to employee-driven initiatives to achieve competitiveness and cost-effectiveness in each of its multi-faceted activities. The Department’s vision is to improve its competitiveness through periodic assessment and benchmarking with other “best-in-class” municipal utilities. As a result of a 1997 assessment by EMA, Scottsdale embarked upon an employee-driven improvement program, which resulted in an organizational reengineering and has allowed the Department to maintain a customer-to-employee ratio of 1,475:1. To achieve further excellence in competitiveness, Scottsdale recently contracted with the firm Maximus to perform an organizational review. The City’s $200-million, award-winning Scottsdale Water Campus, a state-of-the-art water and wastewater treatment complex, operates on an aggressive staffing plan, with three-person teams working 12-hour shifts. These operators, who have dual certification in both water and wastewater, control 150 water and wastewater facilities utilizing Scottsdale’s state-of-the-art SCADA system. The Department’s innovative achievements are based upon its efforts to surpass the expectations of Scottsdale’s citizens by providing an environment that attracts and motivates a best-in-class workforce.

Norfolk Department of Utilities

2002 Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance
The Norfolk Department of Utilities provides water to more than 700,000 people in Norfolk, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake, and at area U.S. Naval facilities. Norfolk Utilities has approximately 64,000 service accounts, providing water service and sewer conveyance for Norfolk’s residents and businesses. Norfolk Utilities strives to deliver a quality product at the best possible price to its customers. A number of initiatives are in place to ensure that operations are as effective and efficient as possible. The initiatives are coupled with a focus on customer satisfaction. Some of the most notable competitiveness initiatives include: • Tracking and reporting of performance indicators for each of the seven departmental divisions; • Participation in the Partnership for Safe Water; • Increased use of Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems; • Establishment of an e-government team to identify customer enhancements for the Utilities’ web site; • Reengineering efforts in Accounting, Engineering and Customer Service divisions; • The award of three grants resulting from an increased focus on financial stability; • Employee development initiatives including Round Table improvement teams, the Communications Team and the annual employee satisfaction survey; and, • Partnership with a local community college to offer courses on-site for an Associates Degree in Industrial Management.