Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Like the Gold Award for Exceptional Utility Performance, the criteria for the Platinum Award for Utility Excellence are based on the Ten Attributes of Effective Utility Management and the Keys to Management Success. Applicants are expected to show progress in implementing the attributes and keys, as well as a distinctive level of management expertise and expanded utility achievement.
Three years after winning a Gold Award, member utilities are eligible to apply for the Platinum Award for Utility Excellence.
Recent Award Winners
Anaheim Public Utilities
2017 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Anaheim Public Utilities keeps an eye toward maintaining stable rates for its customers while delivering reliable service and a high quality product. The utility invests in its employees, water infrastructure system and community through innovative employee development initiatives, carefully planned asset replacement programs and student engagement opportunities. These efforts resulted in the utility having one of the lowest water rates in its county, while water quality continues to meet and exceed state and federal standards. Its customer service is touted by J.D. Power as being in the top 15 percent of large water agencies in the western United States.
Anne Arundel County Bureau of Utility Operations
2017 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Anne Arundel County Bureau of Utility Operations developed a ten-year capital improvement program to implement its strategic decision to end reliance on the neighboring city of Baltimore for 25 percent of the county’s drinking water production. Major expansion was made to two water treatment plants, separate transmission mains were run and a water booster station was commissioned to deliver the production from those plants. The utility’s current water purchase is down to less than two percent, resulting in $8.5 million in annual savings. These efforts will ensure the sustainability of the local system, reduce costs and control water quality.
Greenville Water
2017 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Greenville Water’s strong financial position allows the utility to be proactive in planning for the future and preparing for emergencies while maintaining affordable rates. Employees are well trained with state-of-the-industry technology to manage its assets and protect its resources. The utility also strives to make the community an outstanding place to live by sponsoring community events and supporting economic development efforts to bring better jobs and improve quality of life. Every day – with the help of talented employees, a connected community, strong management and a committed Commission – Greenville Water works to achieve its vision of quality water and a sustainable future.
Peace River Manasota Regional Water Supply Authority
2017 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Through collaboration and cooperation, the Peace River Manasota Regional Water Supply Authority of southwest Florida has secured a reliable, affordable water supply for the region and provides the infrastructure for business development and economic growth. The Authority’s extensive expansion program, utilizing alternative water supply in lieu of further groundwater degradation, makes it a model in development of surface water storage by off-stream reservoir and aquifer storage and recovery systems. The Authority’s goal to create a regional interconnected transmission system is a 25-year vision to provide integrated management of the region’s water resources to better protect the environment.
Tampa Bay Water
2017 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Tampa Bay Water, the largest wholesale water utility in the southeastern United States, planned for future regional water supply through an update of its long-term master water plan and implemented an asset management program for its infrastructure and assets. An environmental management system was created to promote compliance with international standards, and an energy management program was implemented to reduce energy costs. The agency refinanced various bond issues, saving $3 million annually, and maintained high bond ratings with all three rating agencies. Its wholesale water rate has held steady for seven consecutive years through innovative cost-saving measures across the agency.
Beaver Water District
2016 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Beaver Water District optimizes operations to produce a quality product by setting a goal of 100 percent compliance with the Safe Drinking Water Act, maintaining membership in the Partnership for Safe Water and ensuring that capital planning focuses on maintaining high quality water. The utility updated its asset management plan and used the information to establish funding requirements for its Replacement & Refurbishment Fund, which is integral to its 15-year financial plan update and associated recommended wholesale water rate increases. The District promotes customer satisfaction and stakeholder support to achieve community sustainability through various outreach activities.
City of Raleigh Public Utilities Department
2016 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
As a regional utility, operations of the City of Raleigh Public Utilities Department are supported via an enterprise fund model and are fully funded by revenues received from rates and fees for services, as well as fees associated with new development. Over the past three years, the utility made significant progress in strategic plan elements of employee and leadership development, operational optimization, stakeholder outreach, reliability, environmental stewardship, water resource management and financial viability. The strategic plan was updated in 2015 to identify new initiatives, and primary focus now includes customer service, reliability and operational optimization.
Fort Wayne City Utilities
2016 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Fort Wayne City Utilities consistently produces quality water for its customers, allowing management to focus on other key initiatives to improve its organization. The utility prioritizes employee and leadership development by encouraging continuous learning through in-house and external training opportunities, for example, growing the number of professional engineers on staff from two to 16. Management has also rewritten all job descriptions to provide for career growth. In 2015, the utility implemented a new customer account management and billing system, which has benefited both customers and the utility. And new chemical feed programs were implemented at its filtration plant, resulting in more consistent and better quality water.
Kansas City Board of Public Utilities
2016 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Kansas City Board of Public Utilities has implemented improvement initiatives including: valve, hydrant and customer leak detection programs; water treatment plant filter upgrades; water distribution facility maintenance and Geographic Information System; a water main and fire hydrant replacement project; a new four-million gallon water reservoir; and a Maximo asset work order management program. The utility develops programs to ensure training and understanding of work processes and standards throughout the organization. It works continually to improve its services to the community and measures overall customer satisfaction by reviewing data from customer satisfaction studies, customer inquiry reports, a cost-of-service study and AEGIS risk assessment.
KC Water
2016 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
KC Water has capitalized on challenges to establish an evidence-based, data-driven utility in all aspects, including infrastructure rehabilitation, maintenance, operational and customer-service programs. Achievements include: new infrastructure rehabilitation based on increased customer satisfaction as measured by customer surveys; improved main replacement protocols based on business risk exposure; and significant automation of many business processes. Careful management of debt coverage requirements to support long-term infrastructure investment has improved financial results. Forward-thinking processes have been implanted throughout administrative functions including customer service operations, employee training and staff development and long-range organizational planning.
Mesa Water
2016 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
To conserve finite resources, Mesa Water decreased its dependence on non-renewable groundwater supplies from over 70 percent in 1984, to around 10 percent today. The utility recharges approximately 8,000 acre-feet of effluent a year and achieves close to 100 percent reuse of reclaimed water. Its technology initiatives include Cityworks computerized maintenance management software and asset management system, and its mobile dispatch utilizes geolocation to ensure responsive dispatch to emergencies and complaints. Mesa Water maintains an Aa2 bond rating from Moody’s and developed a 20-year forecast model to anticipate revenues and expenses and prepare reserves for smoothing potential future rate increases.
Phoenix Water
2016 Platinum Award for Utility Excellence
Phoenix Water’s executive management team gathered supervisors, managers and field employees into cross-divisional teams based on the Attributes of Effective Utility Management to develop goals to drive and measure performance. Progress was reported over 40 targets. For example, the percentage of calls answered within two minutes went from a low of around 30 percent a year ago, to 98 percent today. To prevent the catastrophic failure of pre-stressed concrete cylinder transmission pipelines, the utility set a goal of inspecting 32 miles of critical water mains in three years. It is currently poised to complete a cumulative total of over 55 miles of inspections.