Political Philosophy for John M. "Terry" Mylne

Candidate for
Director; Western Municipal Water District; Division 3

Vote for John M. (Terry) Mylne ---- for election to the Board of Western Municipal Water District(Div3)

Platform Statement

The following are Issues and Objectives which I believe must be addressed by Western Municipal Water District during the next Five Years.

There are four broad areas which the Western Board and Staff must address aggressively and they are: Water Quality, Water Reliability, Minimizing the Cost of Water, and Systematic Board/Staff re-structuring to achieve a Water Resource Public Agency which is run more like a business and which is responsive to Customer needs.

1. Water Quality—The Water supplied by Western has never failed to meet the public health standards; but the better the scientific instruments and the more that is learned about small micro-organisms/chemical contaminates the more Western must be vigilant in keeping its water supplies safe for public consumption. Recent incidents of ground water contamination by such things as perchlorate, criptosporidium, and MTBE demand that Western's Board and Staff keep up to date with the emerging technology and aggressively pursue the elimination of detected contaminants which are detrimental to our customers health and safety. In addition, a high level of salinity in the water limits the possibility of reclamation of water stored in our ground water basins(and impacts reliability). Long range planning and strong Board leadership are imperative.

2. Water Reliability—The water seldom fails to flow from our faucets when we turn them on but; this does not happen by accident. It takes an extensive amount of physical infrastructure(canals, pipes, pumps, valves, rivers, and reservoirs ) and a considerable amount of planning. The Metropolitan Water District provides Western (and its other Member Agencies) with water supplemental to its local supplies; and has done so in an extremely reliable manner for many years. A redundancy of supply sources, better management of local resources, capturing storm water run-off, basin reclamation, and intra-basin transfers of water (between willing buyers and sellers) each would enhance Western's Water Reliability and should be incorporated as part of Western's Board planning process during the next five years.

3. Minimizing the Cost of Water—Water Quality and Water Reliability are vital to us all and must not be compromised; but Western needs to strive for minimizing the costs associated with water delivery and the rates which both Domestic and Agriculture customers must pay. The bulk of the water cost is in the Metropolitan price of water and because Western is a member agency of Metropolitan; both the Board and Staff must be aggressive in seeking to reduce costs and to prevent water rate escalation.

4. Systematic Board/Staff Restructuring-- Western is a Municipal Water district and a public agency. Public agencies are not always as efficient nor as cost conscious as private companies; and with many private water companies seeking to take over the operations of public water companies it is incumbent upon Western's Board of Directors to initiate a Board/Staff re-organization with the intent of making Western act more like a Business. At the very minimum as Western's new Board proceeds to develop a new vision and a strategy for the future it should include consideration of this restructuring. Only in this way can Western become a businesslike Water Resource Public Agency which is responsive to its Customer's needs.