City Says “No” to AEP Rate Hike, Update LFIDC with Certificates of Formation

by Martha E. Ibarra/LFN

The La Feria city commission held a regularly scheduled city meeting on Tuesday, May 9, in the city commission meeting room.

Following the invocation, pledge of allegiance and determination of quorum, Mayor Olga Maldonado called the meeting to order and opened the floor for public comments.

First to come forth to speak was Anin Keith who congratulated the commission on their recent win. Commissioner Eric Hoff then extended his heartfelt thanks to the city for the love and support received by him and his family, “Twenty- five days ago our lives changed with the death of my 26 year old son, Riley. I’d like to thank our beautiful little town, its residents, La Feria News, our city employees, our friends, our customers, my fellow commissioners and our mayor for all the kind words, texts, e-mails, cards, flowers and donations in lieu of flowers. We’re of course still devastated, but my wife, Tina, and my daughter, Morgan, and I sincerely appreciate this city and its outpouring of love. Thank you, La Feria.”

After the approval of the minutes of the previous city meeting (April 25), the commission considered a resolution that would deny AEP’s application to increase rates. In order for AEP to increase their rates in Texas, they must file an application. City attorney, Rebecca Hayward, informed the commission, “A bunch of cities got together all over the state of Texas to basically appeal their application for the increase in the rates. The passing of this resolution pursues the appeal of the application,” said Hayward.

Commissioner Julian Guevara Jr. motioned for the resolution to be approved and was unanimously supported.

The commission also approved a resolution to update the La Feria Industrial Development Council’s Articles of Incorporation.

“Now the Articles of Incorporation are going to be referred to as the Certificates of Formation and we are including statutes to the current statutes. No substantive changes other than updating the statutes to the current statutes,” informed Hayward. Frank Rios, city finance director then presented financial reports for the month of March.

Severn Trent representative, Ed Schwab, then went before the commission to relay Severn Trent’s findings after a free evaluation of the water, wastewater and lift station was conducted. Schwab informed the commission that most of the machinery was not operating and there were no maintenance reports found.

“We did not find any preventative maintenance records, the equipment is fairly new. It is kind of like having a new car that after a year you haven’t done anything to- it starts show more wear than it should for its age. There is some major equipment offline that is not operating. The SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) system, basically the brain of the plant, does not appear to be operational. There are no maintenance records. Because the facilities are reasonably new, they are in reasonably okay shape, but there are signs of no organized maintenance,” said Schwab.

After emerging from executive session, where there was no action, the meeting was adjourned. The next city meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, May 23, at 6:30 p.m. in the city commission meeting room located at 115 E. Commercial Avenue in La Feria. The public is encouraged to attend.