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ARDEN HILLS CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION – JUNE 20, 2022 4 Councilmember Holden noted they would also need a plaque to acknowledge the donation from the Spring Lake Park Lions Club. C. Public Works 2022 CIP Equipment Purchases Mayor Grant said this was a consent item since the dollar value is low for the trailer and field striper. Councilmember Holden was fine with buying those items but suggested they look at ordering the 450 truck that is on the CIP for next year because of the wait times for vehicles. Public Works Director/City Engineer Swearingen confirmed they are still waiting on delivery of two trucks previously ordered. Mayor Grant agreed they could order the 450 truck now and pay for it once it is delivered. Councilmember Radziej asked if they had looked at tipped trailers due to worker’s comp issues. Public Works Director/City Engineer Swearingen said they are upgrading to a full width style ramp with a beaver tail. He noted the Public Works staff requested this type of trailer as they already have two tipped trailers. Mayor Grant stated Council was OK with the purchase but if a tipped trailer was only $500- $1000 more they should consider that type. He’d like a notation in the Admin Update about what they decide. D. Water Meters Finance Director Bauman stated that since January 2021, 28 meters have been installed (19 new installs and 9 replacements). During that same time, they have changed 64 registers and endpoints to cellular from the Galaxy transmitters, in addition to the 19 new installs. Residential meters in the city were replaced in 1999-2000, commercial meters were replaced in 1997. If residential meters were in good working order and less than 10 years old they were left, so some meters could be upwards of 32 years old. All Galaxy readers were replaced in 2012, but since they have gone to cellular there are a few more problems getting reads. Eighty-three meters are now cellular, and the rest are Galaxy. The 19 new installs got all new equipment. Finance Director Bauman noted that no reads are going up again in the summer which may have to do with the noise floor ceiling that showed up in the frequency study. Public Works Director/City Engineer Swearingen explained that the Galaxy’s are radio transmitted to a collector and then to the cloud, the new cellular equipment transmits directly to the cloud. The study showed that someone is coming into the same frequency and creating the noise. The Galaxy radio boxes aren’t supported or manufactured anymore so they have to transition to the cellular style, which is what they are doing as they fail. He stated the Galaxy is a separate component of the meter; there is a meter body, the register and the endpoint. Mayor Grant asked staff if they thought the meters would continue to fail at an increasing rate.