Camano City Community Club, Inc. Newsletter

Vol. 1, Issue 1 2023

1019 S. Circle Drive ⋄ Camano Island, WA 98282
https://ccccwatersystem.blogspot.com ⋄ FB Group: https://facebook.com/groups/ccccwatersystem
Email us at CCCC.Water.System@gmail.com

In This Issue:

Special Election 2023
Informational Meeting
Annual Meeting
Revisiting November 2022
The 2023 Northwest Glass Quest
Thank You, Carol

Best read on a PC monitor or, you can download the PDF [here].

Special Election 2023

In January 2022, Washington State introduced into law The Washington Nonprofit Corporation Act, RCW 24.03A. In response, the CCCC, Inc. Board of Trustees reviewed our current Bylaws (adopted in 2016) and, working with Apex Law, revised the Bylaws both to be in compliance with RCW 24.03A and to bring our governing documents more current. In January 2023, after numerous revisions, the Board approved of the 2023 Amended Bylaws. Now the proposed Bylaws are before the membership to be adopted.

What's New?

A table of contents, making it easier to navigate the document which has grown since its last revision in 2016.
Added definitions.
Added a fifth Board of Trustees Officer, the Assistant Treasurer position.
Now have a non-member Board Member position which will allow for us to seek grants that will expand and bolster our water service system.
Have language that streamlines our Board.
More finite description of membership qualifications.
The potential to develop policies and procedures to guide the Board.
Installs protocols for vetting our Board.

What's Gone?

Duplications and conflicting language, ambiguities.
Outdated policies.

Will these changes affect my water service?

Absolutely not, if anything, these changes will open up the opportunity to seek grants and other means of financial support to ensure our system serves our membership, prevents system failures, expands our system to meet the needs of our membership, and provides a series of checks and balances to ensure service remains uninterrupted.

Informational Meeting

Learn more about the proposed amended bylaws and earn double entry into the drawing by casting your ballot at the meeting!

Day: Thursday
Date: February 16, 2023
Time: 7:00 PM
Location: Camano Schoolhouse
993 Orchid Road, Camano Island

Annual Membership Meeting

Please join us for our annual membership meeting. This will be a hybrid meeting, meaning that we will be streaming via Zoom from our in-person meeting space. Information on how to attend the meeting via Zoom will be provided at a later date. To receive an email notification, email us at CCCC.Water.System@gmail.com or visit us at http://ccccwatersystem.blogspot.com.

Day/Date: Saturday, March 11, 2023
Time: 10:00 AM
Location: Online via Zoom or in-person at Camano Schoolhouse, 993 Orchid Road, Camano Island

Revisiting November 2023

By Kathie B., Board of Trustees, Member-at-Large

When we first moved into the neighborhood, we made sure our new-to-us home was generator ready and our first big purchase was a generator. Because we knew that we could be without power for days, possibly weeks.

Sure enough. No sooner did we conduct a dry run on how to run the generator, the wind blew, trees fell, our portable gazebo was crushed (after moving it to a ‘safer’ location minutes earlier), and our power went out.

Murphy’s law. [As it so happens, we have good friends, the Murphy’s. She’s a paralegal. She’s still working on getting those laws to work in our favor. She retires later this year. Don’t hold your breath.]

It was during this whole “wait, do I do this first or do I do that first? Should I plug it in before or after starting it up? Am I far enough away from the garage/house?” period that we heard the thrum of an impressively large generator nearby. Even more impressive, we heard it through the cacophony of the windstorm.

Nice, we noted as we climbed on the struggle bus and continued our arduous task of firing up our generator. Spoiler: we did. And less than an hour later, our neighbor sent us a text letting us know the power was back on.

The sun came back out, the wind found better spots to sweep across, and we went exploring.

We had questions.

We had envy.

We wanted to know if that automatic generator was affordable. Or if we could possibly buy in to hook ourselves up.

Finding that generator was awe-inspiring. We stood and stared. We drooled. It is massive. And it’s connected to a propane tank. We were impressed.

And this, dear reader, is how we discovered our water plant. Home to the massive and awe-inspiring propane powered automatic generator.

Go ahead. Channel your inner Tim the Toolman Taylor and make your man-grunt. Because that’s what we were doing.

In the coming months, hearing that generator kick on brought us much needed peace of mind.

Until it didn’t.

Until that one particularly late evening when the power went out again, we fired up the generator, and went to quench our parched throats to find the water wasn’t flowing. After digging through all of our paperwork, still unorganized from the recent move, we located both the emergency number and a corner of the house where we could get a strong enough signal to call someone at our service provider’s office. We would learn, through a Facebook post, that the generator failed to kick on and someone had to manually start it.

Whatever. We had water. We had power. We were good.

But then November 2022 happened.

The power went out.

For nearly a full week.

Spending more daily on fuel for that generator than we do on a month’s worth of PUD bills, the days without power and the days hauling in expensive fuel were taking a toll.

But, we told ourselves, we have water. Our food isn’t spoiling. We’re warm. We’re dry. We have board games. The C-Pap machine is still functioning.

And then the text went out to the Board members. We are running out of water.

How was that even possible? Our water was still flowing, meaning the generator was still humming (and a quick step outside confirmed the thrum of the generator at the plant). How could we be running out of water?!

In the coming days, power restored, the threat of running out of water no longer a threat, the Board of Trustees met and discussed the recent critical situation we faced.

The plant (inset) is where the water is pumped into, treated, filtered (which is a pretty impressive sight to see), and then routed out to the storage tanks, then disbursed, on demand, to our homes. This is also where the generator with the propane tank, are located, ensuring delivery of treated, quality drinking water during an outage.

However, during a power outage, the wells that draw the water (one is on Tyler James, the other on Falcon), stop drawing water because they have no power during an outage.

You see, those storage tanks hold approximately five days worth of water. Approximately because much of that depends on how much water we draw into our homes.

This is why it’s crucial within a small water system that the members are very careful with their water consumption during an event causing a power outage lasting longer than 24-hours.

But we’ll get to how to address that in a moment. Because I know, you have questions. I did. And I want to share the answers to those burning questions for you.

Our well houses. Tyler James pumps out 20 gallons of water per minute. Falcon, like the mighty bird, wallops out over three times that amount, 65 gallons of water per minute.

When there’s power.

CCCC Inc. Water Treatment & Storage Plant
Generator only powers the disbursement of
treated water into our homes during a power outage.

Falcon Well/Pumphouse pumps 65 gallons per min.

Tyler James Well/Pumphouse produces 20 gal/min

But when there isn’t? They sit silently.

The Board of Trustees is addressing this currently. We have asked several in-the-know contractors to come take a look at our pumphouses and determine what is needed to connect the pumps to emergency power. We’ve learned that it will require a 3 phase generator, which is considerably expensive especially considering we’ll have to install and connect propane.

We’ve determined it’s pointless to increase expenses by adding this set-up to both wells especially as this is for emergency purposes. Therefore we are targeting the Falcon location for the alterations.

But this will take some time. And money.

The good news is that this isn’t a critical need situation. We do have the reserves to move forward with this process when the time comes.

Learning this has also provided us a gift of knowledge. We now understand the importance, especially on a membership managed small water system, of taking preventative measures to ensure the continual delivery of quality drinking water to our homes and property.

When the power is out past the 24-hour mark, we ask that everyone conserve water and after the power is restored, that you give the system at least 12-24 hours (the longer the outage, allow a longer recovery period) to recover by continuing to conserve. [End]

The Northwest Glass Quest is February 17-26, 2023

From the Facebook Page: 365 Things to do in Washington State,
a photo of one of the prized hand-blown glass balls.

Beginning Friday, February 17th, questers from all over will be converging on Camano Island and Stanwood in search for a clue ball that will land them a stunning hand-blown glass ball which is created locally by world-renowned glass artists, Mark and Marcus Ellinger.

This is the 14th annual quest by the Camano Chamber of Commerce.

And it is roaring grand fun for the entire family.

To learn more about the quest, which is entirely free, visit http://northwestglassquest.com or find them on Facebook on their page Northwest Glass Quest. Even Google “Northwest Glass Quest” or hit the search feature on Facebook where you’ll find tons of information, tips and tricks, and see these beautiful hand-blown balls.

If you are out and about hunting for clue balls, a tip for indoor hunting is to use a flashlight. According to several hunters, the light often catches the plastic ball. Another great tip is to download the app and follow the many businesses and sponsors on social media where often they will leave hints to where they’ve hidden the clue ball.

Do you hunt for the clue balls? Send in your tips and tricks by emailing us at CCCC.water.system@gmail.com and in the subject line, write: NW Glass Quest.

Join our private Facebook Group and share your pictures of your quest! https://facebook.com/groups/ccccwatersystem

Thank You, Carol

The CCCC., Inc. Board of Trustees would like to thank Carol B. for her tireless work and dedication serving as our Treasurer.

Carol has managed to keep us on a steady course throughout a number of changes.

Coming from a background in finance, Carol has been able to streamline our system, putting into place checks and balances that will withstand the changes we are certain to experience further down the road.

We wish her the best with her new adventures and look forward to seeing her around the neighborhood.

Thank you so much, Carol!

To receive newsletters, updates, and more from us electronically, visit us at https://ccccwatersystem.blogspot.com/p/keep-in-touch.html.

Join our private Facebook group at https://facebook.com/groups/ccccwatersystem.

Submit an article by emailing us at cccc.water.system@gmail.com In the subject line, write: Newsletter Article.

Camano City Community Club, Inc. is a nonprofit registered 501(c)(13) association governed by a Board of Trustees whose mission is to bring quality drinking water to its members. Our service provider is Water and Wastewater of Mount Vernon (https://wwsvc.net/).

Members may submit articles for our newsletter by emailing us at cccc.water.system@gmail.com. Approval, final edits, and publication is at the discretion of the Board.