SHAL­IZA HAS­SANALI

The Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) will set­tle part of its stag­ger­ing $900 mil­lion debt owed to con­trac­tors be­fore the 2023 bud­get is pre­sent­ed on Sep­tem­ber 26.

This as­sur­ance was giv­en by Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les while speak­ing to the Sun­day Guardian at the min­istry's St Clair of­fice on Tues­day. He, how­ev­er, did not dis­close what por­tion of the debt will be paid.

With plans to turn around the un­pro­duc­tive and dys­func­tion­al util­i­ty com­pa­ny in the new fis­cal year, Gon­za­les ad­mit­ted that one is­sue af­fect­ing the au­thor­i­ty's op­er­a­tions was the long de­lay in its pro­cure­ment process and time­ly pay­ment of its con­trac­tors.

"It is a hor­ren­dous sit­u­a­tion. We have too many con­trac­tors knock­ing on our doors, and as a min­is­ter, that is some­thing that I don’t feel com­fort­able with. The con­trac­tors come to us be­cause they have no oth­er choice," Gon­za­les said.

As a re­sult of WASA's fail­ure to pay, some con­trac­tors ceased pro­vid­ing ser­vices to the au­thor­i­ty, while oth­ers sought le­gal re­dress to re­coup what was owed to them.

In some in­stances, the courts al­so or­dered WASA to pay its con­trac­tors. Gon­za­les said a lot of con­trac­tors see lit­i­ga­tion as a last re­sort be­cause WASA is their on­ly liveli­hood and client.

"So, they don’t take plea­sure in su­ing WASA. That is al­so part of the headache we are grap­pling with...You can­not have peo­ple pro­vid­ing crit­i­cal ser­vices to WASA to en­sure that peo­ple have clean potable wa­ter in their homes and you are not pay­ing these peo­ple. We can­not run an or­gan­i­sa­tion like that."

Gon­za­les de­scribed it as un­for­tu­nate that many of WASA's small con­trac­tors had gone out of busi­ness as a re­sult of non-pay­ment.

"I have seen mes­sages on my phone from con­trac­tors in­form­ing me that bailiffs were in front of their prop­er­ty. The banks levied on them for fail­ing to pay. It’s very sad. That is not the way we should com­mit to do­ing busi­ness and treat­ing each oth­er in the coun­try. If you de­cide to take the ser­vice from a busi­ness, you must be able to un­rav­el your in­ter­nal in­ef­fi­cien­cies to be able to en­sure that you pay."

WASA has small, medi­um, and large con­trac­tors. Most of the con­trac­tors pro­vide chem­i­cals, truck-borne wa­ter, road restora­tion and jan­i­to­r­i­al ser­vices, equip­ment, heavy ma­chin­ery, cars, and trucks as well as pumps, steel tanks, and pipes to WASA.

"We are work­ing on a strat­e­gy to set­tle these out­stand­ing ar­rears in con­ver­sa­tion with the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance in pay­ing some of these crit­i­cal con­trac­tors be­fore the bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion so there can be con­ti­nu­ity in the or­gan­i­sa­tion," the min­is­ter added.

In 2016, WASA owed its con­trac­tors $257 mil­lion.

Four years lat­er, the fig­ure jumped to $600 mil­lion and it has now neared the bil­lion-dol­lar mark.

Public Utlities minister Marvin Gonzales at his St Clair office last week.

SHALIZA HASSANALI

"Yes, WASA owes its con­trac­tors about $900 mil­lion," Gon­za­les re­vealed.

When Gon­za­les as­sumed of­fice in 2020, he met with WASA’s board to sort out the con­trac­tors’ out­stand­ing ar­rears. Back then, Gon­za­les at­trib­uted the de­lay in pay­ments to WASA's in­abil­i­ty to ver­i­fy some of the con­trac­tors’ bills or claims, in­di­cat­ing that this stemmed from a man­age­ment prob­lem.

Now, the pro­cess­ing of con­trac­tors’ in­voic­es is prov­ing to be an­oth­er chal­lenge for the cash-strapped com­pa­ny.

"The cer­ti­fi­ca­tion of in­voic­es...What is sup­posed to be a two-day process would turn in­to a year-long process. And that is how con­trac­tors are at their wit's end. These are things that have oc­curred over the years at WASA."

Gon­za­les said that the in­ter­nal dys­func­tions at the state-owned com­pa­ny ap­pear to be nev­er-end­ing and that if these is­sues are not ad­dressed quick­ly, WASA will con­tin­ue to de­cline.

New man­agers on board in Jan­u­ary

Pro­vid­ing an up­date on the au­thor­i­ty’s trans­for­ma­tion­al ex­er­cise, Gon­za­les said every­thing was go­ing ac­cord­ing to plan.

The trans­for­ma­tion in­volves three phas­es.

In the 2020 re­port of the Cab­i­net sub-com­mit­tee ap­point­ed to re­view the op­er­a­tions of WASA, the au­thor­i­ty was de­scribed as a top-heavy, over­staffed, in­ef­fi­cient and un­pro­duc­tive or­gan­i­sa­tion.

Two months ago, WASA an­nounced that all 426 man­age­ment po­si­tions in the com­pa­ny will be made re­dun­dant in the first phase of its trans­for­ma­tion plan and on­ly 213 man­agers will be hired in its 2023 re­cruit­ment dri­ve.

"By the be­gin­ning of Jan­u­ary, we ex­pect that some of these va­can­cies will be filled. So, very soon you will see ad­ver­tise­ments in the news­pa­pers for a CEO and re­gion­al man­agers and so on," Gon­za­les dis­closed.

"Every man­ag­er will be held to ac­count."

Gon­za­les said any T&T na­tion­al and WASA man­agers with the req­ui­site qual­i­fi­ca­tions and skills can ap­ply for the ad­ver­tised po­si­tions.

"Some of these po­si­tions could be filled by peo­ple in­ter­nal­ly. And where that can be done, it will be done."

The new man­age­ment team will iden­ti­fy cri­sis ar­eas and de­vel­op so­lu­tions to en­sure that all com­mu­ni­ties re­ceive wa­ter, en­hance cus­tomer ser­vice and im­ple­ment nec­es­sary changes to en­able WASA to func­tion more ef­fi­cient­ly, Gon­za­les said.

Asked if the salaries of these new man­agers will be re­viewed, Gon­za­les said it will be in align­ment with what is ex­pect­ed in the sec­tor and stream­lined ac­cord­ing to mod­ern HR prac­tices.

WASA is yet to put a fi­nal fig­ure on the trans­for­ma­tion process.

"What I can tell you is the min­istry and WASA are ac­tive­ly en­gag­ing the IDB and CAF with re­spect to get­ting fund­ing for the trans­for­ma­tion as well as to un­der­take some ma­jor emer­gency cap­i­tal in­vest­ment pro­gramme."

The Gov­ern­ment, he said, will guar­an­tee the loan for the en­tire re­struc­tur­ing ex­er­cise and pay­ment of sev­er­ance pack­ages es­ti­mat­ed at $600 mil­lion.

$8 mil­lion to re­pair 120 pumps at pri­vate com­pa­nies

Mean­while, the cap­i­tal in­vest­ment pro­gramme for WASA’s net­work op­ti­mi­sa­tion and au­toma­tion would cost mil­lions more.

Stat­ing that some of the coun­try’s wa­ter treat­ment plants are in dire need of re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion, Gon­za­les said if emer­gency works are not un­der­tak­en at these fa­cil­i­ties "the coun­try's wa­ter sup­ply could be in se­ri­ous per­il".

Gon­za­les stat­ed that for years, WASA did not have a pre­ven­ta­tive main­te­nance pro­gramme in place, and that boost­er sta­tions in Trinidad's east and north-west have been "op­er­at­ing be­low ca­pac­i­ty due to pumps that are in dis­re­pair...and stand­by pumps that are not in place".

Gon­za­les re­cent­ly dis­cov­ered 120 pumps locked away in WASA's Cen­tral Work­shop Fa­cil­i­ty (CWF) await­ing re­pair.

These pumps as­sist in chan­nelling wa­ter to var­i­ous com­mu­ni­ties.

If there are in­ad­e­quate pumps at boost­er sta­tions, the wa­ter pres­sure would be low and com­mu­ni­ties would not re­ceive an ef­fi­cient sup­ply.

"This is un­ac­cept­able and ridicu­lous. It is on­ly up­on my prob­ing as a min­is­ter that was dis­cov­ered. It was not brought to my at­ten­tion for­mal­ly."

Gon­za­les ex­pressed con­cern that there were no time­lines for the pumps to be re­paired and in­stalled.

"Some of those pumps have been at the CWF al­most five years. This is a man­age­ment prob­lem. It is man­age­ment that is re­spon­si­ble for en­sur­ing there is a main­te­nance pro­gramme in place so when your pumps and mo­tors go down, they are quick­ly re­paired and put back in­to op­er­a­tion. This has not been hap­pen­ing for months."

As soon as the 2023 bud­get is passed in the Low­er and Up­per Hous­es, Gon­za­les said he will give a pol­i­cy di­rec­tive to WASA's board to have the pumps re­paired at eight pri­vate work­shops so that these boost­er sta­tions can op­er­ate at op­ti­mal ca­pac­i­ty.

Gon­za­les dis­closed that it would cost WASA "ap­prox­i­mate­ly $8 mil­lion" to have the pumps func­tion­ing by De­cem­ber.

As Gon­za­les con­tin­ues his in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the au­thor­i­ty's poor ser­vice, he ad­mit­ted that shock­ing dis­cov­er­ies were made at WASA every week.

"It’s just sim­ple things that could have been done that have WASA in this mess to­day. There was no over­sight and ac­count­abil­i­ty."

TSTT to pro­vide tech­nol­o­gy for WASA to op­er­ate ef­fi­cient­ly

Gon­za­les said one of the pil­lars of the trans­for­ma­tion is for WASA to be­come tech­nol­o­gy-dri­ven in its op­er­a­tions, stat­ing that the Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tion Ser­vices of T&T (TSTT) will as­sist in this re­gard.

He ex­plained that WASA has sourced 80 da­ta log­gers who are be­ing trained at their St Joseph head­quar­ters through a cen­tral com­mand cen­tre.

"So, we are go­ing to put to­geth­er a new unit that will man­age the net­work re­mote­ly. They (the new unit) will in­form the re­gion­al man­agers where there is a dis­rup­tion of wa­ter sup­ply in a com­mu­ni­ty."

In the com­ing weeks, Gon­za­les said WASA will part­ner with TSTT "to have a mod­ern cus­tomer ser­vice cen­tre" and pro­vide train­ing to a cadre of 440 da­ta log­gers with tech­nol­o­gy train­ing.

WASA will re­tain the ser­vices of an ad­di­tion­al 360 da­ta log­gers be­fore Christ­mas.

"The talks (with TSTT and WASA) are in an ad­vanced stage," Gon­za­les said.

"I will en­sure it is fi­nalised with­in the next two to three months. So, tech­no­log­i­cal trans­for­ma­tion and rev­o­lu­tion are tak­ing place as we speak. These da­ta log­gers will be as­signed to every boost­er sta­tion and wa­ter treat­ment plant to trans­mit in­for­ma­tion in re­al-time. When­ev­er you have a dis­rup­tion that will be trans­mit­ted to a con­trol cen­tre so WASA will be able to re­spond to dis­rup­tions in ser­vice ex­pe­di­tious­ly."

TSTT, Gon­za­les said, would al­so pro­vide the nec­es­sary tech­nol­o­gy to au­to­mate WASA’s valves and set up a vir­tu­al guard sys­tem for the wa­ter com­pa­ny.

Gon­za­les said WASA was dis­sat­is­fied with the lev­el of ser­vice pro­vid­ed by its out­go­ing Cus­tomer Ser­vice Rep­re­sen­ta­tives (CSRs) unit as com­plaints by cus­tomers not re­ceiv­ing wa­ter were not doc­u­ment­ed prop­er­ly or ig­nored.

"Go­ing for­ward, cus­tomer ser­vice will be a key fo­cus."

The con­tracts of most of the CSRs will come to an end.

State agen­cies, min­istries owe WASA $100 mil­lion

In Ju­ly, WASA of­fered a three-month amnesty to al­low own­ers and oc­cu­pants of prop­er­ties with il­le­gal con­nec­tions to reg­u­larise their sta­tus.

Aware that hun­dreds of cus­tomers have not been pay­ing WASA for wa­ter, Gon­za­les said the au­thor­i­ty en­gaged the ser­vices of debt col­lec­tion agency Cred­it Chex last month to go af­ter cus­tomers who have been ow­ing them for more than two years.

"The next phase would be a ro­bust au­dit where peo­ple would be out there go­ing house to house and the util­i­ty com­pa­ny would be mak­ing an as­sess­ment as to whether they do have a wa­ter con­nec­tion and they will be pe­nalised or they will be forced to reg­is­ter and be­come pay­ing cus­tomers or the ser­vice will be dis­con­nect­ed," Gon­za­les said.

WASA's aim, he said, is to im­prove its fi­nan­cial thrust.

"We are look­ing to im­prove WASA’s rev­enue po­si­tion of $700 mil­lion to $1 bil­lion be­cause of un­col­lect­ed rates."

As of Au­gust 31, Gon­za­les said WASA was owed $929.7 mil­lion by cus­tomers.

Of this fig­ure, res­i­den­tial cus­tomers owed the largest sum of $592.7 mil­lion fol­lowed by gov­ern­ment min­istries and state agen­cies $98.8 mil­lion, so­cial (stand­pipe) $59.9 mil­lion, wa­ter ab­strac­tors $55.1 mil­lion, in­dus­tri­al $43.4 mil­lion, com­mer­cial $35.6 mil­lion, To­ba­go $27.9 mil­lion and fae­cal waste $17.3 mil­lion.

"I could tell you that a lot of gov­ern­ment agen­cies…they are not pay­ing. State agen­cies, pub­lic au­thor­i­ties, and per­ma­nent sec­re­taries al­so have to be­come very se­ri­ous by en­sur­ing that the monies they get from the Min­istry of Fi­nance that they pay their bill, be it WASA, T&TEC, and TSTT."

Gon­za­les said that some state agen­cies have no sense of ur­gency in pay­ing for the wa­ter and elec­tric­i­ty they con­sume.