Craley, Rocky

Rocky has been with Raftelis for 18 years, helping utilities in a number of areas, including financial and strategic planning, rate and fee studies,...

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About Craley, Rocky

Rocky has been with Raftelis for 18 years, helping utilities in a number of areas, including financial and strategic planning, rate and fee studies, cost of service, benchmarking and metric tracking, policy development, regional cost sharing, and financial feasibility assessments. Rocky is an active member of WEF's Utility Management Community and immediate past chair of WEF's Finance Focus Group.

Craley, Rocky

Titles from this speaker

Description: Communication & Collaboration: Critical success factors for regional sewer...

Communication & Collaboration: Critical success factors for regional sewer planning in Pennsylvania

Abstract

Lehigh County Authority is a public water and wastewater utility serving 270,000 people in the City of Allentown and surrounding communities in eastern Pennsylvania. Since its founding in 1966, LCA consolidated many small developer-built or municipal-run systems in the region and grew into one of the largest regional municipal authorities in the Commonwealth. LCA also became a regional partner in a sewer network known as the Kline's Island Sewer System, with all flows centrally treated at the 40 MGD Kline's Island Wastewater Treatment Plant in Allentown. The KISS connects 15 municipalities' sewer systems, with LCA's interceptors and pump stations as the backbone of the system. However, each municipality owns their own pipe network, leading to a patchwork of operational and capital approaches. In 2007, an EPA Administrative Order was issued against the KISS due to excessive leakage leading to sanitary sewer overflows during wet-weather events. Solving the problem proved to be complicated. Major barriers included: -Fragmentation of service among 15 KISS municipalities -Decades-old intermunicipal agreements that don't reflect current regulatory requirements -Income disparities across the County, leading to differing views on capital investments -Competing objectives: planning for growth vs. managing costs -Changing regulatory requirements over time Over nearly two decades, LCA and the KISS municipalities struggled to develop a path forward. In the mid-2010s, a new approach started to take shape, one that focused on collaboration and developing a unified approach in communicating with regulatory agencies. As a result of this approach, EPA lifted the Administrative Order in 2019. The KISS municipalities' problems were not solved, however. A record-breaking period of excessive rainfall in the Lehigh Valley occurred in 2019, causing major increases in sewage flows and SSOs within the KISS. By mid-2019, the Kline's Island WWTP had exceeded its permit, and a new corrective action plan was needed. LCA and the KISS municipalities began an intensive period of planning in 2021, which concluded in 2025 with the submission of its first-ever regional Sewage Facilities Plan. The plan includes commitments from each of the 15 KISS municipalities to manage their sewer rehab programs effectively, collaborate on regional programs such as flow monitoring and management, and share in the cost of regional projects such as pump upgrades at the plant. While solid engineering work (and lots of it!) was completed during the five-year planning period, the key success factors for achieving a regional sewer plan were communication, collaboration and trust-building. In this presentation, LCA representatives will review the approaches taken to engage with municipal leaders, elected officials, media, and the public to identify and address the barriers and achieve this regional plan. More work is required, but the KISS municipalities are on their way!

This paper was presented at WEFTEC 2026 in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Presentation time

09:30:00

10:00:00

Session time

8:30:00

10:00:00

SessionStronger Together: Regional Collaboration for Water Resilience

Session locationErnest N. Morial Convention Center

TopicBiosolids and Residuals, Utility Management and Leadership, Watershed Management, Water Quality, and Groundwater

Author(s)

Craley, Rocky, Gross, Liesel, Mastracchio, John, Green, Zachary

Author(s)R. Craley1, L. Gross2, J. Mastracchio1, Z. Green4

Author affiliation(s)Raftelis, 1Raftelis Financial Consultants, 1

SourceProceedings of the Water Environment Federation

Document typeConference Paper

PublisherWater Environment Federation

Print publication date Sep 2026

DOI10.2175/193864718825160361

Volume / Issue

Content sourceWEFTEC

Word count13

Description: Making a Strategic Plan is the Easy Part … Actually Implementing It …...

Making a Strategic Plan is the Easy Part … Actually Implementing It … Well, That's a Whole Different Ball Game! -- SWBNO's Strategy for Strategic Plan Implementation

Abstract

The Sewerage and Water Board of New Orleans (SWBNO) is an organization employing more than 1,300 high-performing individuals who work together to produce drinking water, clean wastewater, and move stormwater for nearly 400,000 residents and millions of visitors each year. SWBNO started a transformational journey just a few years ago by undertaking a comprehensive strategic planning effort where stakeholders met, discussed, and identified key focus areas, goals, and tactics to elevate their utility services. The six focus areas from the plan include: Ensuring Financial Stability Advancing Technology Modernization Addressing Workforce Development and Enrichment Elevating Customer Service and Stakeholder Engagement Improving Infrastructure Resiliency and Reliability Driving Organizational and Operational Improvement But wisely, SWBNO realized that identifying, defining, and creating a strategic roadmap was only the beginning. In order to affect change within their organization and community, SWBNO needed to be committed to the implementation and execution of the plan. They understood that the integration of the plan into the culture of the organization was the only way to show progress and ultimately success. SWBNO staff have begun that effort by developing annual work plans against their 5-year strategic plan with an intentionality of tracking progress of the identified tactics and organizational/operational performance toward the goals of the six focus areas. The utility is currently using a performance cloud-based software package called Ellio to measure both the progress of tactical level implementation as well as their performance around a number of KPIs (key performance indicators) and inform executive staff and the Board on overall effectiveness of implementing the plan. To date, there have been some hurdles in executing the plan, which staff turnover and data availability, but overall, with each passing month, quarter, and year, the commitment to performance tracking improves and momentum is building. The Session Leaders will reveal progress to-date, will demonstrate the performance evaluation software, and will 'get real' about the challenges faced in introducing culture shaping initiatives. SWBNO has a long road to 'success,' but has already learned several lessons along the way to share with their peers.

This paper was presented at the WEF/AWWA Utility Management Conference, February 13-16, 2024.

SpeakerCraley, Rocky

Presentation time

11:00:00

11:30:00

Session time

10:30:00

12:00:00

SessionStrategic Planning B

Session number35

Session locationOregon Convention Center, Portland, Oregon

TopicStrategic Planning and Implementation

Author(s)

Craley, Rocky

Author(s)R. Craley1, K. Tymrak2

Author affiliation(s)Raftelis 1; Sewerage and Water Board of New Orleans 2;

SourceProceedings of the Water Environment Federation

Document typeConference Paper

PublisherWater Environment Federation

Print publication date Feb 2024

DOI10.2175/193864718825159274

Volume / Issue

Content sourceUtility Management Conference

Word count28

Base text size -

Craley, Rocky

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