How Do You Spell Relief?: O–O: Operational Optimization through Industry Best Practice

Most municipal water and wastewater utilities have entered into a period in which many assets have reached the end of their useful lives due to age, condition, technical obsolescence, and other factors. As this is occurring, there is also greater pressure from elected officials and rate payers to keep rates and costs stable. This leads to an increased focus on the continuous optimization of operations and maintenance (O&M) costs and work practices, which requires an ongoing focus on both effective asset management and potential operational efficiency opportunities. Equally important is the measurement and tracking of performance to justify investments and quantify O&M efficiency gains. This continuous evaluation and scrutiny of O&M expenditures and work activities will serve to ensure infrastructure and financial sustainability for utilities long into the future.This presentation will describe the activities employed by the City of Virginia Beach Department of Public Utilities (DPU) to optimize its O&M activities and work practices through a focused effort consisting of: (1) the development of current/updated standard operating procedures (SOPs) covering the major work activities that are performed on a daily, or frequent, basis; (2) the conduct of a best practices gap analysis to produce a roadmap for ongoing improvements to O&M practices and procedures; and (3) the assessment of existing staffing levels to determine their sufficiency to meet current and future service level targets in order to identify resource allocation issues and training needs. The specific objectives of these efforts included:• Fostering greater staff understanding of important maintenance key performance indicators (KPIs) and their relationship to day-to-day operational activities• Supporting improved and consistent utilization of computerized maintenance management system software• Providing useful data to inform decision making for both managers and front-line staff• Allowing enhanced tracking and monitoring of performance over time, including the provision of information for both internal and external stakeholders• Supporting improved and consistent work processes, procedures, and documentation• Ensuring focus on maintenance activities that offer the highest benefit to the DPU and its customers• Understanding the impacts of staffing levels and training opportunities on DPU’s ability to meet accepted service level targetsIn addition, the work efforts directly supported several critical elements of DPU’s Draft Strategic Plan Goals, including:• Maintaining financially sound water and wastewater utilities• Enhancing technology to improve quality, customer service, productivity, and efficiency• Maintaining a workforce that has the knowledge, skills, abilities, values, and resources to accomplish the Departments missionThis presentation will provide the step-by-step approach that Virginia Beach DPU employed to ensure that the management, operation, and maintenance of its water and wastewater utilities is being performed in a highly efficient manner utilizing best industry practices, and will discuss improvements and efficiencies gained from the process.The DPU’s ongoing asset management and organizational improvement efforts have resulted in excellent system reliability, regulatory performance, and financial stability. This operational optimization effort is another focused step by DPU’s executive leadership and management teams to ensure that a performance management and continuous improvement culture and strategy are in place to continue to foster operational optimization and financial and infrastructure sustainability in the future.