CITY OF ATLANTA'S REENGINEERING AND CONTRACT OPERATIONS PROGRAM

In early 1997, the City of Atlanta was faced with an 80 percent sewer rate increase to fund a Capital Improvement Program in excess of 1 billion. Mayor Bill Campbell directed that a full range of cost reduction options be evaluated to mitigate the rate increase. A comprehensive assessment of the City's entire water and wastewater operations was conducted and a range of internal and external management approaches were considered. After reviewing the alternatives, the Mayor announced his plan which consisted of a combination of approaches: contract operation of the entire Water System, contract operation of the largest wastewater treatment plant, and reengineering of the other City wastewater and sewer operations.Since the City launched this aggressive reengineering and contract operations program, all parts of the Mayor's plan have been successfully implemented or have been initiated. Contract operation of the Water System has been in place since January 1, 1999. The Atlanta reengineering plan for the Sewer System was developed in 1999 and a 5-year implementation plan is underway. Due to several factors and events, the City shifted from a plan for contract operation of the largest wastewater treatment plant to implementation of a design-build-operate contract for handling biosolids at all three of the City's wastewater treatment plants.This paper provides an update of the City's reengineering and contract operations program 4 years after it was initiated.