Even as Benicia City Council is about to start the process of finding a new treasurer, Finance Committee members said Friday they wouldn’t object to the next treasurer having a vote on committee matters.

When the question of allowing elected officials to join other committee members in voting was aired Friday, Vice Mayor Tom Campbell said that at one time, elected officials were allowed to vote on Finance Committee decisions. He and Councilmember Christina Strawbridge are the Council appointees to the committee.

That policy changed under the leadership of Dennis Lowry, a former committee chairperson, and would need Council approval to reverse.

At the Finance Committee’s April meeting, City Treasurer H.R. Autz pressed his case for allowing the city treasurer to do more than attend meetings. He recommended the committee allow him to vote.

Autz died May 16, before the committee could make his request a formal agenda item. The City Council will consider Tuesday how it will address the office vacancy.

Assistant City Manager Anne Cardwell asked the committee on Friday to give its views on the treasurer’s vote, so those thoughts could be shared with the Council.

Committee member Lee Wines said he thought the city had decided to do away with the position. That’s been considered several times by the Council, despite a 1998 city referendum in which voters endorsed keeping the post elective.

The idea of eliminating the treasurer position altogether was mentioned again after the city lost Treasurer Margaret “Teddie” Bidou, who died Sept. 17, 2010.

Administrative Secretary Teri Davena was chosen to complete Bidou’s term, and accepted no compensation for her additional work, though Campbell said Bidou had been paid $10,000 a year.

In the Nov. 8, 2011 election, Bob Langston defeated Autz in a campaign that saw the two candidates spend much of their campaign lobbying the Council not to eliminate the treasurer’s job, and to give the official some compensation. They convinced the Council to give the treasurer a $200-a-month stipend, other expense allowances and retirement benefits.

Langston died Aug. 25, 2012, and Autz was appointed his successor.

In other matters, the Finance Committee heard Mike Harrington, director of property and casualty actuarial services for Bickmore, a Sacramento firm, recommend the city set aside $2.7 million and nearly $3 million in assets to address continuing worker compensation claims, as well as between $810,000 and $992,000 in anticipation of new claims.

Harrington told the panel that ideally, an insurance claim can be settled quickly, but ongoing medical conditions can cause a worker’s compensation claim to remain open for decades. Though the number of the city’s claims have slowed, the cost per claim has increased.

Benicia is self-insured for claims of up to $350,000, and pays premiums to Local Agency Workers’ Compensation Excess (LAWCX), a state joint-powers authority, for claims that exceed that amount. Innovative Claims Solutions administers claims for the city.

The city is self-insured for liability claims up to $25,000, and pays premiums to the Association of Bay Area Governments to handle the balance of larger claims and administration duties.

In examining the city’s warrant register, which records outgoing expenses, the panel heard Campbell’s explanation about a $176,300 expenditure for a second installment of its water contract.

Benicia’s water purchase is complex and doesn’t come from a single source, he said. The primary source is supposed to be the State Water Project, which normally provides the bulk of the water used by the city.

However, this year, because of drought, state officials have announced variously that contractors such as Benicia would get 5 percent, no water at all, or 5 percent only after summer is over. Regardless of how much is delivered, the city is required to pay for its full allotment.
Campbell called it “an incredibly bad deal,” and said the agreement would last “in perpetuity.”

He said the agreement looked good 25 years ago when Benicia contracted with the state for about 17,200 acre-feet of water each year, at a cost that averaged $22 per acre-foot. While Benicia rarely gets its full allotment — Campbell said it’s happened twice — the city usually receives plenty to cover annual community needs, about 11,000 acre-feet.

The drought caused the state to reduce distribution to the point Benicia has limited access to other water it holds in reserve. If the city gets 5 percent of its allotment, it would be paying the equivalent of $440 an acre-foot, Campbell said.

The Council has authorized spending up to $900,000 on water to meet 2014 needs. But with the drought, he said, water is selling for $600 to $1,000 for an acre-foot by those who have it to spare.

“When you have enough water to sell, nobody wants to buy,” Campbell said.