Staff Reports
The city of Columbus announced late Friday that City Utilities Executive Director Scott Dompke is no longer an employee of the utilities department.
“We appreciate his work and effort for the city over the past 18+ months,” Mary Ferdon, executive director of administration and community development, said in a statement late Friday.
The city’s Utilities Services Board will next week begin the process of hiring a replacement for Dompke and an interim leadership plan will be announced next week, Feron said.
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Dompke joined the city’s utility department in July 2018, taking over leadership of a city operation functioning with aging infrastructure, from pipes to water plants, and a rate structure that had not been increased in more than 25 years.
He replaced Keith Reeves, who retired after a 38-year career with the city utilities department, which provides water and wastewater treatment for about 44,000 city customers.
When Dompke took over, he faced a challenge of rising out of a rough 2017 for the department, which included the shutdown of a well near the Bartholomew County 4-H Fairgrounds for E. coli contamination caused by equipment failure that resulted in a rare boil-water order for the city.
The utilities also shut down two other wells in its south well field in 2014 for 1,4 dioxane contamination and dedicated $350,000 to determine where the solvent is originating and how small amounts of it are being found in the two wells south of the wastewater treatment plant.
During his time with the city, Dompke and city utilities announced a proposed in June 2020 a water rate increase for the water utility to pay for repairs to the aging infrastructure.
The pending rate case recently reached a settlement with state utility regulators, with customers seeing an overall rate increase of almost 75% over the next three years.
In addition to that plan, a rate increase for the city’s sewer utility could go into effect in June. A rate study for the sewer utility began Dec. 1 and was expected to take about 90 days.
