SJW Group

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the first quarter financial results conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 on your telephone. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. If you require any further assistance, please press star 0. I would now like to hand the conference over to James Lynch. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator. Welcome to the 2022 First Quarter Financial Results Conference Call for SJW Group. I will be presenting today with Eric Thornburg, Chairman of the Board, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Andrew Walters, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. For those who would like to follow along, slides accompanying our remarks are available on our website at www.sjwgroup.com. Before we begin today, I would like to remind you that this presentation and related materials posted on our website may contain forward-looking statements. These statements are based on estimates and assumptions made by the company in light of its experience, historical trends, current conditions and expected future developments, as well as other factors that the company believes are appropriate under the circumstances. Many factors could cause the company's actual results and performance to differ materially from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. For a description of some of the factors that could cause actual results to be different from statements in this presentation, we refer you to the financial results press release and to our most recent forms, 10-K, 10-Q, and 8-K, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, copies of which may be obtained on our website. All forward-looking statements are made as of today, and SJW Group disclaims any duty to update or revise such statements. You will have an opportunity to ask questions at the end of the presentation. As a reminder, this webcast is being recorded, and an archive of the webcast will be available until July 27, 2022. You can access the press release and the webcast at our corporate websites. I will now turn the call over to Eric Thornburg.

Eric? Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining us. I'm Eric Thornburg, and it is my honor to serve as Chair, President, and CEO of SJW Group. It is my pleasure to be joined on this call by Jim Lynch, Chief Accounting Officer, and Andrew Walters, Chief Financial Officer. After my initial remarks, Jim will review our financial results for the quarter that delivered 12 cents per diluted common share compared to 9 cents in the same period last year. Andrew will then discuss our California water supply status later in the call. He will also provide an update on regulatory developments and share our financial guidance for 2022. We're fortunate to lead the employees of SJW Group across all of our four states who are passionate about delivering a reliable supply of high quality drinking water and wastewater services for the families and communities that we're privileged to serve. our people continue to deliver for customers, communities, shareholders, and each other. In early 2022, we focused on laying the groundwork to deliver our 2022 financial and ESG goals successfully. Some of our achievements include reaching a settlement agreement in San Jose Water's 2022 general rate case with the Public Advocate's Office and receiving approval from the Maine Public Utilities Commission on the settlement agreement between Main Water Company and the Public Advocate's Office for the Biddeford-Sacos Division's new $60 million drinking water treatment facility. Through the winter months, we continued investing in drinking water infrastructure. Just this week, Connecticut Water filed an application with the Connecticut Public Utilities Regulatory Authority to begin recovery of $10 million in completed drinking water infrastructure projects. Andrew will discuss this later in detail. We strengthen governance around our ESG commitments through the creation of an ESG Council. The Council is made up of executive leaders, state presidents and senior managers representing ESG initiatives within the organization. It will provide the framework for the prioritization and reporting on delivery of projects, initiatives and investments as related to environmental, social and governance initiatives and we'll track our progress toward established ESG goals, such as our pledge to reduce Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030 using a 2019 baseline. We will hold ourselves accountable to report on existing commitments and create meaningful new goals. Our ESG scores are strong. ISS rates our governance at its best rating. Among our water utility peers, We're tied for first in social and tied for second in environment. One example of our ESG commitment is our new Saco River Drinking Water Resource Center in Maine. We've set aside 250 acres of land near the facility as protected open space and conducted wetland restoration on the property. Agreements have been executed for the installation of a solar photovoltaic array that will offset 100% of the energy needs of the new facility. Development is underway for a pollinator garden and a trail for passive recreation. The facility itself was designed using the Envision Framework, a joint collaboration between the Zafnas Program for Sustainable Infrastructure at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and the Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure. I'm also quite proud of our DEI progress. We've been successful in recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce throughout the organization. Of our 771 employees, approximately 35% of our employees are people of color, nearly two-thirds are under the age of 50, and women are about one-third of our total workforce. Our supplier diversity program has also taken root. Building on our successful program at San Jose Water, our diverse spend across all four states continues to increase with more than $55 million placed with diverse suppliers in 2021, which is 21% of our addressable spend. Great progress and our strong commitment to continue this important work. I'll now turn the call over to Jim, who will review our financial results. Jim?