Log In


Reset Password
Columnists View from the Center Bear Smart The Travel Troubleshooter Dear Abby Student Aide Of Sound Mind Others Say Powerful solutions You are What You Eat Out Standing in the Fields What's up in Durango Skies Watch Yore Topknot Local First RE-4 Education Update MECC Cares for kids

No simple solution to where to put the sewer plant

Brookie

The siting of the wastewater treatment plant is a contentious issue that has no good solution.

In 1983, City Council could have moved the plant from its present site to undeveloped land further down the Animas River above the High Bridge for about $1 million, about 10 percent of the upgrade cost at the time. Since then, Santa Rita Park and its recreational amenities have grown up around the plant. Visitors suffer its industrial appearance and frequently unpleasant aroma. Unsurprisingly, everyone would prefer to rebuild elsewhere instead of making a permanent decision to retain its current location.

The challenge facing the community is to identify an alternative site and to understand all the potential consequences of choosing it. The city staff and City Council have been examining possible sites for the last year. Key results of this process appear at http://durangogov.org/index.aspx?NID=904, which also includes a link to a PowerPoint presentation by City Manager Ron LeBlanc that reviews alternative sites.

This summarizes some of those considerations:

Sites below the High Bridge are prohibitively expensive and create permanent environmental risks of as many as five pipeline crossings of the river.

Most other sites above the High Bridge are too small to accommodate the size of the plant needed to secure our long-term needs.

A possible site next to the La Plata County jail and owned by the county would cost $21 million more than the $58 million cost of renovating the Santa Rita plant. It also would increase operational costs by about $100,000 per year for maintenance and power consumption (and associated carbon footprint) to pump all of our sewage uphill for treatment. At present, the site is not for sale.

City Council has repeatedly rejected the Cundiff Park site as politically unacceptable, owing to imposition on a narrow segment of the population (owners in the Rivergate complex and the bicycle community) for the benefit of the whole community. Disposition of the park would require a referendum, as well as return of about $250,000 to Great Outdoors Colorado, ironically jeopardizing future funding for other recreational facilities.

The final site under consideration is on private property. Full evaluation of its cost on the same basis as other sites is underway, however a preliminary estimate suggests that the cost would be at least 20 percent greater than the Santa Rita site. Additionally, at least one landowner is passionately opposed to selling – or living next to the sewer plant. There also are commercial neighbors who would bear the brunt of the visual or traffic impacts.

Another element of the siting decision, one with potentially very high additional costs, is the potential for delays leading to repeated violations of the treatment plant’s operating permit. The plant already experiences ongoing challenges to keep from discharging excessive ammonia, which is toxic to fish, into the river.

If the November ballot issue passes, authorizing the city to borrow money for the project, work on the Santa Rita design could begin immediately. If the ballot issue fails, it will mean at least a one-year delay in starting the project. If an alternative site is chosen, property purchase would entail delays – and possibly unpopular invocation of eminent domain by the city to take the property. Initiating the lengthy permit process for a new site first requires that the city control the property.

Every delay increases the risk that the Santa Rita plant will violate its discharge permit, possibly incurring financial penalties and a mandate that it expand its treatment capacity (with the potential waste of $8 million) or place a moratorium on building permits in most of the city.

Because the wastewater system is operated as an enterprise fund, the costs are borne by the sewer rate payers. That includes many affluent families who enthusiastically support ever-improving recreational facilities. It also includes businesses that would have to pass rate increases on to their customers, and particularly, many families on low or fixed incomes for whom even larger sewer rate increases would pose a serious burden, either directly or in rents.

As a sustainability advocate, I find off-river sites suspect, owing to the permanent commitment of energy and money to unnecessary pumping – forever. Likewise, reusing the existing facility – with state of the art odor control and mindful design to integrate with the park that has grown up around it – holds appeal over a new plant that still occupies a portion of the river corridor. The alternative, like the Cundiff site, also would impose negative impacts of a civic facility that benefits everyone on a small subset of residents and businesses.

And finally, the wastewater-treatment plant is but one of a series of expensive elements of aging civic infrastructure that will require renovation or replacement in the coming years. Almost all of the money needed to pay for these improvements will come from the same wallets – mine and yours. Is improving the environment of Santa Rita Park, as desirable as that would be, warrant spending about $15 million that might be saved for investments in other civic infrastructure or other recreational amenities? The choice is not simple.

Dean Brookie is mayor of Durango. Reach him at DeanBrookie@DurangoGov.org.



Reader Comments