Lynwood Lewis
For Delegate
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Waste Water Summit was a Success
ONLEY --In his 30 years with the state Department of Environmental Quality, Frank Daniel said the Eastern Shore continuously has been talking about wastewater issues without resolving them.
"It's time for the Eastern Shore to make some decisions and move forward," Daniel said Wednesday at an all-day wastewater summit organized by Delegate Lynwood Lewis.
Officials say wastewater treatment is the linchpin to everything from affordable housing to economic development. But the local approach has been piecemeal and marred by failed attempts at consensus.
That's what Lewis sought during the program, which drew a crowd of 80 people, including Accomack, Northa-mpton and town officials, engineers, private citizens and out-of-state developers.
"Apparently there is some interest in the topic," Lewis said, looking around the packed meeting room at Shore Bank headquarters in Onley.
But the news wasn't all good. State attendees at the summit said building wastewater systems will become more complicated with tighter environmental restrictions -- making alternatives, including land application systems and systems that reuse treated wastewater for irrigation and aquifer recharge, more attractive.
Representatives of towns with their own systems talked about massive capital expenditures and, in some cases, operation costs that have exceeded projections.
Citing the abundance of talk lately on the Shore about wastewater issues, Lewis said he hoped getting the various parties together would help.
"When you get everyone in one room, occasionally a consensus may develop and new ideas may develop," he said, adding that while decisions about wastewater are up to localities, those decisions will be "formative" for the future economic development of the entire region.
Expensive Systems
Attendees heard from state health and environmental agency representatives, engineering firms and government funders about different sewage treatment options and their costs, along with reports on about six existing local systems --four town systems, NASA and Riverside Shore Memorial Hospital.
Jim Davis of the Eastern Shore Health District said the 21st century will see an increasing use of decentralized treatment over conventional plants, while Daniel, Remediation Program Manager of the DEQ's Tidewater Regional Office, told the audience that because of nutrient limits and other restrictions it will become "very, very difficult" to get a permit for a plant that discharges effluent into local waters, such as Onancock's municipal plant.
Onancock Town Manager Sandy Manter said the town's new $14.5 million, 750,000-gallon-per-day treatment plant is on track to be completed by June 2010 and said the town still plans to include at the plant a facility to receive and treat septic tank pump-out, which will likely be built using town funds.
"It's no secret that our plant is going to have some excess capacity," Manter said, adding that Onancock is open to talking to any parties interested in using the facility.
Onancock spends $520,000 a year to operate and maintain its treatment plant, she said.
Bob Panek of Cape Charles said that town spends $530,000 a year to operate its plant. Bids were opened last week to construct a new town facility with the same capacity --250,000 gallons a day with the possibility of future expansion to 500,000 gallons --as the present plant, which was built in 1983. He said the apparent low bid is $14.7 million.
The town will spend another $1.2 million to reroute a half mile of main and modernize three pump stations, he said.
Panek told the group, "Density is your friend," and said localities should "plan for growth, but don't bank on it."
Cape Charles had to simultaneously address an obsolete treatment system, new state nutrient limits, and projected growth from three approved developments from 1,250 connections to 5,700, he said.
While the town has gotten $12 million in grants and loans, that leaves $6 million to pay, which could mean up to $386,000 a year in debt service and could add $28 to each customer's monthly bill.
"You've got to ask yourself, 'What are you trying to solve?'" Panek said.
Two other towns with smaller decentralized systems, Exmore and Parksley, have found having them is more work than was anticipated.
"We've found they're expensive to operate," Exmore interim Town Manager Artie Miles said of the town's three systems.
"It was done on the cheap and we're paying the price," he said.
He said he has two or three people a week come to his office wanting to hook up to town sewer lines and said Exmore is working with engineers on a design to provide more service.
He cautioned that rates must go up to meet the demand and said, "Once you're in, you've got to be all in. We hope to progress, (but) we've got a long way to go."
Parksley Mayor Rick Chase said the town's new $2.8 million municipal system, which began operating in May, requires more oversight than the town had anticipated.
"For the small towns on the Shore ... it is a considerable undertaking," he said, adding that Parksley ended up paying $70,000 out of pocket for hidden additional costs when it built its system and now faces paying another $7,500 a year in testing fees.
But Chase said Parksley had no choice but to install a municipal system because its downtown businesses' septic systems were failing and were, in many cases, located beneath the buildings themselves.
Moving Forward
Daniel said the summit is only a first step toward resolving the region's wastewater problems and it will take community leaders and commitment of local funds for things like feasibility studies to move forward.
"It's going to cost; there's no way around it," he said, adding, "I applaud Delegate Lewis for bringing this summit together."
Northampton County Board of Supervisors Vice Chairman Spencer Murray said the counties and towns need to work together for greater efficiency. He said he has told Northampton's Board of Supervisors, "It's time for us to either lead, follow or get ... out of the way; the fact that we have no plan doesn't mean there will be no activity."
And Lewis' opponent in the race for the 100th District House of Delegates seat this fall, Melody Scalley, had the last word of the day, saying she is concerned about delegating authority for wastewater treatment to "individuals who have the right to tax or set fees" but who do not answer to the electorate -- an apparent reference to a public service authority.
The question of whether to create a public service authority to oversee wastewater treatment in Accomack County has been at a stalemate for months, with some county supervisors supporting it and others opposed.
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