SEELEY LAKE - The fate of a pair of bonds to fund Seeley Lake’s proposed sewer system is in the hands of the voters with ballots being mailed out Feb. 3. If the bonds pass in the Feb. 23 election, the Seeley Lake Sewer District can move forward to finish checking off the conditions of the funding package and put the proposed sewer project out to bid. However the water gets muddier when looking at the impacts of a “no” vote.
The Pathfinder reached out to the Missoula City-County Health Department, Montana Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) and the United States Department of Agriculture - Rural Development (RD) to try and answer some of the questions a “no” vote brings up. DEQ replied that due to the busy legislative season they were unable to answer questions ahead of the deadline.
If the bonds fail, what will happen to the current funding?
The current funding for the proposed treatment plant and Phase 1 of the collection system is coming from a mixture of Federal and State agency grants and loans, a private foundation grant as well as local match from the District.
The bulk of the funding package is coming from RD with $7.2 million in grants and $6.4 million in loans.
The loan portion is what the proposed bond would fund. The General Obligation bond before voters in the entire Sewer District would be used to repay the loans for the construction of the wastewater treatment facility, lift stations and force main. Voters in Phase 1 will also be voting on a Revenue bond that will repay loans for the construction of their collection system.
According to an emailed reply from a USDA spokesperson, if either of the bonds fail, RD will not be able to finance the project. The District can ask for an administrative review of the decision to not fund the project.
While the fate of the District’s other grants is not entirely clear, without RD’s $13.6 million, the $17 million project will stall.
Can the District apply for funds in the future?
If the bonds fail, the USDA spokesperson wrote that the vote has no impact on the ability for the District to apply for funding in the future.
“The District can reapply at any time,” wrote the spokesperson.
Reapplying does not mean that the same funding amounts or terms would be awarded.
At a District Board meeting in June of 2018 a RD representative said that new funding packages were limited to $5 million in grants. Also, during presentations in 2018 on Phase 2 funding, the District’s engineer stated that a maximum of 50% grant to loan split should be used for calculating future RD funding. The current funding package exceeds both of those figures.
Is Seeley Lake mandated to have a sewer?
In an interview with the Pathfinder, Missoula City-County Health Department Sanitarian Jim Erven explained that while the proposed sewer is not currently mandated, it is within the Health Department’s authority to do so. He added there are other options they may take as well.
“Health Boards under state law have the duty and the obligation to see the public health standards are complied with,” said Erven. “We have documented evidence that we have elevated and at times exceedances of state nitrate standards [in Seeley’s groundwater].”
While the Health Department has the authority to mandate a sewer, Erven said he felt they would look to the Board of Health’s authorization before taking any action in Seeley.
“Given the magnitude of the implication of any kind of order for this many citizens or this many properties, we would absolutely want there to be a public process through the Health Board hearings,” said Erven.
There is already a Special Management Area covering a significant amount of Seeley that requires landowners wishing to build new systems or increase use of old systems to prove they will not cause exceedances of pollution in the groundwater. Under the current rules, existing systems that fail can be replaced with similar systems.
Other possible actions ahead of mandating a sewer are laid out in a Heath Board letter sent to the Sewer Board in July of 2018. One additional action would be to require failed systems to install advanced treatment when they are replaced. Another listed action would be to require existing working systems be replaced by advanced treatment systems.
Currently there are three test wells that have shown elevated nitrates with one of those wells violating groundwater standards at times. Erven said that there is enough data to show that it is a widespread problem and not just from a couple of point sources. However, it is not fully understood how widespread the problem is. Erven said more data to help understand the problem might be collected before the Health Board made these decisions.
The Sewer Board itself has not speculated on any actions it might take to remedy the groundwater pollution should the proposed sewer stall.
Are there alternatives to the central sewer and can they be funded?
Erven said that the proposed sewer is not the only way to solve Seeley’s groundwater pollution. However, it is the solution that the Sewer District Board has chosen to pursue.
While acknowledging that the proposed system is expensive, Erven said that it is never easy to retrofit a community with sewer. He added the proposed sewer would however “absolutely solve the problem” by treating the wastewater to far beyond what state law requires for groundwater discharge.
Over the years there has been a couple of attempts to get the Sewer Board to look into alternatives including installing advanced individual septic systems or installing cluster systems with advanced treatment to serve groups of houses and businesses.
According to Sewer Board minutes, in 2011 when Missoula County began donating their Public Works Director as a District Manager he suggested looking into less expensive alternatives. He said the proposed system was too expensive for Seeley Lake calling it a “Cadillac” and suggested they “dial it back to a Chevy.” His idea was quickly shot down. The Board president at the time indicated their engineers had not shown them any options other than a full central sewer.
Some alternatives were considered in the 2012 Preliminary Engineering Report (PER) however the only alternatives that didn’t involve a central sewer were: No Action, Septic Tank/Dosed Drainfield and Septic Tank with Sandfilter and Dosed Drainfield. These alternatives were dismissed due to the inability to consistently remove nitrates from the wastewater.
Cluster systems using advanced treatment or replacing individual systems with advanced treatment systems were never considered in the 2012 PER alternatives analysis. Detailed analysis was only done on the central sewer option.
In 2019 the Sewer Board was presented with an alternative using SepticNET systems to treat the wastewater from cluster systems to a nitrate level comparable to the proposed central sewer. The Sewer Board voted to not look into the option because the current funding package would not pay for an alternative and they would risk losing their funding to change course.
The District’s engineer stated at that time that SepticNET systems approved for clusters were not in existence when the 2012 PER was done. Because the alternatives were not considered in the PER, there is no analysis to compare to the proposed system.
The USDA Spokesperson confirmed that the current funding package from RD could only be used for the currently planned project. The funding cannot be used for alternatives though funding for those alternatives can be applied for at any time.
Information available on RD’s website states that the funding for cluster systems or even individual systems managed by the District could be qualified projects for the same type of loan and grant funding program.
In 2019 when the Sewer Board was presented with the SepticNET option, DEQ Environmental Engineer Terry Campbell said that cluster systems could be funded with state programs if they are a public system. To be a public system they need to serve at least 25 people for at least 60 days in a year.
“It’s not an impossibility. I just think, logistically doing smaller systems, multi user systems, community systems would come with a lot of challenges,” said Erven.
Some of those challenges include finding space for replacing individual systems on small lots, the cost of advanced treatment systems, alternative systems would not be moving the discharge to the proposed treatment plant location by the airport and the current funding package won’t fund alternatives.
Links to several of the referenced documents:
Proposed Project budget: https://www.seeleysewer.org/documents/1151/Project_Budget.pdf
RD comment on $5 million grant cap (page 11): https://www.seeleysewer.org/documents/1151/06_21_2018_mins__FINAL.pdf
Engineer comment 50 percent max grant (page 3): https://www.seeleysewer.org/documents/1151/05_03_18_mins__FINAL.pdf
2011 alternative discussion https://www.seeleylake.com/home/customer_files/article_documents/07_21_11_minutes_alternatives_sugested.pdf
Alternatives Screening Process from 2012 PER: https://www.seeleylake.com/home/customer_files/article_documents/alternative_screening_process_from_2012_seeley_lake_per.pdf
Board of Health July 2018 letter: https://www.seeleylake.com/home/customer_files/article_documents/boh_letter_to_sewer_board.pdf
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