| Cost concerns for potential Coon Lake community sewer in Ham Lake |
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| Wednesday, 26 August 2009 | ||
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Staff writer Residents from the Comfort Resort and Hiawatha Beach neighborhoods packed the Ham Lake City Council chambers Aug. 20 to get an update and ask questions about a potential community sewer system that could service 179 properties. The costs are extremely preliminary because a lot more work has to be done, but the council and a neighborhood sewer task force that includes 10 residents wanted to
The council did not commit to anything after the conclusion of the almost two hour meeting. It will meet with the task force to discuss the next step, said Councilmember Gary Kirkeide, one of two elected members on the task force along with Mayor Paul Meunier. “The purpose of this meeting is not to say this is what we’ve come up with and what we’re going to do with this. The purpose is to say this is what we’ve come up with to this point and we just want to share that information with you,” said Councilmember Tom Johnson. Almost all residents who spoke during the televised meeting were against the high project assessment and told the council to go back to the drawing board. The capital costs for a community sewer project could cost between $4.8 million and $6.8 million, which would be spread over 40 years. The capital costs include land acquisition estimates, but not road reconstruction costs. Thomas Hailey, a senior engineer with RFC Engineer, said road reconstruction could cost between $1.9 million and $2.1 million. The council has not decided whether the Comfort Resort and Hiawatha Beach residents should pay for all, some or none of the road costs, so Hailey did not include any road assessment costs in his estimates of monthly user fees charged to the residents. The assessment charged to residents for capital costs could range from $26,816 to $37,924. In order to hook up to the sewer system, the hook-up fee for the average homeowner could be $7,000. Hailey said the connection cost could be as low as $800 or as high as $17,700 under the current scenarios being explored. The range of capital costs is so wide because it is unknown how much land would be needed for the treatment area because surface soil investigation, wetland delineation, the hydrogeologic study and the topographic survey have to be completed, Hailey said. The cost to residents would be spread over decades. The capital costs would be paid off after 40 years, so the user fee would significantly decrease then, but it would still be in place to cover annual repair and maintenance costs and to pay for use of the system. The user fee is hard to pin down of course until actual costs are known and it is dependent on how many people hook up. If everybody hooks up, the monthly fee could range from $167 per month to $247 per month. If 82 percent hook-up within the first 20 years, but 100 percent hook-up is not achieved until after a couple of decades, the monthly fee for the first 20 years could range from $260 to $358 for those that hook up right away while other property owners that choose to wait would still pay between $91 and $157 per month. Michael Novack said he can get his system pumped every month for a cost less than the $260 per month user fee estimate. This comment drew the first crowd applause of the evening. “If we have to incur this cost, we’ll probably end up having to move,” said Troy Anderson. “I’ve lived there 18 years, I don’t want to move, but I feel like I probably will have to.” Doris Johannes said she and her husband paid $16,000 to put in an experimental mound system six years ago. The 90-year-old resident questioned whether she would have to hook into the sewer system. Meunier responded that this is one of the many factors the council will have to make decisions on. “We have a lot of variables that we don’t know and we have a lot of decisions to make. Does everybody hook up? Do you grandfather people in. If you do grandfather people in, how long does it last? If you do grandfather people in it affects the users fee for the other people.” Property appraisals would also be necessary so the task force and council know how high project assessments could be because these could be no higher than the increased valuation of the home due to this project. Gayle Johnson cannot imagine how anybody’s valuation would increase by $40,000 and the current homeowners would have to eat this cost. “What good is land values if you can’t afford to stay in your house?” asked Bill Daun. Paul Lewis said even at the low end of the estimates, the city will have a hard time legally justifying the assessments. “The only thing I really wanted to say is why isn’t this project dead in the water until we can secure or at least get some promises on funding beyond just the neighborhood?” Lewis asked. “This is a city problem. This is a county problem. This is a state problem.” Lewis suggested the city should approach the watershed district to help out. Mike Bury, who has been pushing the council periodically throughout this decade to find a solution, said this area was platted in 1928 and the lots are too small to meet existing septic, well and structure setback requirements. He said it would be mathematically impossible for everyone to have an individual sewage treatment system (ISTS) and comply with these standards. Bury said they may have a good system today, but with concerns about failing systems impacting Coon Lake and the setback mandates, the neighborhood must plan for the future. “No man is an island,” Bury said. “We are all in this together. This is a community problem.” Richard Steuck questioned how many systems are failing. Hailey said three systems are failing and there are over 100 systems that are questionable, but it does not mean they are in imminent danger of failing. Hailey said the general view is if a septic system has been in for more than 30 years there could be a mottling issue and unless the owner has this tested, they might not be aware of this. Steuck said he has been in his home for 32 years and the last time he had his system pumped, the tank was fine. At the request of the task force, Hailey explored what it would take to connect to the future East Bethel sewer system on the north side of Coon Lake. In order for this scenario to happen, the Ham Lake City Council would have to reverse its comprehensive plan course of not bringing in Metropolitan Council sewer in multiple areas of the community or the Metropolitan Council would have to let up on its standard of requiring new trunk line connections to have a minimum flow of 0.5 million gallons per day (mgd). The Comfort Resort/Hiawatha Beach area would only contribute 0.06 mgd, according to Hailey. Another factor is East Bethel considers the north end of Coon Lake to be in Phase 1A of its sewer plans. Phase 1 is along Highway 65 in the southern area of the community. The preliminary schedule, which will greatly depend on demand for the sewer service, puts the northern Coon Lake neighborhood sewer project off until at least 2015. Rich McMaken, task force member, said if a property owner has a failing septic system, they will have to incur these costs at some point or the issue will have to be addressed in the closing documents of a home sale agreement. He said this problem will not go away and it will not be any cheaper to fix the problem in the future. “I know that for the first time in my citizenship in Ham Lake, the city council has been proactive on this thing and I think we ought to at least acknowledge them and not think of them all as adversaries,” McMaken said. Eric Hagen is at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it |
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