Cathlamet mayor urges care in setting biosolids ordinance

The Town of Cathlamet has submitted a detailed letter of comment on Wahkiakum County's proposed ordinance to govern application of biosolids in the county.

Mayor George Wehrfritz said council members had asked him to write a letter of comment about the proposed ordinance, which will be considered at a public hearing next Tuesday, 7 p.m., in the courthouse.

The proposed ordinance recognizes three grades of biosolids--Class A, Class B and Septage. Class A biosolids have the most treatment, and septage, biosolids composed primarily of human waste from septic tanks, has the least.

The ordinance would provide that:

--No Class B material may be applied to any land within an "area of special flood hazard, and that

--No sewage sludge or septage not meeting the definition of Class A or Class B biosolids may be applied to any land in the county unless it is licensed by the state, it is applied in areas more than 1000 feet from real property belonging to any person without control over authority to which the sewage sludge or septage is being applied, and it is not in an area of special flood hazard.

"From the town’s perspective, we are neither for nor against the proposal," Wehrfritz says in the letter. "We recognize that approval of the ordinance would impact our plan to replace an ageing wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) by potentially raising the cost of the project marginally, yet we also see that approval would create new opportunities for town/county cooperation in waste management.

"Sludge from our existing WWTP: The town will need to dispose of sludge (Class B) from existing sewage ponds at the current WWTP plant located beside the marina when those ponds are decommissioned. One option under discussion is disposal of the sludge on town-owned forestland located inside the county. The proposed Biosolids Ordinance raises new regulatory hurdles should we proceed on this course, so in a narrow sense it would hinder the town's effort to replace our failing WWTP with a modern, ecologically-sound facility."

Another impact, Wehrfritz said, is that the ordinance "would establish restrictions on septage so stringent that they amount to a virtual ban on its disposal within Wahkiakum County. Most households in the county use septic tanks for their waste. So, in effect, the ordinance would mandate that human waste generated by most households in Wahkiakum County must be exported elsewhere for disposal. That would happen as 'honey bucket' trucks empty septic tanks then drive scores or even hundreds of miles to find either a WWTP willing to process our septage, or a community willing to have it dumped on their land for a fee.

"The commission should anticipate that dumping our waste outside the county will become more difficult and more costly over time . . . What we need, therefore, is a plan to address Wahkiakum’s waste-disposal needs within the county."

Wehrfritz said the town has identified three ways this can occur:

1. Expand Cathlamet’s proposed WWTP to incorporate septage processing. The plant’s current design allows for this function, though creating it is beyond the Town’s financial resources and goal of modernizing its own system primarily for in-town customers.

2. Enlarge Cathlamet’s WWTP “footprint” further into county territory surrounding the Town. Sewage lines are . . . a better option than the septic tanks these areas currently rely on for waste disposal.

3. Adopt processing to Class A standards as a long-term goal.

Cathlamet’s planned WWTP will process waste to the Class B standard, but it is designed for future expansion to Class A processing, should that ever become necessary and affordable, Wehrfritz said. That is not cost-effective today, but may become so in the future.

"The proposed Biosolids Ordinance now under discussion was drafted in response to the planned disposal of septage from another county on land near Grays River," Wehrfritz said. "One risk in the ordinance as written is that it puts Wahkiakum in the position of exporting its own waste to other communities for disposal, thereby raising the likelihood that they – like us – will see not-in-my-backyard protest movements rise up in opposition to septage dumping.

"Why does that matter? Because, over time, we should anticipate that disposal options will become scarcer and more expensive. It follows that Wahkiakum should seek to solve its waste problem within the county, which can be done most efficiently through town-county cooperation, as outlined above."