On June 16, the board of the Pagosa Springs Sanitation and General Improvement District (PSSGID), which also sits as the Pagosa Springs Town Council, approved spending around $3.8 million to stabilize its wastewater conveyance system.
The PSSGID operates, through a series of pump and lift stations, an uphill conveyance system, sending its wastewater about 7 miles uphill to the Vista wastewater treatment plant, which is owned and operated by Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District (PAWSD).
Since coming online in 2015, this system has been plagued by failing pumps, electrical malfunctions, aging pipes and other problems.
The town hired Roaring Fork Engineering to consult with it about the future outlook of the system, as well as weighing the costs and analyzing the possibility of switching to a different system, which would utilize a more traditional town-run treatment plant downtown.
The PSSGID also recently hired Interim Public Works Director Phil Bennett to analyze how to ensure that the current system works until a new plant could be designed and built, a multiyear project.
Town Manager David Harris said, “We’ve been having a struggling issue with our conveyance system — our forced main that takes the town’s effluent the 7 miles to the PAWSD’s” plant.
One recurring issue with the system has been the pumps, Harris explained, and “we need to get these [new pumps] in the queue for ordering.”
But, in addition to the pumps, the PSSGID will be ordering and installing “new controls and wire terminations” in the system, as well as running a sensor through the pipeline to determine the “health and condition” of the system, he said.
The funds for this stabilization project will come out of the funds previously set aside to address what the PSSGID calls category 4 and 5 problems with the system, he explained.
Bennett has stated that a major part of shoring up the current system so it can last another decade is replacing the pumps at pump stations 1 and 2 with the proper pumps that should have been installed initially, but were not installed because of cost concerns at that time.
Bennett noted at a previous meeting that his main objective is to “keep the force main running” for another 10 years or so, because “we don’t have another way, right now, to keep the sewer running.”
He suggested another decade would give the town time to explore options for a new downtown treatment plant.
He noted that the town must “utilize the existing system” while minimizing disruptions to an “aging and poorly designed” system, and then “decommission it after 10 years.”
He expressed optimism that the new Flygt pumps would be a better fit for the system and should work for the district over the next 10 years.
He explained that “the only other system like ours in the world,” near Portland, Ore., uses these Flygt pumps and they work well.
“Updating the pump stations and the forced sewer main will entail a multi-part project,” an agenda document on the matter states.
It adds, “A pipeline investigation will inform Staff if there’s a leak in the forced main and if there are air pockets. This investigation will happen in early August.”
“What we are asking for today [is the funding] for the long lead time items, and then that would start the clock of about six months,” Bennett said.
This would allow the PSSGID to “prepare the entire system for operations for when the new pumps arrive,” he added.
The pipe inspection would be looking for the build up of “gas pockets,” he added, “so we can get rid of those gas pockets.”
This would also allow the system to operate within the parameters of what the new pumps can handle, he noted.
Roaring Fork Engineering’s Maggie McHugh added, “It’s imperative that these new pumps operate as intended along the assumed system curve.”
Board member Mat deGraaf asked if any investigations show why the “air release valves were installed improperly.”
Bennett answered, “No. We have not found any decision documents that show” why they were installed that way.
Board member Brooks Lindner asked what would happen to the project to repair the category 4 and 5 problems if the board allocated this money to this other project.
“Would we be just waiting for the funds to come in from the new sales tax?” he asked
“Yes,” Harris replied.
“Our category 4 and 5 projects must get done, yes, but we also got to keep the flow going,” Harris said. “We need to stabilize this system, and at the same time we need to put out to bid the design and building of a new wastewater treatment plant, and, you know, how is that exactly going to come out?”
Mayor Shari Pierce reminded her colleagues that “we still owe PAWSD for this system that we’re now fixing, plus for the system upgrades to the Vista treatment plant, so it just continues to go, and … I can’t imagine where we’d be right now without the [passage] of that sales tax issue.”
She added, “Even with that, it’s a lot of work for staff to figure out all the cash flow issues with this.”
When a motion was made to allocate the funds, it was seconded and approved unanimously by the board, with Bergon and Martinez absent from the meeting.
derek@pagosasun.com
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