PF council OKs $300M master wastewater treatment plan

The Post Falls City Council approved a new master plan outlining upgrades and modifications to its wastewater treatment plant.

The new master plan outlines a nearly $300 million dollar capital plan, which accounts for replacing aging equipment, meeting the treatment requirements imposed by state and federal law and expanding to accommodate future growth, a Friday press release said.

The primary funding mechanisms for the plan are user fees for the maintenance and replacement of existing systems, and capacity fees for expansion. Capacity fees are assessed to new or expanding users of the system. 

While the prior plan required significant rate increases to meet this requirement, the new plan recommends annual increases of 2.5% to user fees to meet the operating and capital needs of the utility, the release said.

Post Falls Mayor Ron Jacobson said he was pleased to see annual 2.5% increases to user fees as the past double-digit increases “were some painful increases."

The expansion elements of the plan "ensure the facility will remain ahead of anticipated growth, as it has for the last several decades," the release said.

The prior master plan, adopted in 2013, set a course, both technically and financially, for upgrades to remove additional phosphorus from the water to meet limits set by the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

The new plan carries on many of the central themes in the 2013 plan, including investment in property to allow for land application to treated water on farm crops. 

Diverting some of the water that would otherwise be released to the Spokane River to a recycled water program allows the city to remain below the strict limits on the number of pounds of phosphorus which can be discharged into the river, even when factoring in expected growth. 

City Councilor Samantha Steigleder said she wanted to ensure user fees accounted for projected future users.

Craig Borrenpohl, the city’s utilities manager and the lead on the project, said the user fees are distributed among those connected to the system and that the financial plan accounted for future growth in the calculations. 

The approved master plan will now be submitted to the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality for technical review. 

"The plan itself does not commit the city to any future actions but provides a roadmap of what will be needed, when it will be needed, and how to pay for those needs," the release said.