ECWSA Chairman
Set for completion in December of 2014, construction is well underway on a major rebuild of the Evans City Wastewater Treatment Plant. Built in 1975, the current facility serves over 850 residential, commercial and industrial customers in Evans City Borough, Callery Borough and portions of Jackson and Forward Townships. The Plant is located just northwest of the Borough along the Breakneck Creek and currently has a capacity of 500,000 gallons per day.
The project will increase the plants capacity to 850,000 gallons per day, converting it to a Sequential Batch Reactor (SBR) Plant which will improve the quality of wastewater discharged into the Breakneck Creek, allow for future customers in the surrounding communities to connect, and will easily handle heavy rain events which would at times overflow the current plant.Once the project is completed, the new plant will use modern technological systems which include two (2) new biological tanks, one (1) aerobic digester tank, ultraviolet light disinfection system, NPW underground tank system, return pump station wet well and four (4) storm water ponds to improve the collection of wastewater, the treatment of sludge and the management of bio-solids. These enhancements will reduce the negative impacts of wastewater effluent on human health and the surrounding environment, and enable the Evans City Water & Sewer Authority (ECWSA) to meet the PADEP’s Wastewater Regulations.
In 2002 Evans City Borough, which owned the Wastewater Treatment Plant, entered into a Consent Order and Agreement with the PADEP to address permit violations and hydraulic overload conditions at the Treatment Plant. A Corrective Action Plan was adopted and in part required an Act 537 Treatment Plan Study, along with sanitary sewer collection system rehabilitation and repair. The study was submitted in 2008 shortly after the ECWSA was formed and a collection system rehabilitation project was completed in 2009. Following the Study, the PADEP required the Borough to consider regionalization of the Treatment Plant and to incorporate post-construction flow monitoring between December of 2009 through May of 2010 which provided justification and recommendation for a new Treatment Plant.
The ECWSA was incorporated in 2006 and acted as an advisory board until 2013. On January 1, 2013 the Borough conveyed all of the relevant water and sewer system assets to the ECWSA. The Treatment Plant Project has been solely managed by the ECWSA and funding was secured through the issuance of a Guaranteed Sewer Revenue Bond. Proceeds from the sale of the Bonds, together with other various funds of the ECWSA, will be used to finance the Treatment Plant Project, to fund the Debt Service Reserve Fund, and pay the costs of issuing the Bonds.
The 9.3 million dollar project will require the ECWSA to raise Sewer Rates to pay for the project. The ECWSA’s most recent rate study will increase the average residential users rates from $43.20 to ~ $74.70 per month. Commercial and Industrial users will also see an increase of ~ 74%. Adversely affecting the rates is a current dispute with Callery Borough. In 1988, the Borough entered into an agreement with Callery Borough to provide wholesale wastewater conveyance and treatment services. The Agreement provided for a minimum monthly flow from Callery Borough of 750,000 gallons. Flows above 750,000 gallons per month are assessed a surcharge. The Agreement references methodology, which is used to calculate wastewater conveyance and treatment charges on an annual basis. The methodology is based upon Callery Borough’s pro-rata share of operating and maintenance costs associated with a pump station and force main in addition to replacement costs of facilities used by Callery Borough.
Callery believes ECWSA has misapplied the formula and as a consequence in 2013 Callery Borough stopped making payment for any services provided. ECWSA and Evans City Borough filed suit in the Butler County Courts. The court ordered Callery Borough to pay $6,000.00 per month until the matter was resolved. Callery has rejected all ECWSA attempts to reach a fair agreement. It is ECWSA’s understanding that Callery Borough is currently charging its customers $100.00 per month and collecting over $18,000.00 a month for sewage, but is only paying ECWSA $32.26 per month per resident, well below the average residential user in Evans City Borough. As of October 2014, Callery Borough was ~$43,000.00 in arrears to ECWSA and this has put the ECWSA in financial hardship.
