For six days councillors were in crisis mode over the Moorefield and Drayton sewage lagoon.
At a special meeting on Monday morning, they may have found a workable solution to a number of the problems presented to them at a previous meeting on Aug. 16.
At that meeting, Chief Administrative Officer Patty Sinnamon presented councillors with the following issues about the sewage lagoon expansion:
– there was only one company bidding to do the work, and it was for $2.13-million, about $950,000 more than what was budgeted and debentured;
– flow reports from the Ontario Clean Water Agency were out of whack, with Moorefield inflows to the lagoon not being counted, leaving only about two feet of space until the fall discharge, and the possibility that there would be a spill; and
– the township has not been using the full discharge capacity it has been allotted by the Ministry of the Environment.
She said in a interview she was laying out the chart prior to the council meeting and the numbers “just didn’t add up.”
Councillors were unhappy to hear such information. Councillor Neil Driscoll reminded council that during the discussions for a debenture to pay for about 59 acres of land and the building of two cells at the lagoon, he had asked specifically if the debenture was for enough money. Council approved the debenture of $950,000.
Council heard a report Monday from Sinnamon, who had talked to R.J. Burnside and Associates engineer Steve Gendron in the interval. He stated the estimates of $1.27-million did not include taxes and contingencies and was based on preliminary lagoon layout.
“It was noted in the memo that the costs are meant to be comparative and are not detailed cost estimates for tendering/construction purposes,” Gendron said in his response. “As such, the figure listed may not be a feasible target for cost cutting measures.”
He told council removing the contingency allowance and the provisional items from the tender price drops the base amount of the bid to $1.91-million.
Driscoll had told council on Aug. 16 the sole bidder, Moorefield Excavating Ltd., was probably fairly close to the actual cost to construct the two cells in the sewage lagoon.
Sinnamon reminded council the estimates for the costs were two years old, and that might have been a factor. At that time, the land was estimated at $625,000 and the work at $1.27-million.
Mayor Bruce Whale on Monday led council through the list of provisional items. Facilities manager Don Culp was on hand to help with technical questions about what was needed and what could be deferred or dropped altogether.
Culp agreed dropping an alum building from the project is feasible and, after much discussion, council agreed to try that.
Councillors learned fencing is now a requirement of the Ministry of Environment, but the upgrade to chain link from page fencing would cost money. Driscoll suggested a fence around parts of the property nearer the property line would save money, and having the township do that would also be a savings, and council agreed to that.
Gendron suggested dropping the rip rap (stones to present erosion) for now from the two new lagoon cells could be feasible, and Culp said the new cells are unlikely to show signs of erosion for several years, but that would have to be watched.
Councillor Mike Downey said council should drop that part of the project. Whale said it can be done “as needed” if staff see erosion problems coming.
Driscoll suggested instead of planting trees on a lagoon berm as a barrier, council should involve Trees for Mapleton and the Wellington County Green Legacy project, and plant trees around the edge of the property. He said a bonus would be that those would hold back snow.
Council agreed to that measure for further savings.
Whale said if township staff is successful in negotiating the removal of all those items from the contract, it would bring the shortfall down to about $400,000.
Council had heard from Treasurer Mike Givens on Aug. 16 that Mapleton could borrow from its own reserves this year for the work, and debenture what it needs to replace them through Wellington County next spring. The county has a triple A credit rating, and can borrow money at a low rate, and it extends that credit rating and borrowing power to all lower tier municipalities.
Also at the Aug. 16 council meeting, several councillors were upset about the lack of information from OCWA and Burnside.
Councillor Andy Knetsch asked on Monday why representatives from those companies were not present when council was considering its options.
Whale said they were not invited. He said the first order of business is to decide how to handle the issues, and council would later discuss the issues it has with those companies.
He noted the actual bid to construct the lagoon cell was actually lower than the estimate, but other costs came into play. “It’s what we can do without now,” he said of the debate.
When council had cut as much as it could find, with several items to be negotiated, it had to decide if it was going to re-tender the entire project, or accept the local bid from Moorefield Excavating.
Councillors agreed to accept the Moorefield Excavating bid, and authorized staff to negotiate the cost with that company for the items it wants to be reduced or cut.
Whale said the final overrun could range from $390,000 to $540,000 depending on the negotiations and what is not immediately needed at the lagoon.
Givens said in an interview prior to Monday’s meeting the debenture for the purchase of the 59.4 acres of land for the expanded lagoon (using 33 acres for the two needed cells and the rest for expansion in the future) would cost $48,000 a year for 20 years, and the shortfall for all the work would be another $58,000 per annum, for an annual total of $106,000 in debenture repayments. That would drop significantly with council’s cuts.
Lagoon filling up
Sinnamon told council on Aug. 16 there was only two feet of space left in the lagoon, likely good for about three weeks, and said that is approaching a “crisis.”
She said on Monday she is working with the MOE about a later discharge from the lagoon.
Councillors had considered irrigation, which means spreading some of the wastewater on land the township bought, but decided against that because it would prevent construction work on the cells. Dumping water on nearby industrial lands was considered but council noted a huge cost there because of the distance away from the lagoon.
Council had already instituted a check of illegal connections of sump pumps and other infiltration into the system, and any reductions there would slow down entry into the lagoons, and save capacity.
Sinnamon said council could seek approval to start construction of the two new cells and move some effluent into one of them as the major holding cell gets full.
She said that would “get us into November – so there would be no unscheduled discharge.”
She said the MOE official she spoke with noted this is a contingency plan, and she will follow up with the ministry, and, “I hope to get approval fairly soon. I think the ministry will work with us so there is no unscheduled discharge.”
Councillors indicated some frustration with the GRCA and ministry rules that do not allow a discharge when Conestogo Lake is high. They noted the beach was closed there for high E. coli counts this month, and noted water from the lagoons is cleaner than water coming into the lake from the river itself.
But, they said, as in Arthur, which has a sewage treatment plant, there is no discharge permitted when the river is low.
Whale said even with cleaner water coming in from the sewage treatment plant, that issue is one of “perception” by the GRCA, the MOE and the public.
