Are we being set up for a hefty fine?

Rainbow Municipal Water District is building a replacement sewage water pumping station (against my vote), known as Lift Station No. 2 at the cost of about $1.5 million. Now the following extracts from their own documents should be considered for coping with a possible sewage spill and avoiding the subsequent fine under the present regulatory enforcement:

Document: “Lift Station 2 Replacement,” “Environment”

“Even with a timely response there is a minimum four hour timeframe between failure and diverting upstream flow into emergency storage tanker trucks.”

Document: “RBF Consulting, Emergency Storage, Sheet 8”

“Volume approx 30’x 40’x 9’x 7.4805 = 80,789 gallons. From Lift Station No. 1 Max inflow is approximately 1,000 gallons per minute which gives approximately 81minutes (Spill) storage.”

Document: “Sewer System Management Plan,” “Overflow Emergency Response Plan”

“If an alarm is received, staff visits the lift station site, assesses the problem and takes whatever action is necessary to correct the situation. Response time to an after-hours emergency call-out is generally one (1) hour.”

As a Director, I have tried and failed twice to have the Board of Directors consider this seemingly inadequate spill storage capacity, or to accept responsibility for possible fines.

If you as a Rainbow bill payer feel that this matter should be considered, I would ask you to contact the Director of your division. The telephone numbers of the Directors are on the Rainbow flier or call Rainbow Municipal Water District office.

Jack Griffiths