No Wastewater Plan Covers the Valley

DRIGGS — Teton County commissioners brought the valley's three city governments together on Aug. 25 and established that no wastewater plan covers the valley. Victor Mayor Sue Muncaster described it to the Victor council the following night as "spearheaded by Ron James" and as the first of a series of meetings that bring the valley's governments together on countywide questions. Driggs, Victor, Tetonia, an engineer from Sunrise Engineering, and a private infrastructure executive attended, along with the Board of County Commissioners. The meeting ran about an hour and a half.

Driggs Mayor August Christensen told the commissioners the city's plant ranks first in the state for construction money from the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), and that the ranking is final. The award carries $6.3 million in principal forgiveness. It was written for $25 million when Victor still planned to build its own plant. With Victor's service area back in the design, Driggs will build the larger plant it drew up first, at about $35 million and possibly closer to $40 million. "We don't have that exact number right now," Christensen said. Asked whether the project stays fully funded at the higher price, Christensen said it does. "Fully funded is a low-interest loan with a $6.3 million loan principal forgiveness."

The plant is sized for Driggs and Victor's service area, as well as for county ground already approved inside both cities' areas of impact, at a 4 percent growth rate across a 20-year design life. "It's not realistic to have all of the county on sewer," Christensen said. Driggs is operating under a federal consent decree with the Justice Department and the Environmental Protection Agency. Christensen said the city "can't pivot at this time," and that the project has been "set back multiple years because of decisions from Victor." Serving more of the county would have to be a separate project at another time.

The award pays for treatment, and DEQ funds collection systems in a separate category. "Collections is a whole separate infrastructure," Christensen said. Commissioner Ron James answered, "And that's not funded that we know of." Muncaster said parts of the collection system may be at capacity today. Driggs' South Lift Station, which handles everything Victor sends north, is currently at 98 percent of its firm capacity.

At the county meeting, Muncaster said Victor remains "open to anything" from a customer agreement to a joint powers agreement to a sewer district. Outside counsel Stephanie Bonney is expected to walk the councils through those options at their second joint session on Sept. 16.

At a Victor work session the next night, Councilor Stacy Hulsing, joining remotely, said the question is closed and Victor is staying with Driggs. The joint meetings are "not about whether we are or are not staying with them," Hulsing said. Councilor Amy Ross took the opposite view. "I don't think we've made any commitment in terms of timeline," Ross said, adding that Driggs is "holding any cards they have close because they have to, because we have not committed to much of anything other than these meetings," Ross argued Victor should pay for a short stay. "If I were them, I would add a surcharge," she said. "If they're building a plant that includes us and we're only going to pay for it for 10 years, then yeah, I think we deserve to pay more because we're not in it for the long haul."

The 2011 agreement between the cities runs 20 years from September 2011. It gives Victor two five-year options to extend, at Victor's sole discretion. If Victor renews in 2031 and again in 2036, it stays on the Driggs plant through September 2041.

Rob Husevelt of Sunrise Engineering said Tetonia "still has some capacity, but it is closely approaching capacity," and said its lagoon is the constraint.

The county operates no sewer system of its own, and Idaho law limits what it could contribute if it did. Each utility runs as its own enterprise fund, paid by its ratepayers, and the cost "can't trickle down to the taxpayer," as Victor City Administrator Jeremy Besbris put it. Only grants and local-option tax revenue come from outside.

The county's standing is in septic, where Clean Water Act grants can cover part of the cost of pumping a system. County senior planner Dan Leemon spent years working in water quality on the Jackson side. "What I saw was just a fractured system," he said. "We had a lot of separate sewer districts that did not coordinate, did not talk to each other, and it just cost the residents a lot of money in the long run, because it is so much more expensive to fix a pollution problem than it is to prevent the pollution."

The only valley-scale proposal came from private infrastructure executive George Wilson, who offered to replace the infrastructure between Victor and Driggs, tie in Tetonia, and build and operate a wastewater plant under a 30-year agreement carrying no federal money. "The cost is on us," Wilson said. "If it goes over, we pay." The firm locks in rates with inflation adjustments, Wilson said. James said the invitation was his: "that's why I asked George to come in."

Driggs City Administrator Doug Self objected to the route. "RFP process through the county. We can't just say, oh yeah, George, come on." Muncaster called it "another governance option" for "the far horizon."

Wilson had also put the valley's septic policy in question. "It seems like, from what I'm hearing, we're trying to control growth by allowing the continued pollution of groundwater via incompliant sewer systems," he said. The remark drew pushback from several people at once. Wilson pressed the point. "From what I hear, it's like we don't want to get people on the pipe because then that would encourage more growth. So instead, we say we're not going to offer the service. You have to stay on septic, but we're going to keep putting up with poor water quality in the river to control growth."

Christensen answered that the Driggs plant serves cities, not the county. Third-party testing by a local nonprofit found no ammonia a mile downstream, she said. "It's like if a moose was standing in the river and going pee, that's actually more ammonia than what is being discharged."

James wanted another session in two weeks, arguing the meetings answer people who "try to stir the pot" online. Christensen asked what they were for. "I just don't know if we're meeting every 2 weeks, like, what is the goal right now? I guess I would need, like, more specifics."

What to watch: Whether any commissioner takes Victor up on the invitation to the Sept. 16 governance session, and whether the county schedules the follow-up meeting James asked for.

No Wastewater Plan Covers the Valley, County's Joint Session Shows

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