News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
The City of Sisters can protect people from coming into contact with sewer effluent without turning the disposal site into a compound resembling a prison.
According to Department of Environmental Quality officials, fencing doesn't have to be chain link with concertina wire -- as long as people take seriously the need to stay out of protected areas.
"The idea is that people know 'I'm not supposed to go past this point,'" DEQ representative Dick Nichols told city councilors in a Wednesday, February 16, workshop.
Even the protective setback from the bike trail that cuts diagonally across the Section 9 disposal site doesn't have to be too big, Nichols said.
If the city installs sprinkler heads instead of water cannons in that area to spray effluent on the forest floor, the setback could be as little as five to 10 feet. Fencing, again, could be made to blend in with the environment so as not to detract from the woodsy atmosphere of a trail ride.
Nichols offered to include in the sewer permit an option for the city to raise its effluent quality from Level I-enhanced to Level II when funds become available. A higher quality of effluent would be needed to allow some recreational activities, such as golf, on the site.
DEQ director Langdon Marsh said his agency has no intention of mandating higher effluent quality standards.
"I don't think we're contemplating that at all," he said.
According to Nichols, it would be virtually impossible for the city to create clean enough effluent to discharge into Squaw Creek or to swap effluent for creek water with Squaw Creek Irrigation District.
To produce effluent of that quality -- nearly good enough to drink -- the city would have to build a much more sophisticated and more expensive treatment plant.
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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