News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
The City of Sisters and the Sisters Ranger District are close to settling accounts on charges to hook the district compound up to the sewer system.
Mayor Steve Wilson presented new figures to District Ranger Bill Anthony based on metered calculations of the compound's water usage.
The total bill comes to $81,119, including a charge for 50 percent of the cost of a main line running to the Forest Service kiosk restrooms in the triangle of land between Highway 20 and Highway 242.
The new figures are a considerable reduction from the $250,669.26 charge originally billed to the Forest Service. That bill launched a series of sometimes intense discussions about the city's methodology in determining the charges.
At a Monday, April 30, meeting, District Ranger Bill Anthony said he thought the new bill "seems more reasonable."
Anthony will submit figures to Forest Service regional authorities for payment.
The original charge was based in part on an estimated water usage of 35.29 EDU (equivalent dwelling units) on the compound. After metering the site for several months, the city came up with a new calculation of 18.63 EDU. Hook-up charges are calculated at $1,000 per EDU.
The city backed off additional systems development charges because, according to Mayor Steve Wilson, the Forest Service "successfully made their case" that the compound was included in the original project map.
The city also eliminated most charges for a main line running across the Sisters Ranger District compound. The district will only have to pay for extensions and modifications to the line that were made specifically for the benefit of the Forest Service.
According to Wilson, the effect on the sewer budget will be "negligible" because revenue from the Forest Service was not budgeted into the project. Wilson said that is because the relationship between the city and the Forest Service involving the sewer was continually "up in the air."
"We always left it as a budgetary bonus if we got anything out of it," Wilson said. "We're basically being reimbursed for any incremental expense over what we were engineered to do (for the whole system)."
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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