Sean C. Morgan
Of The New Era
In response to citizen concerns about storm drainage– or lack thereof – in parts of Sweet Home, the city is beginning this week to establish a storm water utility that would provide solutions to those problems.
What has to be determined is how the work will be financed.
The initial step is a budget proposal that will be reviewed by the city’s Budget Committee. From there, the City Council will need to adopt the budget along with new ordinances and a rate structure before the storm water utility is actually created.
The city already has moved $150,000 from reserve funds to a new storm water utility fund over the past couple of years, and the cost of a study started early this year, about $22,000, will be charged to that fund.
The city has had three ad hoc committee meetings with consultant Paul L. Matthews of Red Oak Consulting to develop proposals for establishing the utility.
Should the City Council establish the utility, Sweet Home residents can plan on paying a still-to-be-determined rate to help maintain and operate storm drainage throughout the city.
Public Works Director Mike Adams is awaiting the final report from the consultant, he said. The report will include a synopsis of the three meetings along with proposed financial details, rates and ordinances.
“How that’s going to shake out into a user fee, I don’t know yet,” Adams said.
The funds set aside already are “actually money that would go to the construction of or cleaning out of a ditch,” Adams said.
The purpose for the new utility is twofold.
“Every year, there’s some storm event and resultant rainfall that raises concerns in the community,” Adams said. “That inevitably leads citizens to come to City Council to do something about the water.”
For the most part, those concerns come from areas that do not have fully developed streets, with storm drains and gutters, Adams said, and it’s always “event-driven.”
“Over the years, the council has talked about how to figure out how to do something about the storm drainage,” Adams said.
In addition to citizens’ concerns, Adams said, Sweet Home is approaching a time when environmental regulations will begin to affect how the city deals with storm water. The city will have to deal with the quality of water hitting the river.
The trigger for regulations is 10,000 population, he said.
Sweet Home’s population is 8,790, according to Portland State University estimates.
A utility will be necessary to deal with the needs of citizens and to take care of legal requirements, Adams said.
With the completion of the study, “we’ll be able to present something to the council and citizens,” Adams said. He’ll be able to say “this is what we’ve done” and it’s “something to consider.”
To implement it will require resources and funding, Adams said. That may come in the form of a storm water rate. Following that, the city may create a storm water systems development charge, a fee that is applied to new developments to cover the cost of adding new capacity to an existing utility.
“Event water gets into the public right-of-way, and there’s an expectation for the city to take care of it,” Adams said. The question is, “How do you pay for it?”