Sweet Home will be the location for a new county-operated RV dump station where campers, snow-birders and trailer inhabitants can unload their wastewater after enjoying the freedoms of nomad life.
The station will be developed near the FAC homeless sleep center at the former Willamette Industries mill property behind Bi-Mart, which is owned by the county.
Blair Larsen, Sweet Home’s former Community & Economic Development Director, said it’s a great location for such an RV dump station.
“They kind of designed a state-of-the-art facility where there will be four lanes to go through and dump your waste, and a bulk water fill-up station as well,” he said. “And it’s right next to a major trunk line for the sewer system, so it’s a pretty ideal location.”
Building a dump station that will use the city’s wastewater system is expected to alleviate a problem that Linn County has been coming up against with its park septic systems.
Linn County Parks Director Stacey Whaley explained that toilets in households use a lot of water to flush the effluent away, thus diluting the contents, but toilets in RVs use very little water in the process. As such, the county park septic systems are becoming increasingly more difficult to maintain according to standards set by the Department of Environmental Quality.
“Even if we’re running restrooms with flush toilets and things like that, it’s really hard to put enough water in there to dilute that out, so it’s very hard to meet those DEQ requirements,” Whaley said. “It’s not that they (DEQ) have gotten tougher. It’s just that it’s gotten harder and harder to do that just based on volume.”
After the dump station in Sweet Home becomes functional, Whaley said the county does not plan to shut down all park dump sites; at least, “not initially.” The county will, however, try to incentivize campers to use the new dump station because it will move the product through the municipal system, which “has a much different treatment system than what we are able to do out in the parks.”
Linn County park dump sites for use by the campsite users are currently located at Riverbend County Park ($7 dump fee), Sunnyside Campground (dump fee included in $35 campsite charge), and Waterloo County Park ($7 dump fee). Other nearby dump sites can be found at Sweet Home RV Center, 4691 Hwy. 20, and Gill’s Landing RV Park, 1400 Grant St. East, Lebanon.
Due to the age of the septic system at Sunnyside, however, the county anticipates removing the dump stations there after the Sweet Home facility is complete, Whaley said.
The cost to dump at the new facility has not yet been determined, but a portion of the proceeds is expected to be paid to the city.
“This is not a free service that the city is providing when it comes to the wastewater,” Larsen said. “This is intended to cover the cost of treating that waste.”
Larsen said the city has been supportive of the plan because not only does it help the county with a growing problem and satisfy DEQ’s preference for the waste to go through a wastewater treatment plant, but it brings the potential for more area businesses to see more customers.
“We want the city to be seen as kind of a base camp for people who are doing their adventuring out in the parks and national forest,” he explained. “So if we can be that place where they come into town, dump their waste, fill up with water, get their groceries, go shopping while they’re here and then go back out, we really want to provide that hospitality.”
The new station would also provide an opportunity for the city to sell its municipal water, one of the city’s few revenue streams. According to Larsen, the city currently has one bulk water filling station at the wastewater treatment plant, but dispensing water there consumes staff time.
“If there was a different place where we could direct people to get their bulk water fill, that would be ideal and cut down on staff time,” Larsen said. “We want to have as automated a system as possible.”
It’s an idea the city and county are still ironing out.
Knife River is expected to begin construction on the dump station this Fall with an expected finish date next Spring.
“I think this really is one of those projects where the county’s interest and the city’s interest very much align, and it gives us a great asset in the community,” Larsen said.