Amador County – The city of Ione received word last week that it still needs to work on its “Report of a Waste Discharge” stemming from a 2003 leak at its wastewater treatment plant.

The California Regional Water Quality Control Board in a letter to the city said Ione’s Report of Waste Discharge “is incomplete because it does not describe measures that will be taken to prevent the discharge of seepage from the percolation ponds to Sutter Creek.”

The November 5th letter said the report “does not provide feasible solutions to prevent wastewater from surfacing outside of the proposed Pond 8.”

The Regional Board said if “the discharge of seepage to Sutter Creek continues, it will be necessary” for the city to obtain a National Pollution Discharge Elimination System permit.

Jim Scully, who lives on Old Stockton Road, near the city’s wastewater treatment plant storage ponds, provided TSPN with a copy of the letter, which was from Cliff Raley, of the Regional Board’s “Waste Discharge to Land Permitting Unit.”

The letter was addressed to Ione City Manager Kim Kerr, with copies indicated to have been sent to Amador County Environmental Health, and the city attorney and engineer.

Kerr told the Ione City Council last week that the city still awaited on the response from the Regional Board on the city’s latest revised Report of Waste Discharge, submitted September 7th. She said: “Based on the discussion with the Regional Board, city staff is working on pulling together additional information and scheduling a follow-up meeting with the Assistant Executive Director Ken Landau from Permitting as well as Compliance staff.”

Raley cites Permitting staff’s letter saying that the “site hydrogeology condition is not favorable for the proposed design capacity of Pond 8 for its proposed location.”

Ione’s September 7th groundwater modeling report said “we conclude that groundwater baseflow to Sutter Creek will remain virtually the same before and after expansion,” and the “impact of seepage to Sutter Creek water quality was discussed in the Final EIR and it outside the scope of this report.”

Raley said the Ione “groundwater modeling report does not demonstrate that the proposed modifications will prevent seepage discharges to Sutter Creek.”

Raley said Ione on October 5th proposed “to reduce groundwater elevations near Pond 8 by pumping groundwater into Pond 4 at a maximum rate of approximately 580,000 gallons per day.”

Raley said: “This is not consistent with the proposal contained in the Report of Waste Discharge, which is to close Ponds 1-4 to reduce the seepage into Sutter Creek.”

Story by Jim Reece. This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..