Amador County – The Sutter Creek City Council voted 5-0 Monday to sell 10 units of the city’s wastewater treatment plant capacity to the Amador Water Agency, at a total cost of $54,000, to help the agency meet demand for a new company in Martell.

City Manager Sean Rabe recommended the sale of the 10 “Equivalent Dwelling Units” worth of capacity to the AWA, saying he “asked City Sewer Engineer Grant Reynolds to analyze the city’s ability to provide the additional capacity.” He said “city staff believes the plant has enough capacity to sell AWA the 2,000 gallons per day and recommends doing so.”

Reynolds in a memo to Mayor Tim Murphy and the City Council said that in 2009, under the direction of former City Manager Rob Duke, and with the assistance of City Planner Bruce Baracco, city staff “created a spreadsheet showing the committed capacity of the city’s wastewater treatment plant.”

Reynolds said the city is permitted for 480,000 gallons of sewer plant capacity, and has 15,580 gallons of capacity available. He said AWA requested purchase of “wastewater treatment plant capacity to accommodate sewage disposal for a new business in the Community Service Area Number 4 business area,” in Martell.

The council approved a resolution that held the purchase terms. It said the AWA requested the purchase of “2,000 gallons per day of additional sewage treatment capacity from the city of Sutter Creek’s wastewater treatment plant.”

The resolution said the agency sought the equivalent of 10 “single family units,” or 196 gallons per day each, and a current agreement signed with the county and with AWA sets the connection fee of $5,300 per unit. The 2,000 gallons equal 10.2 units, setting the cost of the sewage capacity connection fee at $54,060.

The resolution said “prior agreements between the city, the AWA and Amador County … set the equivalent flow for a single family residence at 196 gallons per day.”

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