Amador County – The Sutter Creek City Council heard updates to 2 wastewater master plans Monday, then sent them to staff attorneys for review. The council considered the new city wastewater master plan and also the Amador Regional Sanitation Authority plan. City Manager Rob Duke said changes included developer fees based on dwelling units, in a “new refinement of processes” that is “specifically looking at the sizes of developments.” The “Large” project, 500 units or more, would be required to pay for needed wastewater improvements at the treatment plant. “Medium High” projects, of 101 to 499 units, would pay upfront for each 100-unit phase, and would get approved “only if the capacity exists” at the wastewater treatment plant. “Low Medium” projects, 26 to 100 units, would make an upfront purchase of sewer fees, and “Small” developments, 1 to 25 units, would pay a building permit equal to sewer fees. Duke said a phased improvement of the wastewater plant would be activated by approval of a “Large” project, and have phases based on unit numbers of the development. The first phase (including Gold Rush Ranch & Golf Resort) would create a wastewater treatment plant capacity of 700,000 gallons a day. The second phase would take it to 1 million gallons a day. “Build-out” of the plant was tentatively set to the year 2050, at an engineer’s cost estimate of $9 million to $11 million dollars, with a lot of “contingencies.” If it included Gold Rush, the plant would need capacity expanded to 2.3 million gallons a day. Duke “estimated it will be about 2020 before we will have (water) recycling programs going on at Gold Rush.” Councilwoman Linda Rianda asked about phasing, and what initiated Phase 2. Duke said they cannot build phase 2 homes until they build phase 2 of the treatment plant. He said the master plan phasing was not tied to Gold Rush, but “just so happens that it works that way.” Duke said the master plan “looks at one of those big developments getting approved.” Mayor Pro Tem Tim Murphy said he thought before the project is approved, developers should commit to fully building the treatment plant expansion. He said they could just come and build 100 units, and only pay fees, then the city “would get no new capacity.” Duke said: “We don’t know what’s happening with the economy,” but he thought they “should be looking at that,” and if a developer needs the city to reserve 100,000 gallons of capacity, they “need to pay for that up front.” Duke said “if they drop 800 units to 100, they would have to go through the whole entitlement process for the next 100 units.” Story by Jim Reece. This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.