PORT ANGELES — Mayor Cherie Kidd expressed confidence Tuesday that the city will not bear any financial responsibility for ongoing sediment problems at the National Park Service’s Elwha Water Facilities, which are built on city property 2.8 miles from the mouth of the Elwha River.
Kidd also touched on the city’s waterfront improvement project before an audience of more than two dozen at the Port Angeles Business Association breakfast meeting.
But the focus was on sediment overflow and the potential impacts on the city’s water supply.
“My intention is that no money comes from the city,” Kidd said of the Park Service’s ongoing attempts to address the problems.
“It’s their responsibility, it’s their project, it’s there for them to assume the financial liabilities of this program, and it’s on their backs — and as far as I’m concerned, that’s where it needs to be,” Kidd said.
She and city Public Works and Utilities Director Glenn Cutler said city officials remain watchful about the impacts on the city’s water supply, which is provided from the Ranney Well in close proximity to that same sediment.
The Elwha Water Facilities comprised the Elwha Water Treatment Plant and the plant’s surface water intake apparatus.
The plant has become clogged with silt from the $325 million tear-down of Elwha Dam, which has been completely removed, and Glines Canyon Dam, which has about 60 feet of its 210-foot edifice left. Both dams straddle the Elwha River.
Veolia Water North America, which operates and maintains the treatment plant, began removing sediment from the plant beginning May 13.
It is being hauled away along the Milwaukee Grade access road.
The city continues to draw drinking water from a Ranney well that city officials are worried could be compromised by sediment from the estimated 34 million cubic yards that are being unleashed from behind the approximately century-old dams.
Workers began taking down Elwha Dam in September 2011, with about 6.8 million cubic yards of sediment released since last fall.
“The city’s concern is what the long-term impacts are on the Ranney collector,” Cutler said.
The amount of sediment release is in line with scientific models for the project, he added.
Barnard Construction Co. Inc. has been scheduled to resume the notching and removal of Glines Canyon Dam on July 1, but that may not happen, Cutler said.
The silt-clogged treatment plant is supposed to supply 52 million gallons a day but is supplying barely more than a quarter of that — about 14 million gallons, he said.
In addition, it’s all going to Nippon Paper Industries USA and not to other intended uses by the city, the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe’s hatchery and the state Department of Fish and Wildlife’s fish-rearing channel.
“They are unable to meet the requirements of sufficient quantity at those flow rates,” Cutler said.
The dam removal project, which is ahead of schedule, is slated for completion by September 2014.
“The issue is not taking the dams down too quickly but the Elwha Water Facilities performing the way they should,” Cutler said.
Repairs have been on hold while pump-station repairs are designed.
Olympic National Park spokeswoman Barb Maynes was unavailable for comment on the project Tuesday morning.
City Manager Dan McKeen, who was present at the breakfast meeting but did not give a presentation, had said in a letter earlier this year to Park Superintendent Sarah Creachbaum that park staff were not keeping the city informed enough about water facility problems, which have caused the city to rely more than expected on the Ranney well.
At a May 2 meeting of city and park staff, park staff pledged to continue communicating with the city while the facility is repaired.
Kidd also lauded the city’s waterfront improvement project, which recently received a $167,000 state grant to pay for a portion of the Waterfront Trail that will go through the proposed West End Park in Phase 2 of the improvement project.
An ongoing $3.9 million esplanade project — Phase 1 — will improve West Railroad Avenue and extend a concrete promenade over the water.
“When people realize how exciting it is, it’s really going to take your breath away,” Kidd said.
“It’s going to be the economic spark.”
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
