PORT HADLOCK — With the proposed Tri-Area sewage facility plan well into its design phase, an ongoing public discussion about the system that could cost more than $50 million will resume on Jan. 27.
“The sewer facility has a planning schedule in six-year stages, with the first year of sewer work to the commercial core of the Port Hadlock area and on state Highway 116 to the Inn at Port Hadlock, then going along Rhody Drive,” said Project Manager Joel Peterson.
“Exactly where the line runs is part of the planning.”
Peterson said the idea is to build the sewage system in the most densely populated areas of Port Hadlock and Irondale, then run it to the outer reaches.
Ultimately, Peterson said, the design is projected to be completed by mid-2010.
Project meeting
A sewer project meeting is scheduled to start at 5:15 p.m. Jan. 27 with a presentation at 6 p.m. at Jefferson County Library Humphrey Room, 620 Cedar Ave., Port Hadlock.
The sewer facility plan will be reviewed, and a discussion of design and project financing work is planned.
Jefferson County officials will be on hand to answer questions.
Peterson said projects such as this are ripe for federal funding.
The sewer system would be constructed as a Class A sewage treatment system in the Irondale/Port Hadlock urban growth area.
Sewage service would be constructed by 2024, engineering consultants have said.
A class A water system, such as that built by the city of Sequim about 10 years ago, reclaims and treats water that can be reused for irrigation but not consumed.
County officials said such water could be used to recharge fish-bearing Chimacum Creek at low-flow periods.
Work is scheduled to begin in 2010 on the first six-year phase of the plan.
That phase of construction would surround the commercial core of the Port Hadlock and Lower Hadlock area.
Phase II
The second phase of the 20-year project would run north to Chimacum Creek and Irondale.
The sewage treatment system would bring Jefferson County into compliance with the state Growth Management Act, and county leaders are also selling it as an economic development and job-creation stimulus.
Dense development and affordable housing would be other positive results of the proposal, county officials said.
The project would be built to treat 1 million gallons a day for nearly 4,000 residents projected in the Irondale/Port Hadlock area by 2024, officials said.
Including Rhody Drive — or state Highway 19 — in the plan is also under consideration, said Kevin Dour, an engineer and senior project manager for county-contracted Seattle consultant firm Tetra Tech.
He said that any such sewer system is engineered to be expanded if growth requires it.
A residential sewage treatment fee of about $60 a month is proposed.
The county has begun to apply for grant funding.
The county a year ago was granted $197,797 for preliminary design work on the system from the state Department of Ecology’s Reclaimed Water Grants Program.
The grant will be applied to an estimated $1.2 million needed for preliminary design.
The county has hired a lobbyist to promote grant funding from the state Legislature, a task that is becoming more difficult as state coffers tighten.
The county commissioners are expected to adopt a sewer facility plan in March and begin engineering predesign and financial planning for the system by next winter.
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Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsula dailynews.com.
