CHIMACUM – A proposed Tri-Area sewer system would cost about $21.4 million overall, with construction expected to begin in 2009 and the first hookups accomplished in 2010, said consultants working for Jefferson County.
“Everyone will pay their share of the general costs,” Katy Isaksen, county-contracted utility financial planner, said of the reclaimed-waste-water project expected to be completed in 2018.
Isaksen told an audience of about 40 attending a Port Hadlock/Tri-Area Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Tri-Area Community Center this week that the local cost share of the project inside the Port Hadlock urban growth area would be about $8.9 million.
County Commission David Sullivan, D-Cape George, said that the project is vital to the future of the county’s economic development.
Connecting homes and businesses to the system would cost the private sector about $3.4 million of the project, Isaksen said at the Wednesday meeting.
“I think it does benefit everybody to do this project,” Sullivan said, adding that the county now loses sales tax to Sequim, Poulsbo and Silverdale, where commercial development is strong.
Present septic system capacities are inadequate for large-scale commercial growth in the Tri-Area.
Consequently, county officials and business leaders say, a sewer system will support not only commercial expansion, but also the affordable, high-density apartments needed by service-sector employees.
County economic development officials estimate that annual economic “leakage” – county residents spending outside the county – amounts to between $150 million to $200 million.
Sullivan said county revenue was down largely because of declines in the real estate and construction industries.
The county’s bank capacity, which is the capacity to levy property taxes, is streaming in at about $60,000 a year and is important to the project, Sullivan said.
The commissioners have not increased the county’s bank capacity in two years, he added.
Today, it is almost at $500,000.
Increasing the county’s bank capacity brings the county’s bond rating up, he said, which amounts to lower-interest loans and dollar savings.
