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WASTEWATER INFRASTRUCTURE NEEDS IN OHIO

FIELD HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON

FISHERIES, WILDLIFE, AND WATER

AND THE

COMMITTEE ON

ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

ON

IDENTIFYING WATER SYSTEM PRIORITIES AND POLICIES THAT PROMOTE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

APRIL 30, 2001—COLUMBUS, OH

Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works

(
COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

BOB SMITH, New Hampshire, Chairman

HARRY REID, Nevada, Ranking Democratic Member

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma

CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio

MICHAEL D. CRAPO, Idaho

LINCOLN CHAFEE, Rhode Island

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania

BEN NIGHTHORSE CAMPBELL, Colorado

MAX BAUCUS, Montana

BOB GRAHAM, Florida

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut

BARBARA BOXER, California

RON WYDEN, Oregon

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York

JON S. CORZINE, New Jersey

DAVE CONOVER, Republican Staff Director

ERIC WASHBURN, Democratic Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON FISHERIES, WILDLIFE, AND WATER

MICHAEL D. CRAPO, Idaho, Chairman

CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia

LINCOLN CHAFEE, Rhode Island

BEN NIGHTHOUSE CAMPBELL, Colorado

BOB GRAHAM, Florida

MAX BAUCUS, Montana

RON WYDEN, Oregon

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York

JON S. CORZINE, New Jersey

(II)
(III)

CONTENTS

Page

APRIL 30, 2001

OPENING STATEMENTS

Crapo, Hon. Michael D., U.S. Senator from the State of Idaho ........................... 1

Voinovich, Hon. George V. U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio ......................... 2

WITNESSES

Gsellman, Patrick, manager, Environmental Division, Akron Engineering Bureau, Akron, OH ................................................................................................... 32

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 92

Jones, Chris, director, Ohio Environmental Protection Agency .......................... 19

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 53

Karney, Patrick, director, Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati .. 31

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 88

Odeal, Erwin, executive director, Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District,

Cleveland, OH ...................................................................................................... 28

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 58

Reid, Lydia J., mayor, Mansfield, OH .................................................................... 7

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 51

Stevenson, Robert, commissioner, Department of Public Utilities, Toledo, OH . 29

Vincenzo, Robert, mayor, St. Clairsville, OH ........................................................ 9

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 52

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL

News release, Corps Continues Partnership with Ohio Agencies ....................... 104

Report, Water Infrastructure Network .................................................................. 62

Statement, Moline, Donald, DEE Director of Public Utilities, Toledo, OH, ....... 77

Master Site Plan, Option 1, City of Toledo, OH ............................................. 80–92

Factsheets, City of Akron, OH:

Ohio Canal Tunnel ........................................................................................... 103

Program Overview ............................................................................................ 96–99

Racks 26/28 Treatment .................................................................................... 101

Racks 40/31 Storage Basin .............................................................................. 100

WPCS Storage Phase I ..................................................................................... 102

(1)

WASTEWATER INFRASTRUCTURE

NEEDS IN OHIO

MONDAY, APRIL 30, 2001

U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS, SUBCOMMITTEE ON FISHERIES, WILDLIFE, AND WATER, Columbus, OH.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:39 a.m. Columbus City Hall, Columbus, OH, Hon. Michael D. Crapo (chairman of

the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Senators Crapo and Voinovich.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MICHAEL D. CRAPO,

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF IDAHO

Senator CRAPO. The subcommittee will come to order.

This is the Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, and Water, and

it’s our hearing on options to address wastewater needs in Ohio.

Before I turn the microphone over to Senator Voinovich, I would

like to first make a few brief comments. I’d like to first express my

appreciation to our witnesses and all of our guests today for joining

us here as we examine water quality and infrastructure needs in

Ohio. This is an important opportunity to hear firsthand from community and elected leaders from the State about their concerns

about what is one of the most significant issues facing us in America today.

Congress has been looking into ways to address the growing

problems facing communities with wastewater problems for a number of years. In fact, the Senate Environment and Public Works

Committee has held numerous related hearings in the past two

Congresses, the most recent in March.

I think it’s appropriate that we are here today in Ohio for our

first field hearing on the issue, because Ohio is a good microcosm

of infrastructure issues in this country, with its mixture of urban

and rural communities, industrial sectors and agricultural regions,

and older and newer treatment systems.

It’s my hope that the testimony we receive today will help the

subcommittee achieve a better understanding of the complexities

and the needs of our Nation’s communities.

I’d also like to share some of my thoughts about my host today,

Senator Voinovich. Just as Ohio is a good location for this field

hearing, Senator Voinovich is the right person to help Congress

lead this debate. With his successful experiences both as mayor

and Governor prior to serving in the U.S. Senate, George Voinovich
2

is uniquely qualified to work within Congress to help our communities.

True to this fact, Senator Voinovich has long advocated for additional Federal attention and efforts to enhance available resources

and improve State flexibility in administering wastewater programs. I commend him for his partnership in this cause.

I may state on a personal note that since he’s one of my best

friends in the Senate, I appreciate the invitation to be here.

With that, I’d like to, once again, thank our witnesses for joining

us here today and look forward to an enlightening exchange of

ideas and a healthy discussion on Ohio’s wastewater needs.

Before we begin the testimony, I’d like to turn to Senator

Voinovich for anything he’d like to say as an opening statement.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. GEORGE V. VOINOVICH,

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF OHIO

Senator VOINOVICH. Thanks very much. First and foremost, I

want to thank you very much for coming here to chair this hearing.

Quite frankly, the only way that we can get something in the congressional record is to have the chairman of the subcommittee

come to the State. We met in December, I think, Senator, and none

of that testimony was in the congressional record. We want to build

a good record because it’s very important for the future, in terms

of getting legislation passed.

Senator Crapo, who represents the great State of Idaho, and

prior to his being Senator, he spent three terms in the House of

Representatives. I want to say, this is a big gesture for him to come

to Ohio. I could get on a plane, it takes me 55 minutes to go from

Washington to Cleveland. Senator Crapo has to go from Idaho Falls

to Utah to Salt Lake to Cincinnati. He came in here last night. I

drove down this morning. I want to thank you, Mike, for going out

of your way. I owe him one now, and I’m going to go to Idaho.

Senator CRAPO. We’ll get you out to Sun Valley.

Senator VOINOVICH. Again, I’m pleased that you’re here. You’re

right, Ohio is a microcosm, I think, of the United States of America.

It’s interesting that people always ask me, ‘‘Are you adjusted yet

to Washington?’’ I tell them, ‘‘No, and when I am, it’s time for me

to leave.’’ Too often we get inside that beltway circuit and lose

touch about what’s happening on main street.

Today we’re here to hear some perspective from some folks that

are on the street dealing with the problems in a matter that’s very

important to the health and well-being of all Ohioans. We forget

sometimes, these other issues come along, but good water, good

sewage treatment is very important to public health and to the environment. I appreciate the witnesses taking time out of their busy

schedules to be here with us today.

The condition of our Nation’s wastewater collection and treatment infrastructure systems has been a long-standing concern of

mine. Senator, the first bond issue I worked on when I came to the

Ohio legislature was for a $375-million bond to deal with waste

treatment problems in the State of Ohio. That was a forerunner of

the Federal program.
3

So often people forget that most of the waste treatment facilities

that were built in this country to bring us out of the dark ages

from primary to secondary to tertiary treatment facilities were supported 75 percent by the Federal Government.

The program went into being in 1972, and between 1972 and

1990, there were some 10,000 facilities throughout the State that

received Federal money to the tune of $50 million.

I think that a lot of people are unaware of the fact that we’ve

got 1,000 public wastewater facilities and 1,500 commercial facilities in operation in Ohio. Think of that. Five percent of Ohio’s 11.4

million residents are served by individual septic tanks. So this is

a major issue.

The thing that’s interesting is that the public looks at rate increases as taxes. I don’t know about how it is in your State, Senator; I know about your energy costs, but our heating bills have

gone up 100, 150 percent for our businesses and some businesses,

200 and 300 percent.

Our electric bills are going to go up this summer because a lot

of our power now is generated by natural gas. We know gasoline

prices are going up. Health care costs are going up. I know for sure

that utility rates are going up. So we need to deal with this problem on a realistic basis.

One of the things I’d asked the General Accounting Office to do

is to look at the infrastructural needs of this country. I’m talking

about highways, mass transit, airports, drinking water, public

buildings, water resources and hydropower generators, because

we’re not dealing with these things.

The Senator knows that the President increased the budget 4

percent. When we got done, it was 8 percent. Who knows where it’s

going. But very little money was allocated to some of these unmet

needs in the country. It’s like we don’t exist so we must find some

other areas to deal with them.

So, what we’d like to do today is to hear from you. We want to

hear about what you’re required to do now. We know you have current aging infrastructure problems. I know that because I was a

Governor and a county commissioner. So that’s a problem that exists. We’ve all got to deal with that. Then on top of that, you are

being required to do some things that you’re not doing now. My

concern is, do the things that you’re being asked to do make sense?

We pass laws. The EPA passes regulations; they issue guidances.

Is what they’re asking you to do make sense? Is there another way

that they could do it that would be more reasonable?

Senator, I think you were probably in Congress during the reenactment of the Safe Drinking Water Act. I was kind of the leader

of the Governors on the measure. In fact, I was at the White House

when the President signed the bill. One of the things we said is cities should not have to, every 3 years, treat five new pollutants that

don’t exist. They ought to put their money into those things that

really make a difference.

Then we did something with the Clean Air bill. We put a provision in that says when you pass the regulation, they look at risk

assessment, look at cost benefit, peer review, and do those things

before you make a regulation.
4

Are we making sense? If we are making sense—and Chris Jones,

here, I’m interested in hearing his thoughts—if it’s good stuff, then

who should pay for it? Is it an unfunded mandate? Is it the Federal

Government’s responsibility to be involved in it? Should we be providing money for more loan money? Should we be providing you

with grant money so that it’s a partnership, so that the entire burden of this should not fall upon the backs of your citizens?

So I’m interested in that. I’m interested, also, in what does this

mean in terms of the person in your town, mom and pop at home

in a house with a family—they have other things to pay for, what’s

it going to do in terms of their budget?

Then last but not least—the most important thing, in my opinion, is what’s it going to do with pollution and the environment?

So that’s really what I’m hoping that we get from our testimony.

Again, Senator, I’m so glad that you’re here today and chair of

this committee, and we’re anxious to hear from our witnesses.

[The prepared statement of Senator Voinovich follows:]

STATEMENT OF HON. GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, U.S. SENATOR FROM THE

STATE OF OHIO

Good morning.

First and foremost, I would like to give my deep thanks to my friend and colleague, Senator Mike Crapo, for holding this hearing on Ohio’s wastewater infrastructure needs right at the source of the problem here in Ohio.

Senator Crapo, who represents the Great State of Idaho, and I came to the Senate

at the same time, and I consider him one of my best friends in the Senate. Before

being elected as a U.S. Senator from Idaho, Senator Crapo served the people of Idaho’s 2d congressional district for 3 terms in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Mr. Chairman, it takes a lot longer to get back to Washington, DC from Idaho

than from Ohio, and I am very grateful that you could make a stop in Columbus

to chair this field hearing.

I am particularly pleased that we are here in Columbus today, with a good representation of the individuals whose communities are directly impacted by infrastructure needs. I’ve said on a number of occasions that too often in Washington

we get so caught up in everything that’s going on that we can lose sight of what’s

really important to the American people.

So many times people ask me if I have adjusted to D.C. I answer, ‘‘no,’’ and say

that if my answer is ever ‘‘yes,’’ it is time for me to leave.

Today, we are going to get some perspective from those who are really feeling the

financial pinch on an issue that is not often talked about, but is, nonetheless, of

great importance to the health and well-being of all Ohioans water infrastructure,

and in particular, sewer infrastructure.

I appreciate our witnesses taking the time out of their busy schedules to be with

us this morning. I had the opportunity to meet with many of you last December in

discussing these same issues, and I am pleased that we have another opportunity

to talk about Ohio’s wastewater infrastructure needs in this hearing.

The condition of our nation’s wastewater collection and treatment infrastructure

systems has been a long-standing concern of mine, as I know it is for you, Mr.

Chairman, and for each of our witnesses as well. From my own experience, as

mayor of Cleveland, I saw rates increase dramatically to deal with the City’s dual

water infrastructure problems: drinking water and wastewater treatment.

Mr. Chairman, many years ago, our former Governor, the late Jim Rhodes advised

me, ‘‘George, never put anything in the ground because the public can’t see it.’’ Well,

as you know, Washington, in many cases, has the same attitude when approaching

unmet needs: don’t address anything that isn’t high profile.

But, as our local officials here on this panel know, it is quite often the stuff that’s

underground and out of sight that gets you the most attention and it’s almost always never positive. All it takes is one burst pipe, and you’ll get hundreds of phone

calls from angry citizens demanding that you fix it immediately.

In my hometown of Cleveland, there have been two big water main breaks in the

last year that caused a lot of flooding and disrupted people’s lives. Let me tell you,

those breaks got a lot of attention.
5

Unfortunately, for many communities across our Nation, anything but routine

maintenance for such problems is prohibitively expensive. For those communities

that want to conduct a wholesale overhaul of their aging infrastructure, many face

the realization that they will have to obtain revenues locally.

Of course, the general public considers rate increases as they do taxes. And with

the reaction to the dramatic rise in heating costs this winter, possible increases in

electricity costs, high gas prices, and other necessities like health care, it’s easy to

understand why the public does not want to pay more for something they take as

a ‘‘given.’’ It’s a wonder how the average person can make it.

(That’s one of the reasons I am working to address the lack of a national energy

policy.)

However, with an attitude among the public of not wanting to pay for these infrastructure upgrades, more often than not, these upgrades go on the back-burner, adding to the nationwide cost of repairs.

I have asked the General Accounting Office (GAO) to conduct a study on the

unmet infrastructure needs of our Nation. This includes such items as: highways,

mass transit, airports, drinking water supply and wastewater treatment, public

buildings, water resources (flood control and navigation) and hydropower generating

facilities.

For each infrastructure area, the GAO will look at how agencies develop their

needs estimates and determine whether they used leading practices and guidelines.

I believe the GAO’s final report will give us a better sense of exactly how reliable

the needs estimates are.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s ‘‘Clean Water Needs Survey’’ is a

striking example of how much has to be done to tackle our unmet needs. Conducted

in 1996, this survey estimated that nearly $140 billion would be needed over the

next 20 years to address wastewater infrastructure problems in our communities.

In March 1999, the EPA revised their figures upwards, whereas infrastructure needs are now estimated at $200 billion. Other independent studies indicate that

EPA has undershot the mark, estimating that these incredible unmet needs exceed

$300 billion over 20 years.

Since arriving in the Senate 2 years ago, I have used my position as a member

of the Committee on Environment and Public Works to work toward improving the

condition of our nation’s water infrastructure.

In February, I introduced legislation reauthorizing the highly successful, but

undercapitalized, Clean Water State Revolving Loan Fund (SRF) Program. My bill

‘‘the Clean Water Infrastructure Financing Act’’ (S. 252) which is identical to legisla- tion I introduced in the last Congress would authorize $3 billion per year over 5

years for a total of $15 billion.

As you may know, the SRF program has continued to receive annual funding

since 1994 when its authorization expired. This year fiscal year 2001 is no exception, with Congress appropriating $1.35 billion for the program. Of that, approximately $74.9 million will go to Ohio to capitalize its SRF program.

However, as in many States, my State of Ohio has needs for public wastewater

system improvements which greatly exceed typical Clean Water SRF funding levels.

In Ohio alone, $7.4 billion of improvements have been identified as necessary, according to the latest State figures. Of that amount, nearly $4 billion is needed to

fix Ohio’s combined sewer overflow problem. I will let our witnesses go into details

about the cost of the needs they face, but suffice it to say, most have needs that

far outweigh Ohio’s annual allocation.

In order to allow any kind of substantial increase in spending, reauthorization of

the SRF program is necessary. One of the things that bothers me the most in Washington is that there is no consideration to taking care of our nation’s needs across

the board. The President’s fiscal year 2002 budget request, for instance, increases

funding by 4 percent, although important programs like the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Civil Works program and the Clean Water SRF program face significant

cuts. In my view it is the responsibility of the Federal Government to take care of

our aging water infrastructure.

The Clean Water SRF program is an effective and popular source of funding for

wastewater collection and treatment projects. While the loans provided by the Clean

Water SRF program can help many communities finance wastewater infrastructure

projects, even a low-interest loan can be too expensive for some.

One of the bills that I pushed especially hard last year was the Wet Weather

Quality Act of 2000 (H.R. 828). This bill created a $1.5 billion grant program to help

localities deal with CSO and SSO problems.

I felt that this bill was a reasonable approach to helping communities overcome

the burden of wastewater infrastructure costs. I was pleased, therefore, that it was

included in the Omnibus Appropriations bill that passed in the Senate late last
6

year, and I was further pleased to be able to work with my House colleagues from

the Ohio delegation to get this enacted. Now we will need to work to ensure that we have the first installment of $750

million to carry-out this program, as well as at least level funding $1.35 billion for

the Clean Water SRF program as Congress addresses the fiscal year 2002 budget.

Again, I am disappointed that the President’s fiscal year 2002 budget request reduced the overall amount of money available for water infrastructure. Specifically,

the budget asks for $450 million for the new wet weather grants program and $850

million for the Clean Water SRF. I am not alone in asking that more funds go toward these programs.

This past February, I also attended a press conference held by the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN). WIN is a coalition of wastewater treatment and drinking

water providers, environmental engineers, contractors, and municipal organizations.

During the press conference, WIN called on the Federal Government to significantly enhance its role in financing the nation’s clean water and safe drinking water infrastructure. Their proposal is a 5-year, $57 billion program combining grants and

loans to increase Federal investment in our nation’s water infrastructure, including

our CSO and SSO problems.

After the press conference I was asked by a person from the media if I thought

that was enough money or if Congress would even approve such a sum. I told him that while $57 billion may or may not be something that Congress can

approve, I am in favor of talking about the costs incurred by the local governments

as a result of actions taken by Congress that is, the unfunded mandates that are

passed on by Washington and seeing what we can do to alleviate the situation. Perhaps a program that involves a mixture of grants and loans would suffice. It should

be given our careful consideration.

Mr. Chairman, the Federal Government will not be able to solve our infrastructure needs with more money alone. Accordingly, I believe some of our laws and regulations may need to be revisited to see if there is any way the Federal Government

can alleviate the burden on communities and their ratepayers and still be consistent

with good environmental policy. I believe benefits and costs need to be carefully

analyzed and taken into consideration when the Federal Government makes a decision that will affect our citizens.

That is why when I was Governor of Ohio I was very involved with the amendments to the Safe Drinking Water Act to bring common sense to our nation’s drinking water law. At the time the legislation was being debated, cities like Columbus

were facing having to add 25 pollutants every 3 years and spend millions of dollars

to invest in sophisticated monitoring technology.

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about the extent of water infrastructure concerns in their communities. I am interested in what they have done to address their own concerns and how they have used available Federal and State programs to help finance improvements. Part of what I would like to get out of today’s

hearing is what our witnesses believe Congress should be pursuing in a comprehensive effort to deal with wastewater infrastructure needs.

Further, I would appreciate hearing their thoughts on how they see the Federal

Government acting more as a partner with our States and communities; especially

those trying to comply with Federal water quality standards.

Finally, I would like to come out of this hearing with a consensus on a number

of issues besides just funding, mainly, whether changes in Federal regulations are

needed in order to make them more reasonable and flexible to communities, or

whether changes to Federal law are needed instead.

What are we asking our communities to do that doesn’t make sense and what are

the implications of those requirements on the costs they are facing? If they make

sense, what is fair in terms of who should pay for what? How much should the Federal Government put forth and how much should States and localities be responsible

for? Finally, how do we pay for it?

Mr. Chairman, if we tell communities they have to comply with a law that we

pass, then we need to give them the means to do it not just make a decree.

We need to seriously look at some of the things that we’re asking our State and

local leaders to do. We need to let them use cost benefit analysis, risk assessment

and sound science.

Congress needs to do a better job educating the public on the extent of water infrastructure needs in our communities and why it is important that something be

done to protect public health and well-being. We need to address the regulations

that these communities are faced with, and we need to ensure that they have the

adequate funds to meet their needs.

Once again, I am pleased to be here this morning and I am eager to hear what

you have to say. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for taking the time to be with us this
7

morning. I would like to thank our witnesses as well, and I anticipate a very lively

hearing.

Senator CRAPO. Well, thank you very much, George. You have effectively encapsulated exactly what it is that this committee is trying to do. For those who are here, I would tell you that the committee is looking very aggressively at a major reauthorization bill

to try to address the very issues that Senator Voinovich has raised

so effectively. So the input you provide for us today will be very

helpful as we proceed along that course.

Let me just lay out a few of the ground rules, then we’ll get

started.

I believe you all have a clock in front of you, right? There’s one

at the witness table. We’ve asked each of you to try to keep your

comments—your oral presentation to 5 minutes.

My experience is that I’ve rarely had a witness in front of our

committee who can say everything they want to say in 5 minutes,

so I’m almost certain your time will run out before what you have

to say will run out, but please try to follow the clock.

When it starts, you know, getting down to that timeframe when

you’ve got about a minute left, try to get ready to summarize.

When it runs out, we’ll ask you to summarize your testimony and

finish it, with the understanding that the reason we want to try

to keep it at that is we will try to get into an exchange with you

and you will have the opportunity to say things you want to say,

and that will give us the opportunity to have dialog without running out of time at the end of the hearing.

So I would like to ask you to try to follow the clock. If you’re like

me, you have a hard time remembering to look at the clock, so if

you do go over very far, I will lightly tap the gavel a little bit to

remind you to look at the clock.

With that—are there any other instructions?

Senator VOINOVICH. No, that’s fine.

Senator CRAPO. With that, we’ll proceed, then, with our first

panel. Our first panel is the Hon. Lydia J. Reid, who is the mayor

of the city of Mansfield, and the Hon. Robert Vincenzo, who is the

mayor of the city of St. Clairsville. We welcome you both with us.

Mayor Reid.

STATEMENT OF HON. LYDIA J. REID, MAYOR,

MANSFIELD, OH

Mayor REID. Thank you, Senator Crapo, and thank you for coming all the way to Columbus, OH. I think you’re going to find your

trip enjoyable, and I’m sure that Senator Voinovich will make it

worthwhile. You can see our beautiful statehouse and a few of our

other attractions.

Senator Voinovich, thank you once again. I’ve been with you on

many of our—I guess we call them battles that we’ve waged over

the years, and I remember the Clean Air Act, when we stood with

Senator Glenn and worked on that several years ago, and I appreciate your grasp of what we are going through. Of course, with your

experience as mayor of Cleveland for so many years and as Governor, you understand why we’re here today trying to protect our

citizens from onerous restrictions that none of us can afford. So

having said all that, I will start.
8

I’m here to provide information relating to potential required expansion of our wastewater treatment plant in Mansfield. The service area includes 55,000 people, along with business and industry.

Sewer service is provided by a separate sanitary system and the

wastewater is treated in a wastewater treatment plant with a design capacity of 12 million gallons per day before discharge to the

Rocky Fork of the Mohican River.

The collection system was originally a combined sewer system,

designed to carry both sanitary sewage and stormwater. In the

mid-1980’s, it was converted to a separate sanitary system. This

change from combined system to separate sanitary system brought

the city under a more stringent regulatory regime.

U.S. EPA regulations are based on the assumption that flows in

a separate sanitary system will not have a significant stormwater

component and, consequently, there will be no sanitary sewer overflows and no plant bypasses.

The Mansfield system has no sanitary sewer overflows. At the

wastewater treatment plant, dry weather flow averages about 9

million gallons a day. It is processed through primary treatment,

secondary treatment, and disinfection before discharge to the Rocky

Fork.

During wet weather, intermittent flows of up to 18 million gallons a day are processed in this way. Above that level, some flows

are diverted to the 5-million-gallon equalization basin for storage

and later treatment.

In extremely high flow situations, the EQ basin, which provides

better than primary level treatment, overflows. EQ basin overflow

combines with treated secondary effluent and the entire flow is disinfected. So nothing goes into the stream that hasn’t been treated.

The total flow meets NPDES, National Pollutant Discharge

Elimination System, permit limits for concentration. We believe

that EQ basin effluent alone meets NPDES permit limits for concentration.

Our NPDES permit is about to be renewed by Ohio EPA. It appears that Ohio EPA is seeking requirements in the permit that

would require a plant expansion, even though we currently meet

concentration limits at all flow levels.

Given the high quality of our effluent and given the many competing demands for our municipal resources, we do not believe that

we should be required to provide any additional treatment unless

it is necessary.

Our sewer rates average over $300 per year per hookup. That’s

per household. This is a level that U.S. EPA recognizes as sufficient to properly maintain a system. At this point, we are not certain what our renewed permit will require. A number of factors will

influence our permit renewal and the cost of implementation to our

ratepayers.

Currently, the U.S. EPA is working on two main issues that

could affect our permit. The first is the draft sanitary sewer overflow regulation that was signed by former Administrator Browner

in the last days of the Clinton administration, but not published in

the Federal Register. It is being re-examined by the Bush administration.
9

Among other issues, the preamble to the draft sanitary sewer

overflow regulation requested comment on the level of treatment

required for flows reaching the wastewater treatment plant.

I see I’m running out of time, so I’ll get down here to the bottom.

We ask that you continue to monitor these issues both in the regulatory process and through confirmation hearings for the U.S.

EPA assistant administrator for water.

If unsupportable determinations are made by the U.S. EPA, we

would like to discuss with you options that may be available.

If rule interpretation continues in its current direction, then the

city may be on a path with EPA to spend tens of millions of dollars

to provide additional treatment for 31⁄2 percent of total annual flow

to the wastewater treatment plant in order to eliminate less than

10 annual EQ basin overflows, which are currently meeting all

NPDES permit concentration requirements.

Again, I’d like to thank you for your interest in these matters,

and to simply say that we are doing everything that is necessary

and more. The water going back into the Rocky Fork is cleaner

than the water already in there. To spend another $10 million to

take care of that 31⁄2 percent is ludicrous and wasteful. Our system’s got better things that we need to spend the money on.

Thank you both for your attention, and I’m just about out of

time. I’ve got 30 seconds. Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you very much, Mayor. We appreciate

that.

Next, Mayor Vincenzo.

STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT VINCENZO, MAYOR,

ST. CLAIRSVILLE, OH

Mayor VINCENZO. Senator Crapo, Senator Voinovich, Members of

the committee, I wish to express my appreciation for allowing me

to appear before your committee, testifying on behalf of our small

city’s problem concerning our infrastructure.

St. Clairsville is a city of 5,100 people on the eastern side of the

State, 10 miles from Wheeling, WV. We’re located in Belmont

County, one of the highest Appalachian counties. Our city is largely

residential and service based. We are in the county seat. The largest retail area in mid-eastern Ohio is located on the eastern edge

of my city.

In the early 1980’s, the city took advantage of the Federal EPA’s

75 percent grant to build our main wastewater treatment plant, a

950,000 gallon-per-day average design. We also rehabilitated sewer

lines in the effort to limit infiltration and inflows. The latter has

been largely a failed effort.

Although we’ve repeatedly tested for and eliminated inflow, we

still have a tremendous amount of infiltration problems because

our flow increases five-fold during wet weather.

Our old clay lines dating back to the 1920’s act as a leech field

collecting subsurface drainage. This causes flooding of the pump

stations, the plant, and resident’s homes.

In 2002, we will bid the replacement of four pump stations and

5,200 feet of lines, only 3 percent of our total, with an estimated

cost of $600,000. In performing this upgrade in the 1980’s, we

achieved one of the highest wastewater rates in Ohio.
10

About 4 percent of our current department budget goes to debt

service. According to the most recent OEPA statewide rate survey,

issued in February 2001, for the 1999 calendar year, St.

Clairsville’s rate was in the 33d percentile.

Just after that study was published, the city boosted its rate another 7 percent in August 2000. If that number is factored into the

OEPA survey, our rate is in the 12th percentile out of 444 systems

reporting.

As a side note, customers take a double hit in that we are in the

top 10 percentile in water rates statewide.

Additionally, while we are one of the highest rates in the State,

our community is in the bottom third of the personal wealth. As

these numbers indicate, St. Clairsville has taken steps itself by

paying much of its own way. We have a competitively strong system, but our residents have a high rate burden. To fulfill our

needs, the rates will go even higher unless there’s some infusion

of outside capital.

Ohio’s Public Works grants have helped, but the effectiveness

was diluted when the State allowed these funds to be used for road

resurfacing and tailored the grant point system to rank these politically popular projects higher than wastewater projects.

Our wastewater rates constitute about 2 percent of household income. We do not believe we can push them much higher.

Briefly, our current needs include: First, flow equalization to prevent system surcharging, flooding, during storms; second, pump

station and lift replacement; third, hydrogen sulfide control, and

this gas occurs naturally and destroys concrete and structures in

the collection system; and last, relocation or expansion of our city’s

second plant, a 90,000 gallon per day designed structure that is at

designed capacity.

Relocation would allow us to move this plant from a congested

area and extend service to an underserved area. In St. Clairsville’s

experience, expansion of wastewater treatment definitely yields

new development.

These above needs total about $10 million for this basic utility.

We do not criticize the requirement for clean water, we support

that. We do feel that the EPA’s focus should be on communities

meeting their permit limits and should not be micromanagement

type control of plant operations.

Instead, EPA should focus on the discharge quality and not on

regulating the specific increments of the process used to reach that

quality.

The EPA was very helpful in assisting the city technically in

solving a difficult treatment problem, which has stymied various

engineering consultants. The work of the Ohio EPA solved the

treatment problem and resulted in a nationally publicized technical

paper to help others.

So what help do we need? Our answer is one you’ve probably

heard too often. More money. We’ve dedicated our own resources to

improving our systems, and we’ve taken the unpopular steps of

pushing our rates to the limit. Our residents have shouldered the

burden of support, but to restore these systems will take resources

beyond that which we currently have or will have.
11

I’m aware that there’s not an instant solution for our situation.

However, I’m very appreciative of your concerns to conduct this

hearing for some positive feedback, and I’m very pleased to have

an opportunity to testify before your committee to provide additional insight to the plight of small cities and villages.

Thank you very much.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you very much, Mayor. That was very

good timing, too. One second to go.

Mayor VINCENZO. With a little practice.

Senator CRAPO. I notice these clocks count back up when it gets

to zero. So for the other witnesses, if you happen to see the red

light on it, that’s already the time you’ve used up that you

shouldn’t have. I’m starting to understand the system here.

I’m going to ask Senator Voinovich if he would ask the first

round of questions.

Senator?

Senator VOINOVICH. Your major problem today is this additional

treatment facility. You’re going to have to meet new requirements

for the overflow from a holding basin, when you have an incident

of a storm, which is six or seven times a year.

Why are you being required to put in this additional facility, and

what is it based on, and the cost—roughly the increase in cost to

your people.

I guess the last thing I’d like you to comment on would be, I was

not aware of these regulations that are being considered right now

and I’d be interested in your opinions about those regulations.

Mayor REID. Well, first of all, we are in the process of negotiating

a new NPDES permit, and this is the year that we will probably

finish. We’ve been negotiating with the EPA on this permit for approximately 2 years, and one of the things that we have encountered all the way through this process is their concern about

stormwater overflows. We went through an extensive, renovation

process, and spent millions of dollars to——

Senator VOINOVICH. OK. One of the things I’d like you to clarify

is stormwater overflow.

Mayor REID. Right.

Senator VOINOVICH. Basically means that this is water that’s

generated during a storm that goes into the holding tank or the

holding basin? Or are we referring to stormwater overflow as that

which the basin isn’t able to handle and just——

Mayor REID. Right. We’ve spent $10 million to separate our sewers, our downflows from houses, et cetera, and make sure that we

still have separate systems. When we have heavy rainfall resulting

in high flows in the sewer, we usually treat everything. I think the

EPA misconception comes in, because we do treat everything.

When we have a major storm, the combined sewage and

stormwater flows over into the EQ basin, and all but about six

times per year it receives full treatment.

Senator VOINOVICH. But, again, the EQ basin——

Mayor REID. Equalization, yes——

Senator VOINOVICH. Is that your stormwater, or does that include

sanitary?

Mayor REID. That is stormwater and sanitory flow combined.
12

Senator VOINOVICH. So you have—your town, have you a separate system, separate sanitary, separate sewers——

Mayor REID. Right, but stormwater can get in the sewers.

Senator VOINOVICH. The sanitary is treated during a storm, you

deal with that?

Mayor REID. Right, we treat storm and sanitory together.

Senator VOINOVICH. But what you’re talking about is stormwater

that would ordinarily go into your plant and be treated is now,

then, put over, in a storm, into the holding basin, and in many situations, the holding basin isn’t adequate to take care of it and that

overflows into something else?

Mayor REID. Right.

Senator VOINOVICH. And you’re being asked to deal with taking

the water from the storm that goes into the basin because it’s not

adequate in terms of the regulation——

Mayor REID. That’s exactly right. I have Mr. Angelo Klousiadis

here, who is the plant manager, and he can give you the nuts and

bolts.

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. Yes, if I could, thank you.

What we have is infiltration due to the age of the system, and

when you get a heavy storm event, some of the stormwater infiltrates into the system. Even though it’s a separate system, you get

a lot of rainwater.

What happens is all of that infiltrating stormwater then combines with the already existing sanitary sewage and comes into the

plant. The plant’s designed to handle up to 18 million gallons

through the normal operation. Anything above that rate, 18 million

gallons-per-day rate is diverted over to the EQ basin that slowly

starts to fill.

If the storm event is short, we bring all that water back into the

plant when the flow starts to abate. If it continues, and it overflows

the EQ, that overflow is a combination of stormwater and sanitary

sewage.

But, again, that overflow has already had primary settling, some

aeration and full disinfection. So it is partially treated and then

that overflow comes into combination with the existing treated effluent of the wastewater plant, and the junction where those two

flows come together is monitored. At that point, all the NPDES

permit concentration limits are met.

We’ve never had a violation at that point. Any violation the

plant’s ever had, which is three violations out of the last 15

months, has been at the effluent, where the fully-treated sewage is

discharged. So the wet weather EQ overflow has never resulted in

violation.

Senator VOINOVICH. But the storm overflow could include in that

holding basin—you could have some sanitary waste?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. There is.

Senator VOINOVICH. That’s because of the fact that you have

this—the problem that Mayor Vincenzo has, the sewer system is so

old that the water ends up going into the sanitary system?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. Most systems would have that, Senator, because

you have a lot of manholes. During heavy rains, it’ll naturally come

into your sewer.
13

Senator VOINOVICH. Basically what you’re saying, under the current setup, you think you’re doing things adequately and that the

water—the effluent that goes into the creek is higher quality than

what’s in the creek?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. Correct. The permit limits were based on what

the aquatic life of the creek and human health requirements could

support.

Senator VOINOVICH. So you’d like the regulation to be revisited?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. That’s correct. We would like to be able to say

that if the water leaving our treatment plant during normal operation is good enough to enter the creek without creating a problem,

then why should the combined, if it still meets those same concentration numbers, create a problem.

Senator VOINOVICH. OK. The cost of it is roughly—you were talking earlier and said $10 million if you go to overflows.

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. That’s hard to determine, yes.

Senator VOINOVICH. Could you say conservatively, if you build—

you’re saying $300 a year. If you—conservatively, if you build this,

you ascertain it would probably cost the citizens about $600 a year?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. I think that’s a very fair estimate.

Senator VOINOVICH. And could be more?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. It could be more. Because along with that, additional improvements to the collection system may be requried.

Senator VOINOVICH. In terms of the environment, your position

would be that you’re treating the water at high quality, that you’re

returning it into the—you’re getting rid of the chlorine and all the

other stuff and you’re turning it into a stream that—whose quality

is less than what—the effluent that you’re putting into it?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. Yes, sir.

Senator CRAPO. Could I ask a few questions on this line before

you go on to the next situation?

Senator VOINOVICH. Go ahead.

Senator CRAPO. It seems to me, from what I’m hearing here, that

the water—if you do have to make the changes and do the $10 to

$20 million additional reforms of the system, the water you’re putting back into the creek or to the river will not necessarily be any

cleaner; is that correct?

Mayor REID. Not exactly. What we’re putting in the river now is

better than what’s there already and meets permit concentration

limits. If we have to provide even more treatment, it will waste

public resources.

Senator CRAPO. Is there any issue with regard—if you know, is

there any issue with either the Ohio EPA or the U.S. EPA with regard to whether the existing standards, which you do meet, are

adequate?

It’s my understanding that everybody believes that these standards are now the standards we desire to achieve, and if they are

adequate—do you have any different understanding?

Mr. KLOUSIADIS. The concentration limits that we have are those

which are set by Ohio EPA and, again, are very conservative and

are based upon what that stream can support to not create any pollution or risk to the aquatic life. We’re meeting that, and we would

never ask to increase them.
14

All we’re saying—there is another aspect to consider, and that’s

called load. During the times that you discharge into these

streams, you usually have higher volumes of water in the stream

itself, due to the storm. So the impact of the effluent is significantly less. There are now some people that are looking at load and

what the stream can handle and asking whether there should be

a tiered effluent limit.

We’re meeting the standard which was set by EPA for concentration, yet we’re being told to clean it up more. That’s what I’m saying, we don’t know where that more ends.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you.

Senator VOINOVICH. You’re a small town?

Mayor VINCENZO. Yes, sir.

Senator VOINOVICH. Do you have any idea of what your average

person pays a year in rates?

Mayor VINCENZO. Well, yes, I can tell you, Senator, the—for

8,000—to treat 8,000 gallon of sewage, and also to treat 8,000 gallons of water—and our sewage rate is based on our water consumption, each is identical and is $43.60 each for 8,000 gallons of water

and 8,000 gallons of sewage. So that leaves a total monthly bill,

just for 8,000 gallons, over $87 a family.

Senator VOINOVICH. You’re talking about 80 bucks, about?

Mayor VINCENZO. Eighty-seven bucks a month.

Senator VOINOVICH. So you’re talking $90, close to $90?

Mayor VINCENZO. Yes, that’s a thousand and—$1,080 a year, just

for 8,000 gallons a month consumption of water and sewage treatment.

Senator VOINOVICH. Then you said the average was 2 percent of

the income of the people who live in your area?

Mayor VINCENZO. That’s about 2 percent of the income.

Senator VOINOVICH. Do you think that there should be a special

program—well, let’s ask you this first question: Are you being required to do some things right now that you’re not doing based on

new regulations, or is what you’re being required just to meet the

current standards?

Mayor VINCENZO. Yes, we’re being required—as I mentioned earlier in my report, we have 13 sewage lift stations, pump stations,

that go into forced mains, and we’re being required to rehabilitate

these 13 lift stations, and almost all require some type of maintenance.

The four—we’re doing four right now that are under bid for the year 2000, and these four will constitute $600,000 to rehab four of

our 13 lift stations. We’ve done this with an Ohio Issue Grant, with

the city supplying over $150,000 of our own money for this grant

that will total $600,000. That’s just to do four stations.

Senator VOINOVICH. But the question is this: You’re doing that

to meet the current standards?

Mayor VINCENZO. To meet the current standards.

Senator VOINOVICH. It’s not any new regulation coming from

Washington, this is a question of an aging infrastructure that

needs to be repaired in order to just maintain the current—— Mayor VINCENZO. Correct. These four stations that we’re currently doing now are the worst, and they are almost out of operation.
15

Senator VOINOVICH. So the point is you’ve got two problems here.

I think that’s real important that I think the committee understands.

We have an aging infrastructure problem in many places in the

country. Some of it is probably still from what we built from back

at the end of the early 1970’s, and so forth, some of those have deteriorated. That’s one problem.

Then you have another problem, Mayor Reid’s problem, they’re

asking the new regs to even go more than that.

Mayor VINCENZO. Yes.

Senator VOINOVICH. But your problem, basically, is just with the

infrastructure?

Mayor VINCENZO. Well, we have——

Senator VOINOVICH. I mean, to maintain——

Mayor VINCENZO. Yes, besides that, our storm sewer water is

also definite—has a definite impact on our sewage system which

does flood our plant from time to time because of the infiltration.

Our system is not unique. We do have a separate stormwater and

sewage wastewater system.

Our stormwater builds up so much pressure during the heavy

downfalls that it is aging also and it will force itself into our sewage—our wastewater lines that will also create tremendous pressure and will lift manhole covers during heavy downfalls.

Now, these areas, of course, are in residential areas that would

require a massive rehab job to replace both equally storm sewers

and wastewater lines.

But also there’s a mandate coming from the EPA at this time

that we are to be directing toward stormwater treatment that will

be coming into our area, also, which will be another considerable

mandate that we’ll have a struggle to work through.

Senator VOINOVICH. OK. Because I’ve got legislation right now

that authorizes the safe—the Water Revolving Loan Fund, working

with about a million, $350 million, $15 billion. Those are loans. But

there really isn’t any grant program to the communities. Senator

Crapo is responsible for amending the authorization bill to provide,

I think, a $11⁄2 billion for grants. We’re trying to get this administration to put $750 million in their budget.

By the way, in their initial budget, even though it was a 4 percent increase, there is now—there isn’t the money to fund even the

current funding of the revolving loan fund. They put in about $850

billion instead of 1.31⁄2, and they put in about $450 and a million

into the grants program.

So you’re going to have to lobby very hard to make sure that that

then gets upped.

Then the next issue is how do we deal with this thing over a

longer period of time. But would you—I’ll finish with this question

to you, Mayor. You’re not able to handle this by yourself?

Mayor VINCENZO. Definitely. Definitely not.

Senator VOINOVICH. And your water goes into the Ohio River?

Mayor VINCENZO. Ultimately, yes. Yes. We have—I think, if I’m

not mistaken, I could be corrected by my service director, I think

we’re presently dumping our stormwater into about four different

streams, and our wastewater into two different streams—I’m sorry,
16

one different stream at this time, which ultimately ends up in the

Ohio River.

Senator VOINOVICH. OK. One piece of good news, the Ohio River’s quality report is better than it’s been, but you still can’t go

swimming in it.

Mayor VINCENZO. Yes.

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. We want it to be fishable and swimmable and

drinkable, right? Mayor Vincenzo, what is the population of your

town?

Mayor VINCENZO. Five thousand and one hundred people. We

just made the census.

Senator CRAPO. Just like a lot of towns in Idaho. I’d like to follow

up on one of your aspects of testimony that really struck a cord

with me. It’s one of my own pet peeves, if you will, and that is you

indicated in your written testimony, and in what you presented to

us today, that it’s your belief that EPA’s focus in terms of administration of the environmental laws, at least these environmental

laws, should be more on discharge quality rather than micromanagement of the systems that get you to what is discharged in

the end.

This is a debate that we’ve been having in Washington now for

at least the last 9 years, since I started in Congress.

I can just tell you that when I served in the House, I was put

on an environmental task force by our House leadership to try to

figure out a new approach to addressing environmental issues in

the country, and one of the things we talked about there was

whether we should move from the micromanagement approach that

we now have at the Federal level to one in which the Federal Government sets the standards for water quality or air quality, or

whatever the case may be, and says this is the quality of environment that we seek to have and will establish by law in the United

States, but then let the statutes and the local communities and the

local government authorities figure out how to meet that standard.

Instead of Washington having a one-size-meets-all-cookie-cutter

solution that many of us believe often causes more problems and

costs a lot more money and doesn’t necessarily reach the quality of

cleanup that we could achieve, we’d probably have hundreds of different approaches, and the best ones would rise to the top and communities around the country would be able to watch what each

other does and find what works.

I assume that that’s the kind of approach that you would support, but I’d like to ask your comment on that.

Mayor VINCENZO. Well, yes, I’m very glad that we are back to revisit that statement I made.

We have some of the most qualified people in our department in

the water—wastewater program, and they are very capable to deliver the quality of water on the other end of that plant without

any other standards brought into us that just makes us jump

through hoops, doesn’t really accomplish anything more, except to

put an additional equipment that sometimes does not solve the

problem to come out with that water to be equal—to be quality

water at the end.
17

We just feel that a lot of the mandates have been given to us to

accomplish this, we’ve already been accomplishing it, and our

standard at the other end—at the discharge has not increased any

differently than what we’ve been doing all these other times before

we’ve had to modernize and to put in additional equipment that

didn’t provide any better discharge at the end.

Senator CRAPO. Mayor, all of the discharges from your city meet

the necessary standards, though?

Mayor VINCENZO. Yes, it does. It does. If that quality falls below

that, then, of course, the EPA right away is in on us to post our

discharges as to a violation. So, you see, our testing is done regularly and they are receiving our testing monitor regularly.

Senator CRAPO. When you’re found in violation, do you have to

pay fines?

Mayor VINCENZO. There was, I believe—Mr. Bigler, did we ever

assess the personal fine?

Mr. BIGLER. No.

Senator CRAPO. That’s good news. I’m going to ask you a question. You might find this question surprising, but I’ll explain it

after I ask it.

Do you and the people of your city want to have clean water?

Mayor Vincenzo. Yes. Oh, definitely. Definitely.

Senator CRAPO. You just told me that you have good, competent

people that are there who are capable of meeting the national

standards that you’ve been—— Mayor VINCENZO. Yes.

Senator CRAPO. The reason I ask that question, in the debates

we have in Washington, when many of us say we should have national standards but let our cities and counties and States figure

out how to meet those standards, the response we’re often given is

that the cities and counties and States won’t do it. They don’t want

to do it. We have to have the Federal Government make them do

it, or that they can’t do it, they don’t have the ability to do it, so

we have to have the Federal Government step in and show them

how.

What do you think about those responses?

Mayor VINCENZO. Well, that—I guess that could be a possibility.

I mean, I think you know our society is such that we have rules

that a lot of people will follow—most of the people will follow the

rules and other people won’t, and that’s perhaps the reason we

have prisons in our States today, because of that.

But also the fact that there are some communities, perhaps, that

aren’t able to do this, but what I’m saying, I believe that the final

discharge, which should be the decision that the EPA would make,

to say, ‘‘Well, St. Clairsville’s doing a commendable job, therefore

we don’t see a reason to come in and to change their method’’. If another city is not doing that, then I think it would be the

ideal situation for the EPA to then come in and say, you’re not

meeting your violation, therefore, you’re going to have to put this

system in to make sure that you’re going to be doing this.

Senator CRAPO. In other words, have the micromanagement if

you have a case in which it’s established that the government entity responsible cannot or will not meet its responsibility?

Mayor VINCENZO. Definitely. Definitely.
18

Senator CRAPO. Mayor Reid, you just listened to this line of questioning. Would you like to comment on any aspect of it?

Mayor REID. Well, certainly I know that we have very qualified

people, and I’ve got one of the top guys right here. We believe that

we want the best possible water for our citizens. We all want that.

Whether some cities are capable of doing that—again, I agree with

Mayor Vincenzo, I think that if the regulatory agencies see that

you aren’t meeting the standards set forth in your permit, and you

continuously can’t meet those standards, then obviously big brother’s got to come in and tell you that you have to do something different.

But when we always have met the concentration standards of

our NPDES permit, I do not understand why the EPA doesn’t go

micromanage somebody that has problems.

We are doing an incredible job. We have wonderful water. We

even sent our drinking water in to try to win the National Mayor’s

Association Best Water in the United States. We take pride in our

water. I think that, you know, there are only so many resources to

go around, and if you could take that resource and direct it toward

an area that needs it and leave us the heck alone, because we’re

doing a great job, then I think that’s proper. I totally like your line

of thinking, Senator Crapo. That is just exactly what we say.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you. I’ll just conclude my questions, then,

if you want to ask——

Senator VOINOVICH. I’m finished.

Senator CRAPO. I just want to note in one part of your written

testimony that you didn’t have time to get to, you talked about the

fact that the U.S. EPA recombination on flows is being re-evaluated now and hasn’t been finalized, and I noted one of the things

that’s under consideration is whether the permit issuing authority,

NPDES authority, which in this case would be Ohio EPA, would

have the flexibility to address some of these issues and to allow the

elimination of some of the micromanagement as long as the objectives were being achieved.

I was pleased to see that, and I’ll tell you I’m going to go back

and a talk to Christine Todd-Whitman, and some of the others involved there, and see if they can hurry up this evaluation and come

out with a more flexible approach so we can have more involvement at the State and local levels.

Mayor REID. I appreciate that very much, Senator. Because the

Ohio EPA has been very good to work with. Generally, the problems we’ve had over the many years I’ve been in government, the

Ohio EPA is on our side. They try to help us all they can, but then

they run smack up against the Federal regs. It seems like the fed

guys are—they’ve got this hard set of standards that are sometimes

impossible. I don’t know if they sit in an office somewhere and

dream these up, but the Ohio EPA’s down here in the trenches.

They know what’s realistic and what’s not. I think Chris Jones will

tell you the same thing.

Senator CRAPO. Just to kind of give Chris an opportunity to

know where I’m headed, that’s one of the questions I’m going to

ask them. I know in Ohio, we see them doing things that in my

opinion, is nuts, and when I get an opportunity to talk them in
19

these kinds of forums, I ask them about that, and almost every

case, their hands are tied. They’re doing what they have to do.

Mayor REID. Exactly.

Mayor VINCENZO. Exactly.

Senator CRAPO. One of the problems, to create the flexibility and

do so in a way that does not jeopardize the quality of our environment. I think we can do it.

All right. We thank you both for your attendance here, and your

input is going to be very helpful to us.

Mayor VINCENZO. Thank you very much, Senator Voinovich and

Senator Crapo.

Senator CRAPO. I forgot to announce to those of you who may

have seen the schedule, we’re going to break this into three panels

instead of two panels, and the way we’re going to do that is we’re

going to ask—and I guess—I better get this right. Yes, Chris Jones.

We’re going to ask Chris to come and do a panel all by himself.

Chris is the director of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency for the State of Ohio.

We will then have the remaining four witnesses in the last panel.

I forgot to announce that, and I apologize.

But, Mr. Jones, we appreciate you coming here today, and we

look forward to your testimony, and I think we’ll have a very interesting dialog as we evaluate the issues. Please proceed.

STATEMENT OF CHRIS JONES, DIRECTOR, OHIO

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

Mr. JONES. Thank you, Senator Voinovich, Chairman Crapo, and

thank you for allowing me to speak about the wastewater needs in

Ohio communities. Those needs are great and the resources to address them are not currently adequate.

The Clean Water Act has brought about tremendous improvement in the quality of Ohio waters. By mandating control of point

source discharges, including sewage treatment plants, the Act has

enabled many streams to recover from low oxygen conditions, excess phosphorus discharges, and other degradation.

There are many dramatic examples of the results, most notably,

perhaps, the renaissance along the banks of the Cuyahoga River in

Cleveland and the resurgence of Lake Erie as a world-class fishing

destination. I understand that Senator Voinovich may be planning

some fact-finding missions to the lake this summer to confirm for

himself that the walleye and perch are really biting.

Senator CRAPO. He may have to invite me back.

Mr. JONES. In the 1970’s and 1980’s, as has been mentioned,

many of the infrastructure projects that enable water quality improvements throughout the State were funded through the Federal

Construction Grants program, which provided 75 percent of the

cost of the sewage treatment infrastructure mandated by the Clean

Water Act. As you know, that was converted to a low-interest loan

program administered by the States.

The State Revolving Loan Fund program is currently due to be

re-authorized, and I know that Governor Taft has written you to

express his strong support for your bill to do that, Senator

Voinovich.
20

We are particularly pleased that S. 252 would double the current

level of funding to $3 billion a year over 5 years. If enacted by Congress and signed by the President, it will greatly assist communities in Ohio and throughout the Nation with the construction, expansion and improvement of sewage treatment facilities.

However, even doubling current spending will not adequately

meet the mandates in the Clean Water Act. I’d like to briefly outline the needs in Ohio, and then suggest two areas in which targeted resources are particularly needed.

Ohio EPA is in the process of updating the Clean Water Needs

Survey, which we do every 5 years in cooperation with the U.S.

EPA. Unfortunately, our results for this year aren’t in, so I’m going

to give you some figures based on 1996, and I’ve included a summary with my testimony. We hope to have more current numbers

by the summer.

In 1996, the infrastructure need in Ohio, according to the survey,

was $7.4 billion. That can be further broken out as follows: $1.1 billion for wastewater plant construction and improvement; $900 million to repair existing sewers; $900 million for construction of new

sewers; $97 million for stormwater controls; $198 million for nonpoint source pollution abatement; and $4.2 billion for combined

sewer overflow elimination.

Obviously, combined sewer overflows that account for more than

half the infrastructure needs in Ohio, and even with the dramatic

increases in low-interest loan dollars, the burden is too much for

many communities.

There are 92 Ohio communities with combined sewers, and they

range from the largest of our cities—such as Cleveland, Akron, Toledo, Youngstown and Cincinnati—to very small communities, like

Van Wert and Lisbon. In fact, a total of $16 million for CSO controls is needed in communities with fewer than a thousand residents.

As an example, Port Clinton, a northwest Ohio town of a little

more than 7,000 people, has completed a combined sewer system

long-term control plan. The plan recommends improvements over

the next 5 years of between $8 million to $14 million. Port Clinton’s annual average sewer rate is now $566, which is 77 percent

higher than the State average.

To pay for the improvements, in today’s dollars, the average

sewer bill will increase to $846 in 2004, and $1,132 in 2010. These

projections already include a $1.5 million grant expected in 2002

as part of a previous budget bill.

The second area where Ohio would like to see targeted Federal

grants is to provide sewers in low-income areas where failing septic

systems are causing public health concerns.

It’s difficult to believe that in the year 2001 in the United States,

people are living with raw sewage in the back yard, in the drainage

ditch, or in the creek. But it’s true in far too many communities.

The 1996 Clean Water Needs Survey identified 199 areas in Ohio

with high densities of failing on-lot septic systems, a number we

believe significantly understates the real need. We are attempting

to gather more accurate information in the survey that is ongoing

now.
21

Exposure to drainage from failing systems threatens public

health, but the threat doesn’t end there. Pooling effluent is a breeding ground for mosquitos, which carry encephalitis, including the

form known as West Nile Virus. We expect to see that virus this

year in northeast Ohio.

I’m already over my time limit and I have a lot of recommendations. I would like to make three real quick ones, and they address

some of the questions you asked, Senator.

First, State primacy needs to mean State primacy. The Clean

Water Act should explicitly articulate minimum standards that

States must meet, and then delegate the program. Once a State is

awarded primacy, there should be no independent Federal presence

unless the State fails to perform its obligations.

Second, U.S. EPA needs a better grant program. Under the Federal Clean Air Act, we have one grant for programs. Under the

Clean Water program, we have several grants, and we spend a lot

of time and money just tracking the money. That money could be

spent on programs.

The last point: we need to recognize that when everything is a

priority, nothing is a priority. We have right now U.S. EPA pressing us, and ultimately these people behind me, to move forward on

all fronts. We’re talking about industrial permits that need to be

updated every 5 years, sewer overflows, stormwater, wetlands,

coastal areas, stream uses, and we don’t have adequate funding for

any of them. So we’re trying to do a little bit of everything and not

enough of anything.

I’ve also included all the recommendations, and I’m sure we can

get to them.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you very much, Mr. Jones.

Senator Voinovich.

Senator VOINOVICH. I’m interested in the issue of setting minimum standards and then giving the authority over to the States

to run the program.

It’s very difficult to get the Federal EPA to do that, because as

Senator Crapo said earlier, too many people in the agency and,

frankly, too many people in Congress don’t believe that people on

the State and local level care as much about clean water and the

environment as they do.

We just went through that recently with the groundfills, and

Senator Crapo helped me with my amendment to try and give more

certainty and more to the States. But there was strong opposition

in our committee for that, because they wanted the Federal Government to micromanage this operation.

So this type of attitude just flows throughout the agency. No

matter what issue it is, they are very reluctant to give up any of

their controls. I’m interested in your commenting a little bit more

about those areas where you feel that they’re too intrusive and

ought not to be involved.

Mr. JONES. Senator Voinovich, I couldn’t agree with you more.

The automatic response is that there will be a race to the bottom,

and I just don’t believe that that’s the case. I can cite all kinds of

statistics about what the States are doing.

I think there’s been a dramatic change. Seventy percent of all the

Federal statutes are now delegated to States. Depending on how
22

you count that, over 90 percent of the enforcement activities are

done by the States now. I think that statistic all by itself tells you

that we’re not interested in walking away from the problem. In

fact, we will take the enforcement actions that we need to.

It can be simple things, Senator. For example, we’re required to

renew permits every 5 years under the NPDES program. We spend

lots of time doing that on a lot of permits where there’s no need

to do it. Where we have a wastewater system that’s performing,

and is always meeting standards, it’s a paper exercise but we have

to go through it, and it takes a lot of time. So we could make 10-

year permits instead of 5-year permits, and make better use of our

resources.

I mentioned targeting some of the grant money as opposed to

loan money. Even with the 0 percent loan, in some cases, you’ve

still got to pay it back. If your community is at the poverty level,

you can’t do that. We have tremendous rate increases.

The flexibility that has been discussed before goes to bypasses in

large measure. It’s, in a sense, what gets us into micromanagement. For example, where do you count the bypass? You have situations—I’m sure you’ll hear from Toledo about the central internal

bypasses, a bypass within the system. We’re forced to count that

as a bypass, and that’s a violation. It doesn’t really make sense if,

at the end of the day, there is, in fact, effluent coming out the end

of the pipe that meets standards.

There are other provisions. One of the things that I would like

to see evaluated is what States are doing with anti-degradation. As

you know, Senator, we spend a lot of time, a lot of effort, dealing

with the anti-degradation provisions.

When I go to my national meetings, I don’t hear other States

being concerned about anti-degradation. When I mention it, because it’s been so difficult for us as an agency to deal with, it’s not

even on the radar screen. This tells me we’re doing something really wrong, or everybody else isn’t really following the law. The goals

of anti-degradation make a lot of sense.

Senator VOINOVICH. Can you explain that a little bit more.

Mr. JONES. Sure. Anti-degradation essentially says in order to

continue to make progress toward the fishable, swimmable goals,

we need to keep clean waters clean. That is, we should not allow

for further degradation. In fact, we should improve waters that are

impaired. That’s a laudable goal. That’s a goal we all share.

But what has resulted is a tremendous exercise in alternative

analysis that is costly just to get through the permit process. In

many cases, a huge number of cases, you end up back where you

started from in terms of what you wanted to do to improve your

system.

So we have a fundamental question, does the anti-degradation

provision work? Is it actually improving water quality?

A simple analysis of what States are doing with respect to the

anti-degradation review, and is it having a real impact on improving water quality and maintaining clean streams, I think would be

a real benefit to everybody.

Earlier, I mentioned briefly block grants. We have separate

grants for almost all of our individual water programs, whether it

be wetlands or large wastewater operations. Simplifying the grant
23

process will save us a lot of money and make us able to use that

money creatively, if we don’t have to track every dime 15 different

ways from Tuesday.

I think that, again, goes to Senator Crapo’s comment about

micromanagement. If you believe that you can’t trust us with the

money, you’re going to watch every dime that you give to us. If in

fact, you believe we will try to improve water quality, you’re going

to give us a lot of grants, and we in Ohio can best figure out how

to use those dollars.

We’re right in the middle of a budget debate right now in this

State, and we’re looking at options for cutting back on some of our

programs.

The last one I’ll mention is the TMDL program, total maximum

daily load. What are the loads to a stream and where can we go

from here? We have a fairly active program in Ohio, but what we’re

really trying to do through our 319 grant program, and others, is

to involve the community to create situations where there’s a community investment in the solutions.

There’s not a lot of command and control that goes with TMDL

and non-point discharges. We don’t want that. The last thing we

need for this kind of impact to streams is a command and control

system.

To make it work, it’s going to take watershed groups, locals who

have an investment in the stream, to come up with their solutions

to these problems. In some cases, it’ll be a community that wants

to take a dam down. In other communities, that dam may have important historical significance for the community and they want to

do something differently.

Whether it’s Columbus or Washington, if we tell people exactly

how to do something like that, people don’t want to do it. Ultimately, you don’t get the kind of water quality improvement they’d

really want.

I’m sure there’s folks behind me that will tell you even more specifics of where they’ve had a problem, and it’s ultimately my staff

telling them, ‘‘You have to do it this way.’’ For me, it’s never a satisfactory answer, when we have to tell them in response to their

question, ‘‘Why?’’ ‘‘Well, because the feds are making us do that.’’

It makes no sense. It never makes sense. It’s ‘‘the feds are telling

us do that.’’

Senator VOINOVICH. Do you have a national group that could

come back and make recommendations to this committee about

things that would improve your relationship with the Environmental Protection Agency. That would give you more flexibility, not

waste your time on things that you ought not to be wasting your

time on and overall achieve a better, cleaner water environment,

but do it in a way that’s so much more cost effective than what

we’re doing today?

Because I keep hearing about this problem and anti-degradation

and some of these other things, and it’s difficult for the subcommittee to try and figure out what we ought to do. We need a

comprehensive report back about things that are there that ought

not to be there, and share those with Christine Todd-Whitman. If

there are things that she can’t do because of Federal regulation,
24

then we can look beyond those regs to the Federal law that makes

her feel that she has to do those.

Mr. JONES. Senator, as the Ohio EPA director, I belong to the

Environmental Council of the States, which is all of State counterparts.

One of the things we did as a result of an amendment in last

year’s budget was to look at the enforcement issue on exactly that

kind of basis. What are the States doing, what can we do better?

It, again, gets to primacy. The feds never believe that we’re doing

a good enough job, no matter what we do, so we’ve got an earmark

and we did a study on State enforcement efforts, which was submitted to Congress.

I think the same type of thing can occur with respect to water

issues. We have a very active water committee on ECOS, and have

done a number of things. One of the things that the organization

as a whole did was submit an issues paper to the incoming administration.

I’d be happy to get a copy of that to the subcommittee. It’s not

specific to water, but it has a number of recommendations.

If I boiled it down, I think it is the difference between being a

stakeholder and a partner. If, in fact, we are co-regulators, that we

implement the Federal regulations at the State level, we need to

be partners, as opposed to just another stakeholder of U.S. EPA.

In Ohio, we have lots of stakeholder groups, and work very effectively with many of the people in this room as well, but we need

to start moving to the next step, which is to move from stakeholders to partner, so that when we’re trying to implement TMDLs

in a watershed, it’s not Columbus coming to tell them this is the

way we think you ought to do it, but it’s Columbus working in partnership with the watershed group, and soil and water conservation,

and the metropolitan sewer districts to come up with the best solutions for the economy.

When I try to boil this down, that’s the difference. Right now

we’re a stakeholder of the U.S. EPA. We should be partners as coregulators with the U.S. EPA.

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you. Most of my questions have already

been answered either by your testimony or by the dialog between

you and Senator Voinovich, Mr. Jones, but I just want to quickly

hit a couple things.

I really appreciate the recommendations that you’ve made in

your testimony, and I can assure you that we will take those very

carefully into account as we move forward. I especially liked the

section about making sure that State primacy means primacy.

I assume that you would agree with this, but I want to be sure

to ask you directly, in terms of trying to move toward a system in

which the Federal Government sets the standard and then lets the

States and local communities determine how best to achieve it,

would you agree with that type of direction in our environmental

policy?

Mr. JONES. Absolutely, Senator. In fact, I think that’s what the

model is supposed to be.

Senator CRAPO. I think that’s what it was supposed to be, but go

ahead.
25

Mr. JONES. I really think when you look at it, the system that

allows for these programs to be delegated to the States, says we’re

going to set the standards. The United States is not a monolith; the

State of Ohio has significant differences between the southwest

part of the State, the northeast part of the State, and the northwest part of the State. We have very significant and differing

issues to deal with, and we need to be flexible.

Multiply that times 50 States, and the Federal Government

needs to be willing to say, ‘‘OK, here’s the standard, you figure out

how to meet it’’. I think that’s the way these environmental statutes are structured, although not always implemented.

Senator CRAPO. I agree with you. In fact, I think that in Washington, we have, in a rather typical way, come up with a whole new

definition of what delegation means. Because as I think you said

earlier in your testimony a significant amount of the activity in the

Federal environmental law is now delegated to the States, and they

do have so-called primacy, and they are administering the Federal

programs.

But what I run into consistently is that behind the State’s socalled primacy and the State management is the big brother’s

heavy hand at the Federal level, and that the State regulators are

essentially operatives of those Federal program managers, and they

really don’t have the primacy or the independence to make those

flexible decisions they have told us they need. Would you agree?

Mr. JONES. I would agree, Senator.

One of the things that we have created in our agency is an assistance unit that many of these folks have worked with to try to

find those creative solutions to these difficult problems. You know,

you run into the brick wall.

I think it’s interesting that U.S. EPA, through Project XL, always

talked about alternatives and creative innovations, which are creative and innovative until you submit them for approval, at which

point, you’re not following the regulations, and thanks a lot.

I will tell you, I could improve our water quality tomorrow just

by the way we look at our water quality data. If we just looked at

chemical criteria, the number of streams and water bodies in this

State that meet water quality standards would go up.

But what we’ve chosen to do is look at the biological criteria, look

at more than what’s just the chemical quotient. Now, that causes

me some problems with these folks, sometimes, because we take a

harder look, but it’s a more realistic look at water quality.

U.S. EPA has flown our guys all over the country to teach people

how to do this, but every time we’ve submitted a rules package or

asked for biological criteria—because in some cases it will cause

the chemical number to be higher—they’ve rejected it. So it seemed

ironic that they want us to teach everybody how to do it, but when

we try to put it into our rules, we’re not allowed to. I think that’s

sort of the perfect example of where you run into that Federal inflexibility. They even acknowledge it’s a good idea, but they just

can’t bring themselves to allow us to do it.

Senator CRAPO. That’s a good example. Before I conclude, I just

can’t resist asking you a question, although it’s a little bit of a divergence, but you brought it up, the TMDL issue.
26

As you’re probably aware, we had a tremendous battle last year

in Congress—in fact, for the last 2 years in Congress—over the

EPA’s proposed TMDL rules and regulations, which ultimately we

ended up delaying once and then delaying a second time, in which

the EPA is now evaluating, and we’ll see where they head.

But at the time when we were evaluating this, the same issue

came up, the States by and large were handling non-point source

inclusion through best management practices rather than through

the new TMDL program. The question that came before the committee was whether there was a problem or whether we just had

a debate over this new regulation that was going to be very expensive and divert a lot of resources.

Do you have an opinion on that? Did we need to or do we need

to move to a new TMDL program or are the programs that the

States were administering adequate?

Mr. JONES. Senator, we do believe that non-point source pollution

is where the bigger problem is now. We have done a pretty good

job at controlling the point sources. We’ve ratcheted down discharge limits to where, frankly, you can’t do much more, short of

zero-discharge limits, which are cost prohibitive and probably impossible. So, we think you do have to go after the non-point

sources, agricultural runoffs.

Having said that, I think the TMDL program, at least in Ohio,

the way we were developing it, was very much on a volunteer

basis, essentially best management practices, encouraging local cooperative efforts to address some of these issues. Our biggest concern with what was approached is we’re sort of headed back to the

command and control.

In particular, when you’re talking about diffuse impacts to

streams, my view is it won’t work.

When you have a discrete point source discharge, everybody

knows where it is, and everybody understands that’s what you

have to control.

When you’re talking about runoff impacts to the stream from

non-point sources, it’s not so simple. You start to get into, in a

sense, some of the social behaviors. You’re talking about agriculture that has been encouraged probably 50 ways from Tuesday

in opposite directions, but there are means by which we can address some of these problems.

They won’t work if we’re just telling people, this is exactly how

you have to do that. We have to create a system that encourages

best management practices. Best management practices will

change; that’s the nature of them. But I think that’s the way we’re

going to succeed with the non-point sources.

So, yes, there’s a need for a TMDL program, but it needs to be

a cooperative, voluntary one. The rule that was proposed last year,

I think, is moving exactly in the opposite direction.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you.

Senator VOINOVICH. That’s basically just TMDL, let the watershed work come up with it, come back with the recommendations,

don’t force you to try to come in and do it. A lot of the communities

tell you you don’t have the staff to do it anyhow, and that would

save money and you get the buy-in from the community. You create
27

public value with the various groups that are there that want to

participate.

My last question is, do you believe—are you familiar with the

WIN Proposal?

Mr. JONES. I’ve not read the whole thing, but I’m familiar with

it, yes.

Senator VOINOVICH. Do you think that we ought to go forward

with a major program in terms of loans and grants, combination

programs, that would take this thing up?

Mr. JONES. I think not only do we have to, I think it won’t happen any other way. I think what you’ve heard already, what I’ve

tried to say and what you’re going to hear is, there is a significant

infrastructure need that was met in the past with fairly strong

Federal program.

We’re, in a sense, flipped now—75/25 because it’s now mostly

loans. I don’t think there’s any feeling that we shouldn’t contribute

as a State and local communities.

I think there’s a real need, but when you’re talking about billions

of dollars in infrastructure, that’s something that communities by

themselves and the States by themselves simply can’t address. It’s

just going to get worse.

It’s interesting, I was thinking about the infrastructure question.

Senator, you’re familiar with the water main breaks in Cleveland

in the last 5, 6 months.

Senator VOINOVICH. Major.

Mr. JONES. Major ones.

Senator VOINOVICH. In fact, I was told not to come to my Federal

office because the water was running around the Federal building.

Mr. JONES. Just outside this building, there’s a famous picture

of a Mercedes Benz in a sinkhole because the pipes just gave way.

That was 10 years ago, or more. It’s a problem that’s getting worse

that needs to be addressed. Because, from my perspective as an

EPA director, it starts to impact water quality, and that’s what

people are concerned about.

Senator CRAPO. All right. Thank you very much, Mr. Jones. We

appreciate your time.

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you for being here.

Senator CRAPO. We’ll call up our last panel today, which is Mr.

Erwin Odeal, who’s the executive director of the Northeast Ohio

Regional Sewer District in Cleveland. I understand we have Mr.

Robert Stevenson, the Commissioner of the Department of Public

Utilities—— Mr. STEVENSON. City of Toledo.

Senator CRAPO. Mr. Patrick Karney, director of the Metropolitan

Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati. Mr. Patrick Gsellman, who is

the manager of the environmental division of the Akron Engineering Bureau of the city of Akron. We appreciate all of you being with

us today.

We will begin with you, Mr. Odeal.

Senator VOINOVICH. Could I mention, also, if you could just kind

of quickly talk about the years you’ve had in this business, so we

can get—I want to say to you, Mr. Chairman, you couldn’t find a

better panel of people to give you a cross-section of what’s going on.

They’ve been in it a long time. They’ve got different perspectives,
28

and I’m tickled that you’re here. Because we would never have the

time to get this kind of testimony in Washington. It would never

happen. So we’re really looking forward to seeing what you have

to say today.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you.

STATEMENT OF ERWIN ODEAL, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,

NORTHEAST OHIO REGIONAL SEWER DISTRICT, CLEVELAND, OH

Mr. ODEAL. Senator, Mr. Chairman, in terms of years, the testimony says here I’ve been around for almost 35 years in this business out on the front lines, all of it, really, working in the Cleveland area, city of Cleveland, with the Regional Sewer District. I’ve

been fortunate to be a part of the Association of Metropolitan Sewage Agencies. So I appreciate the chance to be here today and talk

about the future of the national and Ohio’s water quality.

The district, since its creation in the 1970’s, has invested over

$1.6 billion for capital improvements to the wastewater conveyance

and treatment system. These improvements include upgrades in

treatment plants, construction of five interceptors, and numerous

relief sewers.

The Clean Water Act financed 40 percent of the cost of this

project, with the balance paid for by the district’s ratepayers, either

as repayment of low interest loans or as pure district funds.

The most——

Senator VOINOVICH. Erwin, would you mind, even with my hearing aids, I’m having a tough time.

Mr. ODEAL. OK. It’s not the first time, Senator. I remember—just

as divergence—when I used to work for the State of Ohio, I think

the recorder used to tell me to slow down all the time when I was

testifying. I definitely won’t get through it.

But the most recent regulatory requirement imposed upon the

district is our combined sewer overflow management and reduction

program, which involves a management requirement of CSOs, the

use of storage tunnels and various other infrastructure.

The district has spent over $220 million to date on CSO program—probably helps if my mike’s on—which 11 percent was funded through Federal grants, with the balance paid for by the district’s rate payers.

Our current program is anticipated to cost over $1 billion over

the next 15 years. I give you these numbers to show you the

amount of burden that’s placed on the wastewater ratepayers. The

ratepayer’s burden has increased from about 37 percent to over 90

percent of the current situation. There’s no question that without

additional funding and loans and grants, we will not be able to

meet these requirements.

The SSO program, for example, that the regs have been talking

about, EPA has estimated over 80 billion, and we think that number is probably low.

On that basis, we strongly endorse and support and work actively for the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN) program and

the Water Infrastructure Caucus to bring about a balance of funding between local, State and Federal funding.
29

Without that, we do not think that the progress that we have

made will be sustained or that we will meet these new objectives.

In addition, we think that there needs to be a more efficient way

to integrate and balance the various aspects that we have to face

in terms of the separate CSOs, SSOs, stormwater management and

TMDL programs.

Currently, communities must face these as individual sets of regulations with individual and sometimes divergent program requirements, requiring deficiencies and not leading us to a uniform objectivity. As a result, as a member of the Association of Metropolitan

Sewage Agencies, and others, have worked to try to develop some

unified Federal legislation that would allow us to deal with all,

particularly wet weather, water quality problems on a watershed

basis.

In addition, the water quality standards that are fashioned for

urban streams must be scientifically defensible. We certainly support and highly endorse the Ohio EPA’s approach to biological

standards. We believe that proof of streams quality is in the biology, not in the chemistry. We think that we would continue to like

the opportunity to work with the committee.

We’ve got a lot of information in our written testimony and some

information on the WIN program. Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you very much, Mr. Odeal.

Mr. Stevenson.

STATEMENT OF ROBERT STEVENSON, COMMISSIONER,

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC UTILITIES, TOLEDO, OH

Mr. STEVENSON. Thank you. My name’s Robert Stevenson. I have

about 25 years in the water and wastewater treatment field. Mayor

Finkbeiner could not be here. He is at a function for the $1.2 billion Jeep plant. Publicly, on behalf of the city of Toledo, we’d again

like to thank Senator Voinovich for his help in that project.

The city of Toledo is currently involved in discussions to settle

a lawsuit that was brought by the U.S. EPA on October 29, 1991.

The claim was that the city of Toledo was not meeting its NPDES

permit. The plant had undergone massive rebuilding efforts, with

Federal assistance, and had not been in full compliance.

Over the 10 years of the lawsuit, the final effluent has come into

compliance and its discharge is no longer an issue. The issue of bypassing them became evident. The issue of bypassing was submitted to Judge James Carr. He had ruled that the bypasses were

illegal if feasible alternatives are available. This term is contained

in the Clean Water Act, and he defined feasible alternatives to include building new treatment units. He stopped short of defining

what the measures would be needed to be undertaken. He did,

however, indicate that maximizing their existing treatment plant

was not sufficient when it comes to feasible alternatives and bypassing. It has huge ramifications for wastewater treatment in general.

The U.S. EPA has insisted that we build an equalization basin

that would hold a sufficient quantity of wastewater such that we

can avoid bypassing. This amounts to a $60 million basin.
30

In previous discussions, we had conceived and designed an alternative wet weather system that would treat higher flows and return them to the Maumee River without the need for storage.

We fully intended to ensure that the discharge would meet water

quality standards such that no harmful effects would be produced.

This alternative could have saved us $40 million. The U.S. EPA insisted that this was a good idea, that we should downsize it slightly

and combine it with the 60 million gallon equalization basin. Our

remedy of 30 to 35 million ended up costing $80 million.

The disappointing part of this is that there was little water quality benefit to the Maumee River. The reason we did not agree on

the Actiflow system alone is that it wasn’t getting full secondary

treatment, and technically it was a bypass.

They would be willing to allow us to build such a system as long

as we build an equalization basin, too.

The previous discussion is only a portion of our lawsuit issues,

but it serves to highlight the problems with completing wastewater

infrastructure projects. The first topic that needs to be addressed

is regulatory oversight.

The U.S. EPA has placed more emphasis on enforcement rather

than water quality results. Meeting technical definitions contained

within rules and regulations is more important than water quality

standards. There seems to be an imbalance there.

The second area of regulatory oversight is cost-effectiveness and

scientifically-based reasoning.

In discussion, everyone champions the idea of applying good scientific evidence, sound engineering principles, and cost-effective solutions. However, in practice, these issues are not given the weight

or consideration which is appropriate.

The recently adopted CSO policy has a better approach. The policy talks about comprehensive and coordinated planned efforts by

municipalities, regulatory agencies and the public.

It allows for site-specific solutions and the need for flexibility to

tailor controls to arrive at the best solutions.

The U.S. EPA needs to fully embrace this approach to enhance

technical assistance and reduce regulatory enforcement.

In Toledo’s case, our proposed consent decree will cost the ratepayers over $400 million. The city is prepared to spend this money,

we just don’t want it to balloon to $600 million or $700 million.

To give you an idea of the impact on the city of Toledo, consider

the following: Our current overall debt for the entire city of Toledo

over the last 100 years is $423 million. With the wastewater

projects proposed, this will double our debt for the entire city of Toledo.

The need for water and wastewater capital infrastructure improvements industry-wide amounts to $46 billion per year. That

equals $230 billion over a 5-year period. Clearly, there is a need

for funds.

If I were to summarize some of the actions I would like to see

Congress encourage, No. 1, regulations that are based on scientific

and engineering principles; No. 2, regulations that are based on

water quality objectives; No. 3, regulatory actions that place an emphasis on cooperation rather than enforcement; No. 4, Federal

funding for the long-term and in sufficient quantities to meet the
31

needs of the industry; No. 5, clarification of language of the Clean

Water Act to provide flexibility of meeting demands of wet weather

systems; No. 6, provide research and support for new initiatives;

No. 7, provide Federal funding, because the need is so large; No.

8, continue to educate the public; No. 9, allow communities to be

a partner, not simply those who execute the plan; and, finally,

begin to look at non-point source discharges as opposed to point

source discharge. Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you very much, Mr. Stevenson.

Mr. Karney.

STATEMENT OF PATRICK KARNEY, DIRECTOR,

METROPOLITAN SEWER DISTRICT OF GREATER CINCINNATI

Mr. KARNEY. Good morning. I’m the director of the Metropolitan

Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati. Recently, I testified before the

House on behalf of the Association of Metropolitan Sewages, whose

members provide water services in more than 50 metropolitan

areas around the country on the subject of financial crises those

utilities are facing.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today on the issue of

water infrastructure needs. Recently, more than a million consumers in California were plunged into darkness. Imagine what

would happen if the Nation’s water and wastewater systems began

to fail.

Failure of the wastewater system could create a public health

concern, cause widespread degradation, and lead to an erosion of

the public trust and clean and safe water as unwavering.

Everyday, Americans rely on clean water for recreational, commercial fishing and industrial activity. These activities generate

billions of dollars every year, none of which would be possible without clean water.

Would we have built roads, bridges, and airports in communities

that would not provide clean and safe water? No. Inadequate capacity to treat wastewater can cripple a local economy, drive out

manufacturing, and wipe out tourism.

The gains we’ve made over the last 30 years are now at risk. According to the EPA, without significant new development, we can

lose the progress by 2016.

Today we ask the Senate, once again, to make water infrastructure funding a financial priority. We face an estimated gap of $3

billion a year between current investments in infrastructure and

what we need over the next 20 years to replace aging and failing

pipes, and Safe Drinking Water Act mandates.

This unprecedented level in investment would be needed at a

time when our community budgets are escalating by 6 percent a

year above inflation. Federal contributions should decline by 75

percent since 1980, and represent less than 5 percent of today’s

water and wastewater outlets.

Let’s put it in perspective. In Cincinnati, we need to invest between $1 and $3 billion to address a combined overflow and sanitary sewer overflow profits. This is over and above operation and

maintenance of our system and routine rehabilitation of aging systems that we have to operate.
32

This number’s staggering. Our user charges are mid-range compared to those of 67 surrounding utilities. If the problem can be

solved on the low end, we’ll be forced to increase our user charges

by 7 percent per year each of the next 15 years. This would multiply our existing rates by merely threefold, or 76 percent. If we end up closer to the $3 billion figure, we face rate increases

of 1 percent per year for 15 years. This would multiply our current

rate 17 times.

MSD does not receive government subsidies or local tax contributions for normal operations. These increases will fall solely on the

shoulders of our ratepayers, ordinary families who pay the true

cost of wastewater collection and treatment in their quarterly bills,

and have been doing so since 1968. These are the same families

whose sewer rates went up over 9 percent in 2000, another 7 percent this year, and probably 7 percent next year.

Cincinnati is just one of tens of thousands of cities and counties

facing a financial crisis due to aging infrastructure and the challenge of eliminating CSOs and SSOs. Plus with the expectations of

greater demands from new regulations, local rate payers could not

address these tremendous needs alone.

We can close this water infrastructure finding only if the Federal

Government and States meet our cities and counties halfway by

authorizing an average of $111⁄2 billion a year in capitalization

funds to the States over the next 5 years.

The Water Infrastructure Now report released last month, and

endorsed by over 30 national organizations, provides recommendations to the Congress and the President on how to address these

issues.

In an era of unprecedented surpluses, I can’t think of a better investment than the health of our citizens, the integrity of our environment, and the well-being of our communities.

Simply put, we can’t afford to leave any community behind as we

address the national water and wastewater infrastructure crisis.

On behalf of America’s wastewater utilities, I’d like to thank you

for your recent initiative, to re-energize the State’s resolving funds

program. Such leadership is what is needed to bring us all to grips

with funding crises facing our water infrastructure threatening our

citizens.

Mr. Chairman, we look forward to working with you and the rest

of the committee to find solutions to this national crisis. Water and

wastewater treatment would be truly devastating to the health and

well-being of our citizens and the national economy.

Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you, Mr. Karney.

Mr. Gsellman.

STATEMENT OF PATRICK GSELLMAN, MANAGER, ENVIRONMENTAL DIVISION, AKRON ENGINEERING BUREAU, AKRON,

OH

Mr. GSELLMAN. Thank you. On behalf of Mayor Plusquellic, I’d

like to give you an update of where we are in the city of Akron.

The city of Akron is located on the Cuyahoga River in northeast

Ohio, approximately 30 miles upstream from the city of Cleveland.

The Akron wastewater planning area covers approximately 167
33

square miles and includes most of the Akron metropolitan area.

There’s a population of 352,000 in the service area, including all or

a portion of five cities, four villages, and seven townships.

The sewer system includes approximately 1,165 miles of sewers,

consisting of 188 miles of combined sewers. There are 38 combined

sewer overflows within the city of Akron. Based on predictions from

the hydraulic model typical annual CSO volume is 2,400 million

gallons.

Previous efforts by the city of Akron have resulted in the elimination of sanitary sewer overflows in the city of Akron, and the

award of the Association of Metropolitan Sewage Agencies gold

award for no effluent violations in year 2000.

The city of Akron proposed a long-term control plan that will cost more than $248 million to implement. This cost is in addition to

the millions Akron’s already spent to date to study CSOs and the $25 million spent to eliminate sanitary sewer overflows.

Akron has seen a significant decline in its industrial base since

the 1960’s, requiring the residential users to carry the burden.

Akron already carries one of the highest residential sewer rates in

the State for cities with similar population.

The Akron Public Utilities Bureau is currently undergoing significant changes as a result of high water rates. This led to a Blue

Ribbon Panel to study the utility and the current Competitive Action Program. This program includes the water treatment facility,

sewer maintenance, water pollution control station and utilities engineering.

Significant reductions in operation costs were being realized and

will allow the utility to be competitive in the future. This will allow

the city to pay its fair share of needed improvements as long as the

Federal Government contributes its fair share.

As part of developing the Akron long-term control plan, several

options to fund the projects were evaluated. Given the significant

total costs of these projects, it is likely that the funds will be obtained from multiple sources, grants, loans and revenues obtained

by the sewer rates.

Grants are essential to the fundability and feasibility of the program. Without outside funding, sewer rates will more than double

just to handle the CSO program. The impact of additional operation and maintenance costs, system repair and replacement and

normal inflation will likely see the rates triple.

Current monthly sewer charges for a typical residential customer

are approximately $30 per month, for sewer only. The rate increases to $60 or $90 per month will adversely affect a significant

portion of the ratepayers, including those who can barely pay or afford their current utility bills.

The selected alternatives for the city of Akron’s integrated plan,

the long-term CSO plan, incorporates storage conveyance tunnels,

detention basins, treatment basins and sewer separations.

A set of rating criteria was used to compare the various alternatives. The criteria included stormwater impacts, water quality

improvements, operation and maintenance costs, public acceptance,

community improvements, and construction issues.

The approach taken for the long-term control plan was the presumptive approach, and the annual percent capture after the plan
34

is 94 percent. In addition to the funding, the issues of wet-weatherwater-quality standards, use designation and urban stream habitat

need to be addressed.

The city of Akron Public Utilities is also faced with rapidly rising

costs associated with stormwater, that’s the municipal stormwater,

total maximum daily loads, and drinking water regulation.

Akron continues to develop access to receiving streams with bike

paths, downtown development, a Mustill Store restoration, and

Cascade Lock Park. Also, the National Heritage River designation

and National Park will continue to attract people to the Cuyahoga

River.

We look forward to a solution that will cost-effectively address

CSO issues while producing benefits to the Akron ratepayers, enhance the parks and trails, show improvements in water quality,

and further the goals of the Clean Water Act.

Proposals similar to the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN) are

needed to provide for adequate funding now and in the future.

Through water and sewer bills, local ratepayers already pay 90

percent of the total cost to build, operate, and maintain their water

and wastewater systems.

We need a long-term, sustainable, and reliable source of Federal

funding for clean water. Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you very much.

Mr. Gsellman—Senator Voinovich.

Senator VOINOVICH. I’d like each of the witnesses to, if you can

do it, give me an idea of your current costs, on the average, household. I know it varies from how much water you use, and so forth.

Give the projected cost you’re going to have in, say, the next 5

years.

Mr. ODEAL. I guess in terms of the Regional Sewer District of

Cleveland is essentially a wholesaler, so we—our charge covers the

capital cost, the conveyance on the treatment, and the average consumer is probably paying about $300 a year to us now. The local

communities—some add a charge, some do it through general taxation. Then, frankly, some just haven’t had the dollars to do much.

We are just finishing——

Senator VOINOVICH. You say some——

Mr. ODEAL. Just don’t have the dollars to do much at all with

the sewer.

Senator VOINOVICH. Ratepayers, so many of them pay $300, some

of the cities subsidize them?

Mr. ODEAL. No, they add an additional charge. Some of the communities have charges, some do it through general taxation, and,

frankly, some just don’t do too much because, particularly the suburbs that have severe economic problems haven’t been able to invest very much in their infrastructure, and they have the most serious problems.

In terms of our projections, we’re just finishing our CSO longterm control plan, we’re working on our rate study, but I think it’s

safe to say, in the absence of Federal funding, we would be looking

at—if we’re going to do $1 billion worth of programming over 15

years, we’d look at a tripling of costs, ultimately, if there were no

Federal funds.
35

If it was all local dollars, based on the rates now in effect, we’ve

got probably a third of that federally funded. If we get nothing federally funded, with increased operating costs, I think it’s likely to

see a doubling or tripling of rates.

Senator VOINOVICH. You’re talking 15 years, you’re talking about

the average cost where communities are not putting something—

are the communities responsible—I should know this. Are the communities responsible for their infrastructure in their respective——

Mr. ODEAL. That’s correct, Senator. The communities have infrastructure responsibility for their individual sewer systems, as well

as they will be responsible for their stormwater programs under

the Phase Two.

Stormwater Program, and they will also be responsible for meeting the SSO regulations.

The sewer district is responsible for the combines of sewer overflows, but the separate overflows exist almost exclusively on the

suburban sewer systems, and they will be forced to having meet

any costs associated with the separate overflow program.

Senator VOINOVICH. So over 15 years, that $300 a year could go

up to $900?

Mr. ODEAL. That’s correct. But that would not include any money

at all for the 53 communities that do something with their sewers,

particularly the ones that have to deal with the SSO problem. That

would be in addition.

They will have to come up with those dollars to deal with that

SSO program, as well as all the additional regulatory requirements

of developing the programs and getting permits from Ohio EPA, as

well as getting stormwater permits of OEPA, and all those requirements.

Senator VOINOVICH. So it could be, say, $300, maybe $1,200?

Mr. ODEAL. Oh, I’m sure that the way the SSO regs—which

hopefully it will never see the light of day—were drafted, conceivably many of the communities would be forced with almost having

to replace their sewer systems under the premise that thou shalt

never have any overflow from any sewer system, no matter how old

it is. It is just not achievable, particularly in communities that

have sewers that are 60, 70, 80 years old. They do leak, they do

get stormwater in them.

Many of our communities, I’m sure, would face many of the horror stories that you heard on your first panel. There’s really no difference. The only difference is that these communities don’t have

a wastewater plant. They still have sewers, they get holes, and

they leak. Many of them are—as you know, some of the primary

suburbs are faced with some severe economic hardships, and many

of their ratepayers and taxpayers are well below the poverty level.

So for many of the people in our communities, they would have

a major impact for the inner city residents and the suburban residents.

Senator VOINOVICH. How about Toledo?

Mr. STEVENSON. In Toledo, the average cost for water and sewer

per year is about $300 to $400. With just the items that are in the

proposed consent decree that we’re talking about, specifically for

wet weather treatment, those bills could escalate to $600 to $900
36

per year, and that doesn’t include some of the provisions that he

was talking about on SSO’s. So it could double or triple our bills.

Mr. KARNEY. I need to answer one question earlier that I didn’t

speak to. I’ve been in the business 5 years. I’m not quite that

young, though, because I have half a decade in industry before I

started with that. But it’s nice to be speaking on a panel with

Erwin because of the comparison that I look really young. So I kind

of like that.

Cincinnati, right now, our residents are paying $300 a year. I

gave you a range earlier of $2 billion to $3 billion. That’s not just

a fuzzy number, we’ve actually had consultants go back to help us

do that estimation. That range is based upon how conservative or

how completely wacky the interpretation, especially the SSO rule,

could become.

When we look at how we would do it in good science and good

financial risk base, doing the best for the environment, we’re at

about $1 billion. We think, now, wait a minute, if we get to this,

as Erwin pointed out, no discharges from the sanitary system ever,

where do you go? Well, then we have to up the ante, and it gets

us to a $3 billion number. We’ve evaluated over 4,300 projects to

get that estimate.

So what that ends up doing is it takes us from the current $300

to within 15 years of either being at $1,000 or $5,000 per home per

year.

Senator VOINOVICH. One thousand dollars, five thousand dollars—it’s a big number. This is a 15-year period?

Mr. KARNEY. Yes, we’ll easily get to the $900 figure. If we are

really pressed hard, as some of the folks at U.S. EPA want to do

now, we’d be at $5,000 a year in 15 years, to be able to finance the

kinds of moneys we have to put in the system.

We’ve got parts of our system that go back to early 1800’s. Folks

say, why don’t you keep that up to where it should be? Well, things

that were done in the 1800’s, things that were done in the early

part of the 20th Century or the mid- or even late parts of the 20th

Century had no concept of what kind of regulations we’d be looking

at today.

Senator VOINOVICH. I think you’ve already said that your rates

have gone up, on the average, about 7 percent per year?

Mr. KARNEY. Yes, since I got to town, we did 9 percent the first

year, 7 percent this year, and we’re looking at 7 percent for next

year. That’s without even addressing these really big issues that

are still standing out in front of us.

Senator VOINOVICH. How about Akron?

Mr. GSELLMAN. In Akron, we’re looking at a little less than $30

a month, and that’s for sewer only. That would be $360 a year just

for sewer. The water’s another $20 a month. We’re looking at the

sewer bill itself being doubled, just implementing the capital portion of the CSO.

Senator VOINOVICH. What period of time?

Mr. GSELLMAN. Well, right now we’re still negotiating with Ohio

EPA and the long-term control plan what the schedule’s going to

look at, but generally talking about 10 years for the rates to double.
37

Senator VOINOVICH. So over 10 years, they would go up 100 and

some?

Mr. GSELLMAN. Right. By the time we look at inflation and those

items, probably three times.

Senator VOINOVICH. OK.

Senator CRAPO. I have a general question I’d just like to throw

out to the panel, and any of you who would like to can pitch in on

it.

You’re all aware, as I am, of the reports of what the infrastructure needs are. In fact, the hearing we held in March tried to just

get a handle on what everybody thought the infrastructure needs

in the industry were. As you may be aware, those estimates are ranging from $300 bil- lion to $1 trillion. It just depends on—and we’re talking, I think,

both the Clean Water Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act.

It seems to me that obviously it’s difficult to get a handle on

what the infrastructure needs are going to be. That’s why you see

such a wide range of needs. But part of the reason is to get such

a handle on it, because as this panel just indicated what it is that

they’re going to see the cost being, it’s hard to tell, because we

don’t know how rigid the commanding control system that we have

is going to be.

The question I’m getting at is this: As we look at trying to get

a handle on how to meet those infrastructure needs, it seems to me

that one of the things we have to do is better identify what we are

going to be requiring.

If you and those who are trying to estimate our infrastructure

needs better knew what would be required, we could get a better

handle on what our needs would be.

Would everybody agree with that?

(No verbal responses.)

Senator CRAPO. From what I’m hearing in the testimony here

today—and, frankly, this is not different from what we’re hearing

from many other parts of the country—those infrastructure needs

estimates that we are seeing are exceedingly high because we are

expecting that we are going to have to meet some standards, such

as zero overflow under any conditions.

Yet I’m also hearing that a different standard, which would allow

some flexibility, would not reduce water quality in the country, but

could significantly reduce costs of infrastructure; is that correct?

Anybody want to—— Mr. KARNEY. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Senator CRAPO. So in terms of how we meet this need—and I

want to get to this in a minute with regard to the—what the Federal role should be in terms of funding—one of the things we need

to look at is simply what might be called efficiencies or effectiveness in terms of cost-benefit analysis, and so forth.

I know this is going to be a really tough question for you to answer, but I’d like to see if anybody in the panel has an opinion on

it. If we were to have the kind of flexibility that we’ve talked about

in the hearing today, where the Ohio EPA would be able to—in its

issuance of NPDES, or whatever other regulatory action it would

take—would be able to work flexibly with the communities and

achieve the water quality standards that we set in flexible ways,
38

do you have any kind of a feel for what kind of reduction in the

overall infrastructure needs, that we would be looking at, would be

achievable?

Mr. STEVENSON. In Toledo’s case, the costs of our consent decree

that we’re talking about for wet weather treatment is about $450

million. We’ve submitted this to three national engineering firms

and asked them to give us a cost with the flexibility that you’re

talking about. Each of those three national engineering firms think

they can cut $100 million off of that $450 million capital cost.

Senator CRAPO. So that would be a little more than 20 percent

reduction in your specific case?

Mr. STEVENSON. Our specific case, yes.

Senator CRAPO. There would be no negative impact on water

quality?

Mr. KARNEY. And still meet water quality standards at the end

of the discharge, yes.

Senator CRAPO. Anybody else on the panel have any input or

opinion on that? You don’t have to be specific, even if you just have

a general opinion.

Mr. Karney.

Mr. KARNEY. Yes. My general opinion, having worked with Chris

Jones’s folks, both in Columbus and in the district office, is that

they have a better sense of practical benefits to be gained by different changes. As he noted, many times they are strictly against

the wall. They can’t do things. They can’t exercise the judgment.

I would say that that would get us down to close to that $1 billion number. He might be a little tougher on me than I’d want to

be on myself, so edge it up to $11⁄2 billion, rather than $3 billion.

So we could cut $11⁄2 billion off of just one city’s price tag.

Senator CRAPO. In terms of percentage, you’re talking about

maybe a 50-percent reduction?

Mr. KARNEY. That would be 50 percent of that gigantic increase

that we’re looking at, sir.

Senator CRAPO. Mr. Odeal or Mr. Gsellman, do you have an opinion on this?

Mr. ODEAL. I guess I would just have the general opinion that—

I think one of the real concerns I have is sometimes there’s a level

of expectation that’s put out there, the public’s going to get something for this investment, and this is probably my biggest concern.

As Senator Voinovich knows, we’ve made spectacular progress in

Cleveland, the lake front, the Cuyahoga River, we’re trying to focus

on some of the small streams in people’s backyards and—which directly impact it.

But I think if we were able to look at SSO and CSO and

stormwater on an integrated approach, looking at the stream biology, looking in urban streams, the stream variation flow, high flow,

low flows destroys habitat. I’m a converted engineer to biologist,

but I’m really listening to the biology, and that’s what we’re talking

about.

I think that kind of approach not only will save us significant

dollars, but actually will put the public expectation at a level that

can be achieved. I mean, the biggest danger here, frankly, in an

urban stream in wet weather, is high flows and drowning. People
39

shouldn’t be in the streams anyway during high flows, therefore,

there’s no use that’s impacted.

During high flow periods, we’ll waive the bacteria standard or

have a different standard if it quickly stabilizes back will have no

impact on use, no impact on fish, and could save us considerable

dollars.

I think those are the kinds of things we need to look at, reasonable approaches, and I think that, frankly, given the flexibility,

those are the kind of things we could sit down with Director

Jones’s staff and work through on a watershed by watershed basis

as opposed to one-size-fits-all for anything.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you.

Mr. Gsellman, do you have anything?

Mr. GSELLMAN. I’d like to add one thing that Mr. Odeal pointed

out. The expectation, after the day’s over, we’re going to spend

$248 million, the stream’s still not going to meet its uses during

certain wet weather events, and we need to make sure the public’s

aware of what the benefit is from doing this program; if the stream

is still not going to meet its water quality in certain situations because of other impacts on the stream, as far as non-point septic

systems, other localities’ SSOs, those kind of things; and also to

make sure the standard that we’re trying to obtain is the reasonable goal of the—especially in the urban streams. An urban stream

is different from another, you know, wooded area, agricultural

area, and I really think Ohio EPA needs to not only have the funds

but have the time so they can fully develop an urban stream category, so we can truly have a realistic goal that can be met.

Senator CRAPO. I appreciate the input that you’ve given, both in

terms of general comments, as well as the specifics.

In fact, we have two cities here, Toledo and Cincinnati, who

could achieve 0 percent to 50 percent savings if they had flexibility,

and still not impact water quality.

I think that the comments that Mr. Odeal and Mr. Gsellman

made about the perception of the public in terms of this investment

in our infrastructure are critical.

I think if the public understood that the numbers of dollars that

we are talking about don’t necessarily translate into a comparable

improvement or, in some cases, any improvement in the water

quality, that there would be an outrage, that we are expecting

them to see these kinds of doublings and triplings, and maybe

even, you know, much more—much higher increases in their resources.

A couple of years ago, there was a study done that got some national attention that indicated that when you’re talking about people’s health and their environmental satisfaction, and so forth, that

the most significant factor on the quality of life, in terms of people’s

health and safety, was their own economic circumstance.

When we’re talking about reducing a family’s economic ability in

these kinds of ways, in terms of the percentage of their family

budgets, or if it’s something where the city or the county or the

State steps in and pays for it instead, to save the family, you’re

talking about taking those resources away from the city, the county

and the State, which they could use on health and safety concerns
40

or environmental concerns. We’re talking very significant issues for

what are potentially zero benefits.

It seems to me that one of the things that we need to do is to

make sure that we have the most bang for the buck, in terms of

the infrastructure that we address here.

The second thing, which I’ll finish on, is after all that’s done, it’s

very clear that we’re still going to have a giant need for infrastructure. There’s a tremendous amount of need out there, and there

will be a responsibility at the Federal level to figure out how to

deal with this.

One of the debates that—well, not one of the debates, the debate

that we are now in is, should we meet that through the current approach, which is a system of revolving loans, or should we transfer

into some kind of a mixture with a system of grants?

It has seemed to me to be quite evident that with regard to the

small communities where they can’t achieve the economies of scale

that especially aren’t able to get some of this regulatory flexibility,

that there will have to be a grant program in place, because the

small communities simply can’t handle it.

I would appreciate any input that any of you would like to give

us in that context. Does that also apply to the larger cities?

Should we move to a grant program or some mixture of grants

with regard to smaller and larger communities, or can we handle

it through simply beefing up the revolving loan program?

What are your thoughts on this issue? I guess maybe we can just

start on the left, and if you don’t have a comment, just pass it on.

Mr. Odeal.

Mr. ODEAL. I can’t imagine anybody who wouldn’t be in trouble

if they didn’t have a comment on that.

I think as we’ve indicated in our comments, we certainly support

a balance of grants and loans. I think the loan program has been

exceptional. I think the real—one of the real values to the loan program is a reduction in red tape. Being trained as an engineer, I

don’t enjoy dealing with investment bankers, and all that is taken

away. You can focus really on building facilities, and some of this

other stuff. A lot of time saving, a lot of administrative saving.

But they are also really seen in the larger communities—I think

if you look at the problem with the larger communities, the average

income is wonderful, but the divergence of the income is—not only

in Cleveland, but our primary suburbs, and even in more affluent

communities, you have people that are well below the poverty line

and, therefore, what might be a tolerable rate to some folks is just

going to break their back.

Plus, I think, second, there’s a question of equity. Many of these

requirements are—they’re going to be well beyond what locals we

can justify, what I feel I can, as a good professional, justify.

If that is the national objective and the Federal Government

wants us to achieve that, then I believe the Federal Government

should finance that differential between what the local community

wants and can accept—and I don’t mean environmental degradation—but what is achievable and acceptable versus this higher

level.

I think that increment definitely should be financed by the government level that’s asking for that higher level.
41

Senator CRAPO. Good point.

Mr. Stevenson.

Mr. STEVENSON. In looking at engineering programs over a 15-

year period there invariably are years that have peaks and then

there are valleys. It would be extremely helpful for Federal assistance during those peak times so that we could average out rate increases to our citizens.

In our program, we estimate about a 5 to 6 percent rate increase

for the next 15 years. But there are a couple years where you get

into a 10, 15 percent increase because of the nature of the construction programs.

So it would be extremely helpful in those times to have Federal

assistance to level out that increase.

Senator CRAPO. Mr. Karney.

Mr. KARNEY. I’d just like to start by saying that a comment had

been made earlier, it’s too bad we can’t get these folks to come to

Washington, DC, this is so critical to our utilities. I know I, for

one—I’m sure several others—would be more than happy to make

that trip. If you can give us a little more than a week’s notice,

that’s good, too. But we need to come up and provide that kind of

input.

When I was doing the House testimony, I’d heard that there

were folks that were walking in and lobbying various representatives saying the local utilities aren’t paying their fair share, you

know, they’re not—the citizens aren’t doing this, they can certainly

do more, and these were all incredible amounts of misinformation.

So I’d be more than happy to come up and provide that local testimony if it’s necessary or can be of use to the system.

Yes, we do need grants. There needs to be a mixture of grants

and loans for the large as well as the small. The large utilities

have even bigger needs in some cases than the small utilities do.

As Erwin mentioned, there has been an incredible diversity of

economic levels, and there are a number of places, especially within

the city of Cincinnati, that if you ask folks to up another $500 a

year or $1,000 a year, they couldn’t do it. I don’t know what they’d

do for water supplies or wastewater treatment, but they just

couldn’t do it.

In the WIN proposal, not only is that asking for money, but it’s

also giving some direction and suggestions on Federal ways to administer funds so that we cut out a lot of red tape that was in the

old grants program and make it easier for States to be able to work

with some of that money to go right back to States.

Chris would be happy with that. Of course, it speaks to providing

funds to assist the States in running their environment programs.

Senator CRAPO. Your comments, and all the witnesses’ comments

about the need to streamline the financing part of this, the economic management, have been heard.

Mr. Gsellman.

Mr. GSELLMAN. Yes, in the Akron situation, specifically a sustainable grant program is essential. We’re kind of unique. We’re

not as caught up as the large cities that have the significant industrial base. We lost the significant portion of our industrial base,

and basically the sewer and water utilities fall onto the residential
42

customer to support. Due to that, they’re the ones that have to bear

these improvements.

Also, I think it’s important to have a sustainable grant program

instead of just one big, you know, pile of money coming in for a

short period of time.

We need something similar to the highway funds where we have

some sort of reliable source of revenue that goes into the funding

program and continue on to take out a lot of the peaks and valleys,

as far as funding, so that we can plan—we’re into doing programs

that are going to be 0-, 30-year programs. We need to know where

that funding source is going to be over that 0, 30 years.

Senator CRAPO. Thank you.

Senator Voinovich, do you have any more questions?

Senator VOINOVICH. Yes, I do. The issue of this cost projection

that—Senator Crapo made a good point, and that is how you base

your projections, has a lot to do with what the agencies can be required to do. I was thinking about that with this GAO report that

I’ve asked for that should be out here pretty soon.

But one of the things that we’ve got to know is—we’re asking

them, also, whether or not the agencies are really doing a realistic

job in projecting their costs.

For example, 1996, the EPA said the Clean Water Needs Survey

was $140 billion—no, $200 billion. Then $140 billion in 1996, and

then they said it was in 1999, $200 billion. Some other groups have

said it’s $300 billion over 20 years.

So, in other words, it’s all over—how in the world can you really

plan for it if you don’t some realistic idea how much that’s going

to cost? So I think that’s key.

The other thing is that I’ve learned from my vast experience that

people really aren’t—they don’t confront regulatory agencies until

they feel it in their pocket.

I think one of the things that your respective organizations

should be doing is a lot more effort in talking about what the problem is and what the projected costs are going to be and how that’s

going to be reflected in the pocketbook of the people in your respective communities.

It’s only then that there is going to be any kind of effort, I think,

in terms of looking at some of these regulations in a more realistic

fashion.

Just think about this. We’re talking about still in Congress of

having a massive school construction program, which is a fundamentally State and local responsibility, but no one wants to put

on the table the issue of what are we going to do with clean water

in this country or what are we going to do with sewage treatment,

and replacing the infrastructure and so on.

So a lot of the job here is going to be to elevate this issue into

a priority issue.

Frankly, in terms of the agency—we’re talking about the Environmental Protection Agency. It cuts across just about every area

you can think of. Because there’s no consideration ever usually

given to the cost.

As Senator Crapo said, the quality of life of individuals has a lot

to do with how much money they have available to them for their

families. If you can’t show some measurable, real improvement in
43

the environment and public water supply, how do you justify these

enormous costs increases?

What I’d like to know is what do you think, in terms of the overall cost increases that you’re seeing—could you rate the number

of—No. 1 projected cost increase—we know you’ve got—all of you

have got your projected infrastructure costs, depending on how old

your community is, you’ve got your problem. But let’s talk about in

addition to that, OK, that’s the given—the added cost. The added

cost. What, where is it, what’s going to generate the largest amount

of money that you’re going to have to spend? What issue is that?

Mr. ODEAL. Well, actually, just sitting here, Senator, I think one

of the issues that you’ll recall when you were Governor, and I think

you worked hard to get a realistic approach, was the Great Lakes

Initiative.

Director Jones’s office now is struggling with implementing the

approach to handling mercury, which is a natural substance that

is occurring everywhere. Some of the unrealistic objectives are

where we want to get in terms of totally eliminating mercury. That

can drive the costs unbelievably.

If we, in fact—if the goal—one of the difficulties we face is that

these things are zero, we can measure zero better all the time. So

we’re out in the parts per billion—we’re getting out there so far,

literally as ridiculous as it is, we do clean sampling and analyze

for mercury in a clean room on wastewater, because the requirements are coming down for mercury. So depending how mercury is

dealt with, it could be astronomical costs.

There’s lots of other items that are coming down out of the Great

Lakes Initiative that could be approached the same way.

One of the issues we haven’t talked about here at all today,

which is a big municipal issue, is what is more traditionally called

sludge. This has been a lot of work to get realistic standards, real

biosolids. If properly treated, it can become a real asset.

One of the difficulties that the government faces is the moving

target. So if, in fact, we were to develop a product—a biosolids

product, put it out in farmland, put it out in agriculture, meet all

the current standards, something new appears 5 years from now

and all of a sudden these things become retroactive. As many cities

have discovered, where they happened to put some trash in a landfill where somebody else put some bad stuff, they end up being liable. There are some unknown perils out there.

The biosolids peril is of particular concern because there you

could really get bothered, I think in the future, because of some

new requirement. So I think some of the shadow toxic issues, as

I call them—again, not that, you know, anybody wants to harm

anybody, we’re in the clean water business. Sometimes the four of

us sitting here are called polluters by environmentalists.

Well, in reality, we’re the good guys. We’re the ones, and the

folks back there are the good guys, and Director Jones. We cleanup

the pollution. We’re not the polluters, but I think those unknown

perils that we haven’t even talked about by some well-meaning

people who really think we can get everything down to zero when—

even in the natural occurring substances.

If, in fact, mercury is such a bad actor, why doesn’t the Federal

Government prohibit the use of thermometers? On the one hand,
44

we allow things to come out that another branch says are God

awful, and I myself have thousands of dollars worth of mercury in

my mouth, so maybe that’s why I’m like I am, huh?

You got me on my soap box. I apologize.

Senator CRAPO. Mr. Stevenson.

Mr. STEVENSON. I would echo those sentiments. Biosolids are one

of our largest line item on the budget, and Great Lakes Initiatives

holds a great deal of uncertainty that could cost us money.

Another thing that I would like to add—— Senator VOINOVICH. As a really interesting aside here, I was the

chairman of the Great Lakes Council when the initiative came

through. By the way, this was a voluntary thing. A couple of our

colleagues put it into law. EPA got a hold of it, and the initial rejections of the cost were astronomical, so what we did was go to

work and had a study made to reduce it down to what we call a

biocumulatives of the Great Lakes. Even now, we’re down to what

mercury and a couple of the other ones. Oh, PCBs and some of the

other things that really broke the chain. But here we’re talking

about one of the aspects, and that’s mercury. How far do you go

with the issue of mercury?

Mr. STEVENSON. It’s an interesting discussion. Being an old research chemist, years ago, when we used the tests for things, we

sometimes say the research is being driven by analytical technicians and not any specific agenda or target.

We’re able to test down that low, so that becomes the limit of

what we’re required to do.

Another thing that I would mention as an item on the horizon,

wastewater plants have large costs of energy. In the city of Toledo,

I’m a $3-million-year customer on electricity alone. So we watch

very closely deregulation of electricity, costs of those kinds are an

issue.

Senator VOINOVICH. They’re going up?

Mr. STEVENSON. Yes.

Senator VOINOVICH. Because what we’re doing is we’re not burning coal, we’re going to natural gas, and that’s what’s driving it up.

Mr. Karney.

Mr. KARNEY. In Cincinnati, I guess the SSO regulations are the biggest hit for us, could be $2 billion on that side. CSO is next on

that line with $11⁄2 billion. The whole nutrient issue, it seems like

that gets pushed down from the north on us with GLI—— Senator VOINOVICH. Let me make sure I understand this, because I—SSO, storm sewer overflow——

Mr. KARNEY. SSO is sanitary sewage overflow. That’s just that

pipe that picks up what comes from homes and industries, not the

rainwater from the streets or curbs.

Then combined sewers have both the sanitary flow in them plus

stormwater.

Then obviously a stormwater system is only the pipe that’s carrying the stormwater.

Senator VOINOVICH. So the SSO combines sewer overflow, the

stuff that Mayor Reid is trying to work with in Mansfield?

Mr. KARNEY. Yes, two different issues there. SSO rules, and the

costs associated with those, and then you’ve got the CSO issue,

which is overflows from a combined source, which is—it’s a more
45

dilute mixture. Obviously you’ve got the rainwater in there diluting

what sanitary sewage is in that pipe.

So those are two different programs, two different sets of costs

and obligations.

Senator VOINOVICH. Are they still forcing some of the communities to go to separate sewers?

Mr. KARNEY. We’re doing that a lot of times in response to CSO

regulations, the directives. You want to cut down on combined

sewer overflows, and one of the ways to do it is to separate the

storm flows, take them to a nearby stream, get them out of the

pipe, so you can separate—we used to have one pipe serving both

needs, now you have two sets of pipes, and folks are no longer constructing combined sewer systems.

Those were the heart and soul of northeast, midwest, the older

cities, is put one pipe in to handle both. But we’re being forced to

actually put in a brand new set of pipes and collection systems

under the ground to separate and get away from some of the CSO

issues.

Senator VOINOVICH. But even if you separate them, aren’t you required to treat the stormwater?

Mr. KARNEY. Not at this point. Although we’re still looking at

things like floatables. That’s going to be the other shoe that drops

out of Phase requirements that just came out, requirements having

to keep track of where those storm flows are going.

Senator VOINOVICH. Now I’m starting to get it. You do not have

the separate systems. That’s when you have a combined sewer system. It takes your storm water and your sewer water; you treat all

water sources. If a flood comes along or a heavy rain, then you

have to bypass some of that into a facility until it subsides. You

treat that and you put it out a little at a time.

Mr. KARNEY. You can use them that way, yes, sir.

Senator VOINOVICH. But if you have separate systems, then the

stuff that flows out of the storm sewers goes into the untreated

water, right?

Mr. KARNEY. That would be correct, yes. If you have separate

systems it’s going to go right into it, and we’re going to start looking at floatables and making sure things are screened before they

go out, all those interfering in the future, I believe.

Senator VOINOVICH. But it’s the—and the one that’s costing you

the most money is—which one is it?

Mr. KARNEY. Right now, our biggest liability is in SSO. If we

have to completely eliminate any discharges from the sanitary system, that’s going to be the biggest one for us. Because we’re going

to have to construct whole new pipes to take things from the outer

areas.

In the case of Cincinnati, it’s like our core areas, combined sewers, but you go out beyond that, the newer construction that’s been

done over the last few decades is all separate sewer.

But those sanitary lines are going to come up and eventually end

up in a pipe that’s coming from a combined system and then it becomes a combined flow.

So that’s the biggest price tag for us right now. But not to be

overlooked, the nutrient issue, as I said, it’s kind of partially coming down from Great Lakes. I don’t have a lot of lake frontage in
46

Cincinnati, but I’ve got 30 miles of river frontage on the Ohio

River. What’s coming up from the Great Lakes is the other end of

the nutrient issue in this toxic zone in the Gulf of Mexico.

So between those two, they’re going to meet somewhere around

Cincinnati, and I’m going to look at another half billion dollars

worth of removal of nutrients. That’s not in my price tag, that $1 billion to $3 billion. Doesn’t include half a billion. TMDLs, who

knows what that’s going to cost? That’s still a big question.

Senator VOINOVICH. So the thing about it is you really think that

we need to review what’s coming out of the EPA to see if it’s realistic, and your organizations have put together stuff that will come

back on enforcement and come back on some of these other issues

that are being required to make some sense out of it, that the committee would have that information available to us; is that right?

Mr. KARNEY. I don’t know, have we got anything——

Mr. ODEAL. AMSA has been developing stuff. I think what we—

what we would really like to see, I think—and the idea was to have

a look at all these issues and look at them as we talked about them

here—offer some stability for 10 or 15 years so, you can fashion a

program, you can put your rates in effect, and you can begin to

build your infrastructure. But these things seem to be coming

piecemeal. One here and one here. The financial studies says it’s

no big deal, but eventually it is a big deal because it all adds up.

Sometimes there are variants. For example, Pat Karney talked

about one possibility is separating your combined sewers, but long

range if you’re going to be faced with stormwater treatment, it’s

probably not the thing to do. I’m of the belief that maybe we’d be

better off to just continue building large capacity combined sewers,

because the separate sewers leak so bad anyway, and we could provide a more logical approach.

That’s why if you’re allowed to do a consistent watershed approach instead of arbitrarily dictatorial rules, you could say for this

particular watershed, this makes the most financial, most economic

sense in approaching it.

But we need to get, as indicated, some stability in the regulatory

environment, stability in funding, and some consistent approach, so

that guys like us who put these programs together can fashion a

program to sell it to the elected officer’s, sell it to the populous, we

can fund it, and have some stability here.

Senator VOINOVICH. Let me ask, is the—I should know this. Is

the State implementation plan doesn’t include this stuff, does it?

Mr. JONES. No.

Senator VOINOVICH. It doesn’t deal with this? You know what

might be a good idea would be to talk about regional watershed

recommendations, and give these folks some time to put these

things together and recommend how they could best get the job

done, instead of just every single entity nailing them down for

what they’re required to do.

We want to get something done. We need some help from some

of your organizations to come back with what are the most significant things we ought to be looking at now—a short, mid-term and

then long-term plan. If there are some things on the horizon—I

think the point that Erwin made is a good one. We’re telling everybody they have to break them apart, and you’re saying that maybe
47

we should build a bigger combined sewer that would treat the

stormwater, also, along with the sanitary, correct?

Mr. ODEAL. I mean, that’s an option. I’m not in favor, generally,

of separating these sewers. I think in many of these areas what we

have is really old, leaky separate sewers. They don’t really function

much different than combined sewers. If we were able to look at

the combination of some relief sewers and capacity issues and a

recognition of a periodic need for them to overflow, the water quality impacts, given the right design, are not going to be any worse

than from a CSO, or even the straight stormwater, because their

pure stormwater isn’t that pure. It has bacterial problems, it carries pesticides, and other contaminents in it, too.

Mr. KARNEY. It’s interesting, it’s almost heresy, but to talk about

building combined sewers, but every time I separate one, I have

this nagging feeling in the back of my neck that I’m creating a liability that’s going to be incredible down the road, if then I have

to go back in 15 years or 10 years and build all kinds of new treatment facilities at every one of those places where I cut a new pipe

out into the stream, that’s going to be horrendous. But at this

point, that’s the kind of thing we do.

Senator VOINOVICH. Well, how are we doing on time? Do you

have any questions?

Senator CRAPO. No.

Senator VOINOVICH. You’re OK?

(Pause in proceedings.)

Senator VOINOVICH. This is another general question concerning

five other possible enforcement mechanisms by the U.S. EPA. How

does that affects your decisionmaking regarding infrastructure improvement and rate increases?

Mr. KARNEY. If we’re looking at things that can be an additional

financial burden placed on you, then that adds to a priority rating

of what goes first. No matter whether it seems to do good things

for the environment overall or not. You’ve got to be aware that. Because if you look at $5 million, $10 million, or $50 million

worth of fines, that’s money that cannot go into the ground to repair real problems and solve environmental issues.

Senator VOINOVICH. Any other comments on that?

Mr. ODEAL. Yes, I guess I just—I don’t look at, in most cases,

fines being appropriate against public agencies. The theory of industry is that perhaps there was economic advantage, and the fine

levels—I think most of those bad actors are gone, but in terms of

municipalities, transferring money from local taxpayers to State or

Federal, doesn’t eliminate water pollution. So I just don’t see the

value of it.

I think virtually everybody that’s in a capacity—I mean, we understand the Federal law, we want to follow the Federal law, we

want to do what’s right, but many times we get these nebulous situations, and it’s almost like it must be bonus time at EPA, because

all of a sudden the findings and orders roll out. I don’t mean Ohio

EPA, I mean the Federal Government.

Or we had some ridiculous cases where U.S. EPA brought enforcement actions against facilities in the Cleveland area. We’ve

been playing around for years and had to pay a small fine of a few

thousand dollars, so that somebody took these cases off his docket.
48

So I just had real difficulty with governments fining each other. I

just don’t think it’s appropriate.

Mr. GSELLMAN. One of the successes I’ve seen, though, with

fining municipalities, was in the industrial pretreatment program,

because I think at that point, the municipalities needed a kick in

the butt, and it provided that. I think with that, the pretreatment

program became what it was, one of the most successful programs

ever—that came down from EPA.

I think it was the fact that they were dealing with industry and

with other entities outside the municipality. I really think that

that’s what gave the major impetus for that.

I really think if you want to seek progress, it’s in the grant funding. It’s with providing the money. I think the communities know

where they’re at as far as enforcement, but provide the money and

that’s where you’ll see results.

Senator VOINOVICH. So the bottom line is that, that doesn’t do

very much good. Second of all, it’s even more difficult when you’re

not getting any kind of grant money and it’s basically—you have

to take care of the situation?

Mr. GSELLMAN. Right. It’s counterproductive, that lost money.

Senator VOINOVICH. Would you say that without a Federal partnership program, like the WIN program—I’m not sure whether it’s

57, or what the number is—we’re not going to really deal with this

problem in this country?

Mr. KARNEY. That’s an absolute. That’s an absolute.

Senator VOINOVICH. I guess one last one. It’s a technical one.

What’s the difference between this bypassing and recombination?

I don’t get that. What—you bypass within the system and—what

does that mean.

Mr. STEVENSON. In our particular situation, we had proposed the

wet weather system that did not give it full secondary treatment,

and then it would be recombined with the effluent from secondary

treatment. That was what the EPA calls blending.

A bypass could be a primary bypass where you give primary

treatment and it goes out to the receiving stream and is not recombined downsteam. So there’s a technical difference between the

two.

What we had technically proposed was a blending issue, where

we would put them back together and meet all of our effluent criteria.

Senator VOINOVICH. What do you mean put them back together?

Mr. STEVENSON. Well, the secondary treatment would be one flow

through the plant. We would have a second flow that would go

through our swirl concentrators around secondary—to a second

treatment, which is an actiflow treatment system. Then they would

both converge together before they went out into the river. So you

have two separate flow treatments.

Senator VOINOVICH. Why do you do that?

Mr. STEVENSON. Because the stormwater, when it rains, can be

treated with this wet weather system effectively, and you treat as

much as you can through the secondary treatment, up to the capacity in your plant. The excess capacity being caused by the storm

goes through this stormwater treatment, and then you combine

them to get your final effluent.
49

It’s a way of treating the water without storing it and then treating it at a later time. So it’s real time treatment.

Mr. ODEAL. I think the point is it achieves the required effluent

level. I think one of the problems that we’re going to face with

SSO, is most of us use biological treatment, and the bugs need a

certain amount of food, and if they get too much flowing into the

plant, you’ve washed the bugs out and upset the whole treatment

plant.

So the goal is what is the discharge we want to meet? That’s the

goal. Unfortunately, it starts flipping back to the bureaucrat

minds, they start talking about secondary treatment and percent

removals, and then it’s a case of micromanaging.

In other words, ultimately I think no one should care how we get

to the effluent, they care about the effluent. Whatever mystical

process we might use to get there ought to be our only problem,

and their only problem is the effluent. How we get there is our

problem.

I think when you start micromanaging——

Senator VOINOVICH. So the main point is to look at what you’re

ultimately discharging into a stream?

Mr. ODEAL. Right.

Mr. STEVENSON. Exactly.

Senator VOINOVICH. What you do to get it there ought to be your

business and no one else’s. The only help that you ought to be able

to get is how to you pay for it, if there’s some technology that you

might get from the EPA or the State EPA to do that the best

way——

Mr. ODEAL. There are many ways we can do it like they’re proposing. The EPA is telling them, for the same objective, it’s costing

them a heck of a lot more money.

Mr. STEVENSON. There was a $50 million difference between the

two systems.

Mr. KARNEY. It’s definitely an issue, as Senator Crapo said earlier, of micromanagement.

You’ve got a lot of folks from Washington, DC, who don’t understand, who really know the system, have not worked in the system,

have not run the systems, and yet they’ll come out and pick up a

few terms and all of a sudden, they want to see those things on

a piece of paper, because then it’s easier for them to determine

whether or not something by the letter has shown up.

Not necessarily whether it’s going to work or where the dollars

are going to come from, or what the effect is, but whether or not

it meets certain levels.

There’s a little checklist that makes it much easier to say, ‘‘Oh,

you didn’t do it correctly’’. We didn’t do it the way you think is correct, but it’s working a hell of a lot better.

Senator VOINOVICH. Do we have the water system—maybe 6

months from now we’ll have somebody from air and water——

Mr. KARNEY. There are some good folks up there. Mike Cook has

been talking for a long time about urban stream standards and acknowledging the fact that urban streams are not going to go back

to pristine environments, but unfortunately some of the voices of

reason get pretty overwhelmed by other forces within the agency.
50

Senator VOINOVICH. Well, all I know is this, that Steelhead,

which was, 30 years ago, reported as one of the most polluted

creeks in the State of Ohio, and we’re doing something right. It’s

getting better.

Senator CRAPO. Finished?

Senator VOINOVICH. Yes.

Senator CRAPO. Well, I would like to thank this panel, as well

as the other panels, for coming today. We’ve reached the end of our

time limit here, but I can tell you that both the written testimony,

which I read last night in my hotel, and the verbal testimony that

we’ve had today, is going to be very, very helpful to us as we proceed.

I would encourage you all to continue to keep us informed, and

as well as members of the House of Representatives who will be

working on this as well.

To try to help make certain that your points of view are heard

and understood as we proceed. We will be moving ahead to try to

put together a major forum to not only the regulatory arena but

the financing arena, and to situations which we face in terms of

providing the necessary resources to meet our infrastructure needs.

I believe it is becoming better understood what we are facing. I

think in terms of the environment and the kind of challenges we

face in the country, this is the biggest one that we face in the country.

I think it should start getting more attention, and as its public

starts to realize the kind of difficulties that we face, that we’ve discussed here today, I think we’ll start seeing a lot more public support for the kind of reforms that we’ve discussed.

So, again, I commend you all, and thank you for providing this

information to us.

Unless there’s anything further?

Senator VOINOVICH. Mr. Chairman, I’d like to thank you again.

This is one of my best friends in the Senate. I could—you can tell

from what he has to say, we think a lot alike on a lot of these

issues, and I think we’re really fortunate to have somebody as conscientious and bright and committed to heading up this committee.

Even though it’s not my subcommittee, I know this, that I will

do everything I can to help him get the job done. Do you want to

know something? He will get the job done. Thank you.

Senator CRAPO. Well, thank you. I was just reminded that we

should remind the witnesses today that we will keep the record

open for 2 weeks, so if you want to supplement the record with any

further information or responses to questions, you’re very welcome

to do so.

We may come up with some other questions we’ll submit to you

and ask you to answer them in writing, if you would. So we will

keep the record open for 2 weeks.

Senator VOINOVICH. One last thing. I would really be interested

in finding out what your respective national organizations would be

willing to contribute to this committee in terms of input.

Senator CRAPO. That is very helpful and I would appreciate that

being submitted as well.

Senator CRAPO. I want to return the compliments. This isn’t just

a mutual admiration thing. I’ve said to many of my friends that
51

Senator Voinovich is one of the brightest lights we’ve got in the

Senate, and it was great of Ohio to send him there.

You can tell from the hearing today, and just the fact that he

asks that we bring our subcommittee to Ohio, and his introduced

legislation, and his not only interest in but understanding of the

issues, is one of the reasons he’s so helpful in the Senate.

I look forward to working with you, George, to make certain we

get the right solution in this legislation.

With that, this hearing is adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 1:16 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned, to

reconvene at the call of the chair.]

[Additional statements submitted for the record follow:]

STATEMENT OF LYDIA J. REID, MAYOR, MANSFIELD, OH

Thank you for the opportunity to provide information relating to potential required expansion of our wastewater treatment plant. The city of Mansfield Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) service area includes 55,000 people along with business and industry. Sewer service is provided by a separate sanitary system and the

wastewater is treated in a 12 MGD WWTP before discharge to the Rocky Fork of

the Mohican River. The collection system was originally a combined sewer system

designed to carry both sanitary sewage and stormwater. In the mid–1980’s it was

converted to a separate sanitary system. This change from combined system to separate sanitary system brought the city under a more stringent regulatory regime.

U.S. EPA regulations are based on the assumption that flows in a separate sanitary system will not have a significant stormwater component and consequently

there will be no sanitary sewer overflows (SSO) and no plant bypasses. The Mansfield system has no sanitary sewer overflows. At the WWTP, dry weather flow averages about 9 MGD. It is processed through primary treatment, secondary treatment

and disinfection before discharge to the Rocky Fork. During wet weather, intermittent flows of up to 20 MGD are processed in this way. Above that level, some flows

are diverted to the 5 million gallon equalization basin (EQ basin) for storage and

later treatment. In extremely high flow situations, the EQ basin, which provides

better than primary level treatment, overflows. EQ basin overflow combines with

treated secondary effluent and the entire flow is disinfected. The total flow meets

NPDES (National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System) permit limits for concentration. We believe that EQ basin effluent alone meets NPDES permit limits for

concentration.

Our NPDES permit is about to be renewed by Ohio EPA. It appears that Ohio

EPA is seeking requirements in the permit that would require a plant expansion

even though we currently meet concentration limits at all flow levels. Given the

high quality of our effluent and given the many competing demands for our municipal resources, we do not believe that we should be required to provide any additional treatment unless it is necessary. Our sewer rates average over $300 per year

per hookup. This is a level that U.S. EPA recognizes as sufficient to properly maintain a system. At this point we are not certain what our renewed permit will require. A number of factors will influence our permit renewal and the cost of implementation to our ratepayers.

Currently U.S. EPA is working on two main issues that could affect our permit.

The first is the draft sanitary sewer overflow regulation that was signed by former

Administrator Browner in the last days of the Clinton administration but not yet

published in the Federal Register. It is being re-examined by the Bush administration before publication for comment.

Among other issues, the preamble to the draft sanitary sewer overflow regulation

requested comment on the level of treatment required for flows reaching the WWTP.

We intend to comment on this rulemaking when it is published in the Federal Register. We believe that meeting NPDES permit limits should be sufficient to comply

with the law. We should not be required to provide treatment for the sake of treatment.

The second important issue relates to the development of the U.S. EPA policy on

‘‘recombination’’ of flows. Recombination is the blending of the part of the total flow

that is diverted from secondary treatment with those flows that receive secondary

treatment. In Mansfield the recombination only occurs during wet weather. In a letter to Senator Frist dated March 7, 2001, U.S. EPA indicated that NPDES permit

issuing authorities (in our case, Ohio EPA) have considerable flexibility in address-
52

ing the recombination situation. Generally speaking, if the recombined flows meet

permit limits based on secondary treatment or more stringent water quality-based

effluent limits and the WWTP was designed to operate in this fashion, then this

practice may be approved in the permit. However this policy has not yet been finalized. The agency states that it will be developing guidance addressing this issue.

We plan to monitor and participate as necessary. We believe that the guidance

should also clarify that, in a separate sanitary system, load limits may increase during wet weather. At this point we are somewhat unclear as to Ohio EPA’s view on

the recombination issue other than that it is willing to consider various alternatives.

We will know more in the near future.

If U.S. EPA confirms this interpretation in the recombination guidance, Ohio EPA

will be able to act on the Mansfield situation as it deems appropriate. We do not

believe that Ohio EPA should be denied the ability to draft flexible permits as a

result of the U.S. EPA interpretation.

We ask that you continue to monitor these issues both in the regulatory process

and through confirmation hearings for the U.S. EPA assistant administrator for

water: If unsupportable determinations are made by U.S. EPA, we would like to discuss with you options that may be available. Last year Congress acted through the

appropriations process to require further examination of the TMDL (Total Maximum Daily Load) rule. Such an approach could be appropriate for these issues. Another approach to overly stringent U.S. EPA requirements would be the expansion

of the grant program in the Wet Weather Water Quality Act of 2000 to provide financial support to cities facing high or increasing wastewater treatment costs due

to wet weather. Finally, U.S. EPA should aggressively develop and approve more

cost-effective wastewater treatment technology.

If rule interpretation continues in its current direction, then the City is on a path

with EPA to spend tens of millions of dollars to provide additional treatment for 31⁄2

percent of total annual flow to the WWTP in order to eliminate less than 10 annual

EQ basin overflows, which are currently meeting all NPDES permit requirements.

In closing, I would like to thank you for your interest in these matters and for

your efforts on behalf of the cities in Ohio.

STATEMENT OF ROBERT VINCENZO, MAYOR, CITY OF ST. CLAIRSVILLE, OH

St. Clairsville is a city of 5,100 in the eastern side of the state, 10 miles from

Wheeling, West Virginia. We are located in Belmont, one of Ohio’s Appalachian

Counties. Our City is largely residential and service based. We are the county seat.

The largest retail area in mid eastern Ohio is located on the eastern edge of my

City.]

In the early 1980’s the city took advantage of U.S.E.P.A.’s 75 percent grant to

build our main Waste Water Treatment Plant, a 950,000 GPD average design. We

also rehabilitated sewer lines in an effort to limit infiltration and inflows. The latter

has been largely a failed effort. Although we have repeatedly tested for and eliminated inflow, we still have a tremendous infiltration problem whereby our flow increases five fold during wet weather. Our old clay lines dating to the 1920’s act as

a leech field collecting subsurface drainage. This causes flooding of pump stations,

the plant, and homes. In 2002 we will bid the replacement of 4 pump stations (about

1⁄3 of the total) and 5,200 feet of lines (almost 3 percent of our total) at an estimated

cost of $600,000.

In performing this upgrade in the 1980’s we achieved one of the highest wastewater rates in Ohio. About 24 percent of our current department budget goes to debt

service. According to the most recent OEPA statewide rate survey (issued February,

2001 for 1999 calendar year) St. Clairsville’s rate is in the 33d percentile. But just

after that study was done the city boosted its rate another 27 percent (in August

2000) and if that number is factored into the OEPA survey our rate is in the 12th

percentile out of 444 systems reporting. (As a side note, customers take a double

hit in that we are in the top 10 percentile in water rates statewide.)

As these numbers indicate St. Clairsville has taken steps to help itself by paying

much of our own way. We believe that despite our many needs we have a comparatively strong system, but our residents have a high rate burden, and to fulfill our

needs the rates will go even higher unless there is some infusion of outside capital.

Ohio’s Public Works grants have helped, but the effectiveness of that was diluted

when the State allowed these funds to be used for road resurfacing and tailored the

grant point system to rank these politically popular projects higher than wastewater

projects. Our wastewater rates constitute about 2 percent of household income. We

do not believe we can push them much higher. Our current needs in brief include:

(1) Flow equalization to prevent system surcharging (flooding) during storms.
53

(2) Pump station and line replacement.

(3) Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) control. (This gas occurs naturally and destroys concrete and structures in the collection system.)

(4) Relocation or expansion of the city’s second plant, a 90,000 GPD design structure that is at design capacity. Relocation would allow us to move the plant from

a congested area, and extend service to an underserved area. In St. Clairsville’s ex- perience expansion of wastewater treatment definitely yields new development.

However, Ohio’s pending annexation law as drafted makes such expansion far less

attractive to the city. Neither the surrounding County or the Township has filled

this need historically.

These above needs total about $10 million for this basic utility.

We do not criticize the need for clean water, we support that. We do feel that

EPA’s focus should be on communities meeting their permit limits, and should not

be a micro management type control of plant operations. Instead EPA should focus

on the discharge quality, and not on regulating the specific increments of the process used to reach that quality.

EPA has been very helpful in assisting the city technically in solving a difficult

treatment problem which has stymied various city engineering consultants. The

work of Ohio EPA in conjunction with our operator solved a treatment problem and

resulted in a nationally published technical paper to help others.

So, what help do we need? Our answer is nothing you have not heard too often

before . . . more money. We have dedicated our own resources to improving our systems, and we have taken the unpopular steps of pushing our rates to the limit. Our

customers have shouldered the burden of support. But to restore these systems, particularly our system will take resources beyond that which we currently have or will

have.

I am aware that there is not an instant solution for our situation. However, I am

very appreciative of your concerns to conduct this hearing for some positive feed

back and I am very pleased to have an opportunity to testify before your Committee

and provide additional insight to the plight of Small Cities and Villages. Thank you.

STATEMENT OF CHRISTOPHER JONES, DIRECTOR, OHIO ENVIRONMENTAL

PROTECTION AGENCY

Chairman Crapo, Senator Voinovich, thank you for the opportunity to speak about

the wastewater infrastructure needs of Ohio communities. Those needs are great

and the resources to address them are currently not adequate.

The Clean Water Act has brought about tremendous improvement in the quality

of Ohio waters. By mandating control of point source discharges, including sewage

treatment plants, the Act has enabled many streams to recover from low oxygen

conditions, excess phosphorus discharges, and other degradation. There are many

dramatic examples of the results, most notably perhaps the renaissance along the

banks of the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland and the resurgence of Lake Erie as a

world class fishing destination. I understand that Senator Voinovich may be planning a fact-finding mission on the Lake this summer to confirm for himself that the

walleye and perch are really biting.

In the 1970’s and 1980’s, many of the infrastructure projects that enabled water

quality improvements throughout the State were funded through the Federal Construction Grants program, which provided 75 percent of the cost of sewage treatment infrastructure mandated by the Clean Water Act. As you know, that program

was converted to a low-interest loan program administered by the States.

The State Revolving Loan Fund program is currently due to be reauthorized, and

I know that Governor Taft has written you to express his strong support for your

bill to do that, Senator Voinovich. We are particularly pleased that S. 252 would

double the current level of funding to $3 billion per year over 5 years. If enacted

by Congress and signed by the President, S. 252 will greatly assist communities in

Ohio and throughout the Nation with the construction, expansion, and improvement

of sewage treatment facilities.

However, even doubling current spending will not adequately meet the mandates

in the Clean Water Act. I would like to briefly outline the needs in Ohio, and then

to suggest two areas in which targeted resources are particularly needed.

Ohio EPA is in the process of updating the Clean Water Needs Survey, which we

do every 5 years in cooperation with U.S. EPA. Unfortunately, the 2001 results are

not yet available, so the figures I am about to give you are based on the 1996 survey. We hope to have more current numbers by mid-summer.

The total infrastructure need in Ohio, according to the survey, was $7.4 billion.

That need can be further broken out as follows:
54

• $1.1 billion for wastewater plant construction and improvement • $900 million to repair existing sewers • $900 million for construction of new sewers • $97 million for storm water controls • $198 million for nonpoint source pollution abatement • and $4.2 billion for combined sewer overflow elimination.

Combined sewer overflows account for more than half of the infrastructure needs

in Ohio. Frankly, Senators, even with a dramatic increase in low-interest loan dollars, this burden is too much for many communities. There are 92 Ohio communities

with combined sewers, and they range from the largest of our cities, such as Cleveland, Akron, Toledo, Youngstown, and Cincinnati, to very small communities like

Van Wert and Lisbon. In fact, a total of $16 million for CSO controls is needed in

communities with fewer than 1,000 residents.

As an example, Port Clinton, a northwestern Ohio town of a little more than 7000

people, has completed a Combined Sewer System Long Term Control Plan. The plan

recommends improvements over the next 5 years of between $8 million to $14 million. Port Clinton’s annual average sewer rate is now $566, 77 percent higher than

the State average. To pay for the improvements, in today’s dollars the average sewer bill will increase to $846 in 2004 , and to $1,132 in 2010. These financial projections already include a $1.5M grant expected in 2002 as part of a previous budget

bill.

Eliminating combined sewer overflows is important if we are to continue to improve water quality. But the cost of controls is simply out of reach of most communities. Noncompliance brings Federal sanctions, including monetary penalties that

simply exacerbate the problem. What is needed are Federal grant dollars, matched

with State and local funds. This is the only way that CSO control infrastructure is

likely to be built on the necessary scale nationwide, particularly when you consider

that the same communities that must invest in these controls must also maintain

aging wastewater treatment plants and sewer lines.

The second area where Ohio would like to see targeted Federal grants is to provide sewers in low-income areas where failing septic systems are causing public

health concerns. It is difficult to believe that in the year 2001 in the United States

of America, people are living with raw sewage in the back yard, in the drainage

ditch, or in the creek. But it’s true in far too many communities. The 1996 Clean

Water Needs Survey identified 199 areas in Ohio with high densities of failing onlot septic systems, a number we believe significantly understates the real need. We

are attempting to gather more accurate information in the survey that is ongoing

now. Clearly, exposure to drainage from a failing system threatens public health, but

the threat does not end there. Pooling effluent is a breeding ground for mosquitos,

which carry encephalitis, including the form known as West Nile Virus. Ohio expects to see West Nile Virus, which is potentially fatal, in the far eastern parts of

the State this summer. At the same time, Lake County has filed a complaint, which

we are now investigating, that the neighboring county to the east is allowing discharges from on-lot systems to go unabated, affecting water quality in Lake County

downstream. These are our easternmost counties, and the places where mosquito

breeding is particularly worrisome right now.

Community development is also impeded by failing on-lot systems. Obviously, a

home with a septic system that does not work properly declines in property value.

It becomes even more difficult to revitalize these low income areas, because few people would choose to live with such a nuisance if they could afford not to.

One example of a small Ohio community that is doing its best to rectify this problem is the village of Morristown, in Belmont County. The Village has been trying

for years to find an affordable way to install sewers. Raw sewage from failing septic

tank systems has been confirmed in the storm sewers and creeks around the town.

Development in the Morristown area has grown stagnant due to the lack of suitable wastewater facilities. Ordinary businesses that we all take for granted, such

as a restaurant or a laundromat, have been unable to locate in the area.

The village has evaluated different alternatives, trying to find something that

would be affordable for the 350 residents. The most recent proposal is for the village

to construct sewers to tie into the existing Belmont County Fox Shannon wastewater treatment plant. The county has already extended sewers to the edge of the

village to enable the village to tie in. However, the cost to the village residents could

be as high as $105 per month for the approximately 130 households in the village

without supplemental grants to bring down the cost.

Low interest loans, even zero interest loans, are not particularly helpful in this

situation. Residents living at or near poverty level simply cannot afford to repay the

loan. Again, Federal grants are needed. I don’t think it is an exaggeration to say
55

that there are places in America, places in Ohio, where the lack of adequate sewage

treatment compares to that in some Third World countries. The Federal Government simply must help.

I do not want to leave you with the impression, however, that increasing funding

is the only thing we can or should do. Regulatory flexibility will help available dollars go further and reduce the obstacles to compliance for many communities.

Among the things Congress can do are:

Say Clearly That State Primacy Means Primacy.—The CWA should explicitly articulate minimum standards that States must meet to achieve primacy, that is, delegation of the Federal program. Once the State is awarded primacy, there should be

no independent Federal presence unless the State fails to perform its obligations.

The Federal agency should not second-guess enforcement decisions or permit conditions.

Create Block Grant Funding.—Currently, funding under the Clean Water Act is

a maze of separate grant programs, each with its own requirements. The goal of restoring and preserving watersheds drives all the State’s clean water activities: permitting, enforcement, wetlands restoration, nonpoint source mitigation, monitoring,

and so on. Yet most of these activities are funded through separate grants, imposing

a burdensome grant tracking obligation. Clean air programs are managed for the

most part under a single grant, and successfully so. Federal funding under the

Clean Water Act should be changed to a block grant system, with the State held

accountable for maintaining the fundamental standards of a delegated program, and

free to allocate Federal dollars according to its unique needs to achieve that end.

Recognize That When Everything Is A Priority, Nothing Is A Priority.—Currently,

U.S. EPA is pressing States, and ultimately communities, to move forward simultaneously on all fronts. Municipal and industrial permits must be updated every 5

years, sewer overflows must be controlled, storm water must be controlled, wetlands

must be protected, coastal areas must be managed, stream uses must be designated,

and on and on. Yet none of these efforts is adequately funded. The result is that

States can do a little of everything, and not enough of anything.

Congress should change the term of discharge permits from 5 years to 10 years.

States spend inordinate resources renewing permits every 5 years, even though

there is frequently no substantive change in permit requirements. There is a national backlog of expired permits, largely because States recognize that renewal on

a 5-year schedule is often a paperwork exercise that produces less benefit than actual field work.

In addition, the reporting schedule under Section 305(b) should be changed from

every 2 years to every 5 years. This section requires States to report water quality

trends. Meaningful changes are unlikely to show up on a 2-year cycle. Five year reporting will ease the resource burden without negatively impacting forward

progress.

GAO should evaluate whether States without an active antidegradation program

are making less progress toward the ‘‘fishable, swimmable’’ goal, or whether

antidegradation enforcement makes little difference in States’ progress. The goal of

antidegradation is to ‘‘keep clean waters clean.’’ However, the Act is unclear with

regard to when a discharge is significant enough to trigger this provision. Many

States, therefore, fail to implement antidegradation, while others, including Ohio,

devote significant resources to it. A GAO analysis could help to determine whether

the antidegradation process effectively supports the goal of the Clean Water Act.

Chairman Crapo, Senator Voinovich, thank you for your willingness to explore

this problem and work with us toward constructive solutions. On behalf of Governor

Taft and the many communities in Ohio that are struggling to address their wastewater infrastructure needs, your interest is much appreciated.

Periodically, USEPA conducts a national survey of the needs for water qualityrelated facilities and improvements. This survey, called the Clean Water Needs Survey (CWNS), provides EPA with a detailed estimate of the funds needed in Ohio

and across the country for activities necessary to comply with the requirements of

the Clean Water Act. To assist USEPA, the Ohio EPA collects statewide data from

communities and compiles the results. Since the best source of data are the communities of the state, we rely on them to provide us with information relative to specific water quality needs.The needs presented here are from the 1996 Clean Water

Needs Survey. The needs are based on information provided by individual communities and Ohio EPA district offices. The majority of the costs for Categories I

through IVB are based on documents provided by the community. The majority of

the costs for Categories V, VI and VII are based on costgenerating computer models

used by USEPA.
56

1996 Clean Water Needs Survey Summary

Category I: Secondary Treatment ............................................................................................................... $830,000,000

Category II: Advanced Treatment ............................................................................................................... $248,000,000

Wastewater Treatment Costs Subtotal ............................................................................................. $1,078,000,000

Category IIIA: Infiltration/Inflow Correction ............................................................................................... $748,000,000

Category IIIB: Sewer Replacement/Rehabilitation ..................................................................................... $191,000,000

Existing Sewer Rehabilitation Costs Subtotal .................................................................................. $939,000,000

Category IVA: New Collector Sewers .......................................................................................................... $358,000,000

Category IVB: New Interceptor Sewers ....................................................................................................... $534,000,000

New Sewer Construction Costs Subtotal .......................................................................................... $892,000,000

Category V: Combined Sewer Overflow Abatement (both documented and modeled) ............................. $4,199,000,000

Category VI: Storm Water (both documented and modeled) ..................................................................... $97,000,000

Category VII: Nonpoint Source Pollution Abatement (both documented and modeled) ............................ $198,000,000

Grand total ........................................................................................................................................ $7,403,000,000

It is important to note that the cost in these tables are at least 5 years old. Communities have implemented improvements since 1996 that are not reflected here. In

addition, new areas of needs have been identified since 1996 that are not reflected

here at all.

To update this information, Ohio EPA has been asking cities, villages, counties,

sewer districts, and health departments across the State for assistance with collecting information regarding wastewater, storm water, and nonpoint source pollution control needs in Ohio. In order to update and correct this information for the

2001 effort, we’ve requested information from more than 1,000 separate entities asking them to provide updated information for the CWNS.
1996 Clean Water Need Survey

Summary for Ohio Total pop < 1,000 1,000 < pop < 3,500 3,500 < pop < 10,000 pop >

Category I: Secondary Treatment ........................................................................................................... $830,000,000 $71,000,000 $89,000,000 $23,000,000 $6Category II: Advanced Treatment ........................................................................................................... $248,000,000 $14,000,000 $24,000,000 $10,000,000 $2

Wastewater Treatment Costs Subtotal .......................................................................................... $1,078,000,000 $85,001,000 $113,001,000 $33,003,500 $8

Category IIIA: Infiltration/Inflow Correction ............................................................................................ $748,000,000 $10,000,000 $11,000,000 $287,000,000 $4Category IIIB: Sewer Replacement/Rehabilitation .................................................................................. $191,000,000 $0 $3,000,000 $4,000,000 $1

Existing Sewer Rehabilitation Costs Subtotal .............................................................................. $939,000,000 $10,000,000 $14,000,000 $291,000,000 $6

Category IVA: New Collector Sewers ...................................................................................................... $358,000,000 $105,000,000 $81,000,000 $36,000,000 $1Category IVB: New Interceptor Sewers ................................................................................................... $534,000,000 $46,000,000 $49,000,000 $25,000,000 $4

New Sewer Construction Costs Subtotal ....................................................................................... $892,000,000 $151,000,000 $130,000,000 $61,000,000 $5

Category V: CSO Abatement (doc + model) .......................................................................................... $4,199,000,000 $16,000,000 $287,000,000 $317,000,000 $3,5Category VI: Storm Water (doc+model) ................................................................................................. $97,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $Category VII: NPS Pollution Abatement (doc + model) ......................................................................... $198,000,000 $0 $0 $0 $1

Grand Total .................................................................................................................................... $7,403,000,000 $262,000,000 $544,000,000 $702,000,000 $5,8
58

The above table breaks down the information by population density and category

of needs. As can be seen from the Table, Category V: Combined Sewer Needs is an

area where Ohio has significant needs: $4.2 billion. In Ohio, we have 92 communities with CSOs and those communities range from the very small to major sewer

districts such as Cincinnati and Cleveland. Unfortunately, the significant costs to

deal with CSOs and protect water quality are so high that projects are often

unaffordable, even in large communities like Akron, Cincinnati and Cleveland. This

is why grant money is needed to lower the cost to the local community.

A second area that should be highlighted is the issue of failing individual home

sewage disposal systems. Surfacing sewage from failing systems or pooled effluent

from discharging systems can be a direct public health threat as well an ideal breeding ground for mosquitos. In addition, there is a direct economic cost due to the

lower property values for homes in these areas, The CWNS identified 199 different

areas in Ohio with high densities of failing individual home sewage systems. Ohio

EPA feels the 199 count signifcantly underestimates the existing need and is conducting a better survey to improve our data. Buildiong new sewer plants and/or accessing centralized sewers is often the only way to abate the unsanitary conditions.

New sewer construction is usually unaffordable due to the high costs for new sewers

and low incomes of many rural areas, especially in southeast Ohio’s appalachia

area. Based on the CWNS data, we estimate that $240 million is needed to provide

sewers and/or treatment to the 199 area identified in the 1996 CWNS. Without direct grant money to buy-down the costs of these projects, the problem will continue

unabated.

STATEMENT OF ERWIN J. ODEAL, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NORTHEAST OHIO REGIONAL

SEWER DISTRICT

As executive director of the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District (District), I

appreciate this opportunity to provide information to the Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, and Water, Committee on Environment and Public Works on wastewater infrastructure needs in the State of Ohio. The District has served the communities of Northeast Ohio for almost thirty years, bringing vast improvements to the

water quality of the area and contributing to the rebirth of the Cleveland area. I

appreciate the opportunity to tell you about the District’s efforts and our needs and

concerns for the future of the environment .

The District has invested significant resources to address water infrastructure

needs in Northeast Ohio. Since its creation in 1972, the District has invested over

$1.6 billion for capital improvements to the wastewater conveyance and treatment

system throughout its 54 community service area. The major thrust of these improvements included upgrades of our three treatment plants (Easterly, Westerly and

Southerly), construction of five major interceptors (Southwest, Heights/Hilltop, Mill

Creek, Cuyahoga Valley and Northwest) and numerous intercommunity relief sewers throughout the District’s service area. As noted at the top of the Attachment

1 Summary, these projects were financed in part by Federal grants under the Clean

Water Act Construction Grants Program (35 percent) and recent special Federal appropriation grants (4 percent), with the balance (61 percent) paid for by the District’s ratepayers either as repayment of low interest loans received under Ohio’s

State Revolving Fund program, the Water Pollution Control Loan Fund (WPCLF),

or as pure NEORSD local funds.

The most recent regulatory requirement imposed upon the District is our combined sewer overflow (CSO) management and reduction program. This program resulted from Ohio’s implementation of U.S. EPA’s 1994 Combined Sewer Overflow

Policy. Included in this effort is construction of CSO storage tunnels and tanks, relief sewers and treatment facilities, CSO system rehabilitation and/or modification,

and potentially, sewer separation projects. These projects are being conducted on a

watershed basis, enabling the District to identify and evaluate the impact of combined sewers and numerous other stressors to water quality in the Northeast Ohio

area. As noted on the bottom of Attachment 1, the District has spent over $220 million to date on its CSO program, of which $26 million was funded through Federal

grants (11 percent) with the balance paid for by the District’s ratepayers, either as

repayment of low interest loans received from the WPCLF program (66 percent) or

as pure NEORSD local funds. It is expected that the total cost to the District for

CSO projects could approach $1 billion over the next 15 years.

As you can see from the numbers above and those in Attachment 2, the burden

of wastewater infrastructure funding has shifted from significant Federal grants,

which do not require repayment, to State revolving loans, which must be repaid.

The ratepayers’ burden has increased from about 37 percent to over 90 percent.
59

While it is impossible to calculate the potential rate increases that will be required

by ongoing and future regulatory requirements, there is no question that, without

additional funding resources in the form of grants and low or zero interest loans,

the District’s ratepayers will continue to bear essentially all of the costs of these

expensive programs.

The District strongly supports the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN) and

Water Infrastructure Caucus in their efforts to identify a mechanism for closing the

large funding gap that exists today. The level of infrastructure improvement required by existing and future Clean Water Act requirements exceeds the amount

of available funding by orders of magnitude. This fact is recognized by EPA as well

as the State and local entities attempting to improve water quality and protect the

public. A consistent source of funds, distributed in the form of grants and low or

zero interest loans, is the only way that municipalities with limited resources will

be able to maintain the water quality improvements achieved to date and assure

further improvement in the future. Information on the WIN and Win’s recent recommendation report, WINow, are included in the packet of materials provided.

In addition to funding wastewater infrastructure needs, however, the District believes that there is a great deal that can be done to improve local communities’ ability to address water quality issues in an efficient and cost effective way. One of the

key impediments to this is the lack of programmatic interaction between the current

EPA mandates for CSOs, Separate Sanitary Overflows (SSOs), Stormwater management and Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs).

Currently, communities are required to address CSOs, SSOs and stormwater

through three separate regulatory programs. Each program requires extensive monitoring, infrastructure modification/capital investment, and recordkeeping and reporting. Yet the need for these three programs is the same: the ability of municipal

wastewater and stormwater systems to address wet weather impacts on water quality. It has been EPA’s position that these separate programs will come together

through the TMDL process. Yet even through TMDLs, the three programs remain

separate and independently enforceable. There is no flexibility for communities

prioritize their water quality issues and begin addressing the most significant

sources of water quality impairment first.

As a member of the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies (AMSA), we

have been working toward proposing legislation that would give EPA the authority

to combine these separate regulatory programs into a unified wet weather regulatory program. A unified program would enable municipalities to evaluate the

sources of their wet weather water quality problems and rank them by environmental benefit, thereby allowing the community to address the most severe environmental stressors first and getting the ‘‘most bang for the buck.’’ To date, EPA has

spoken of the benefit of such a unified program, but has taken no action to pursue

this course of efficient and cost effective environmental protection. A legislative

mandate would certainly provide the legal authority and impetus for such a reworking of Clean Water Act requirements.

Increased flexibility also represents an opportunity to jump start the process of

restoring urban streams through adoption of urban water quality standards that are

tailored to specific watersheds. We believe that this tailoring also has the potential

to result in substantial cost savings for the public. Typically, streams which predominately drain urban areas are affected by the complex land use patterns to such

an extent that they are not capable of attaining the current water quality standards, which are benchmarked against the most pristine areas of the State. We believe that a cooperative program between watershed communities and regulatory

agencies must be formed to start restoration processes and evaluate land use practices that threaten the last remaining habitat along streams. Communities need to

be empowered and encouraged to understand urban impacts on streams and look

at the potential value of the resource to the community. State regulatory agencies

need flexibility within Federal regulatory guidelines to adopt standards that make

sense for streams that are substantially altered by their surrounding land use patterns.

We believe these are important new directions that have the power to result in

substantial improvements to urban streams. However, at the same time we are concerned that these programs might be stalled by the inflexibility of current Federal

regulatory guidelines. Current regulations have been interpreted to allow revisions

of water quality standards only where substantial and widespread social and economic impact is at issue. In addition, EPA has been resistant to accepting Ohio

EPA’s proposed use of biological criteria as a holistic measure of stream health.

Clean Water Act requirements must be both realistic and accepting of innovation

and creativity to encourage progress in improving urban water quality.
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Encompassing all of these issues is the lack of a sound scientific basis driving the

management of wet weather flows and determining appropriate water quality.

While EPA has committed to do so, it has failed to pursue what we believe to be

the key to effective wet weather management—the development of wet weather

standards and associated management techniques. Until the impact of wet weather

flows and urbanization are studied and scientifically defensible water quality standards are developed, municipalities will be spending billions of dollars to address

non-existent or marginal water quality impacts simply because the current dry

weather-based regulatory scheme requires such actions. In addition, the burden of

water quality compliance will continue to be placed on point source discharges such

as publicly owned treatment works, when the most significant sources of impairment is actually from non-point source (i.e.) agriculture and urban runoff.

We would be most interested in continuing the discussion of modifications to current legislative and regulatory guidelines in ways that we believe would vastly enhance our potential to make substantial progress on the overall improvement of

water quality and the restoration of urban streams. I appreciate the subcommittee’s

interest in this area, and welcome any opportunity to be of assistance.
Attachment 1

Total NEORSD Capital Costs USEPA Construc- tion Grants USEPA Special Appropriation Grants Total Federal Share [In percent] SRF Loans NEORSD Funds Tota

[I

NEORSD Whole Capital Program 1972–2000:

$1,609,750,000 ............................................................................................................................................. $555,500,000 $72,000,000 39 $387,400,000 $594,850,000 

NEORSD CSO Control Capital Program Component 1972–2000:

$221,800,000 ................................................................................................................................................ $14,300,000 $12,000,000 11 $145,400,000 $50,100,000 

Attachment 2.—EPA Construction Grant Program vs. Post-Construction Grant Era

Total NEORSD

Capital Costs USEPA Grants

Total Federal

Share

[In percent]

SRF Loans NEORSD Funds Tota

[I

NEORSD Whole Capital Program:

1972–1990 .................................................................................................................................................... $881,100,000 $555,500,000 63 $0 $325,600,000 1991–2000 .................................................................................................................................................... $728,650,000 1 $72,000,000 10 $387,400,000 $269,250,000 

NEORSD CSO Control Capital Program Component:

1972–1990 .................................................................................................................................................... $23,800,000 $14,300,000 60 $0 $9,500,000 1991–2000 .................................................................................................................................................... $198,000,000 2 $12,000,000 6 $145,400,000 $40,600,000 

1 Reflects FY 1995, FY 1997 & FY 1998 USEPA Special Appropriation Grants.2 Reflects FY 1997 & FY 1998 USEPA Special Appropriation Grants.
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STATEMENT OF DONALD M. MOLINE, P.E., DEE DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC UTILITIES, TOLEDO, OH

I am Donald M. Moline and I am the public utilities director for the city of Toledo.

On behalf of Mayor Carleton S. Finkbeiner, I am pleased to provide you with some

thoughts and ideas as they relate to wastewater infrastructure. More specifically,

I would like to relay our experiences in treating or controlling wet weather events.

The city of Toledo’s wastewater system serves about 375,000 individuals. The

wastewater treatment plant treats, on an average, 75 million gallons per day (MGD)

with wet weather flow going up to 400 MGD.

The city of Toledo is currently involved in discussions to settle a lawsuit that was

brought by the USEPA on October 29, 1991. The claim was that the city of Toledo

had not been meeting the limits of it’s NPDES permit at the final effluent discharge

to the Maumee River. The plant had just undergone a massive rebuilding effort,

with Federal assistance, and had not been in full compliance. Over the approximately 10 years of this lawsuit, the final effluent has come into significant compliance and therefore it’s discharge is not an issue. The focus of the debate then

switched to the issue of bypassing.

During wet weather, most older, Midwestern cities that have combined sewers

must bypass the treatment plant either from a CSO (combined sewer overflow) or

a primary bypass at the plant itself. This practice is not unique to the city of Toledo.

Wastewater treatment plant were not built to handle large raw water flows that

happen relatively infrequent. The basic problem centers on the fact that there are

very few ways to remedy this situation.

Wet weather facilities are only used during rain and the traditional biological

treatment cannot sit idly by waiting for rain. The alternative is to develop some different form of treatment or provide storage for wet weather flows with the idea of

treating this water after the rain event has subsided. The city of Toledo was involved with both alternatives, our costs for this is over $80 million.

The issue of bypassing was submitted to Judge James Carr in Federal district

court in Toledo. He ruled that bypassing was illegal if ‘feasible alternatives’ are

available. This is a term contained within the Clean Water Act and he defined feasible alternatives to include building new treatment units or storage tanks. He

stopped short of defining what measure would need to be undertaken or how much.

He did, however, indicated that maximizing your existing treatment plant was not

sufficient when it comes to feasible alternatives and bypassing. This has huge ramifications for the wastewater industry in general.

The USEPA has insisted that we build an equalization basin that would hold sufficient quantity of wastewater such that we could avoid most bypassing. This

amounts to a $60 million basin.

In previous discussions, we had conceived and designed an alternative wet weather system that would treat the higher flows and return them to the Maumee River

without the need for storage. We were going to combine our swirl concentrators with

an Actiflow system to treat the water. We fully intend to ensure that the discharge

would meet water quality standards such that no harmful effects would be produced. This alternative could have saved us at least $40 million. The USEPA indicated that this was a good idea and that we should downsize just slightly the

Actiflow system and combine it with the 60 MGD Equalization basin. The remedy

went from our idea costing $30 million to $35 million to their idea costing $80 million. The disappointing part about this is that there is little benefit to the water

quality of the river. The reason that they would not agree to the Actiflow system

alone was that we were not giving all of the wastewater secondary treatment and

therefore it technically was a bypass. They would be willing to allow us to build

such a system as long as we built an equalization basin too. They were standing

on a technical definition that bypassing any treatment unit constituted a bypass regardless of the water quality impact or cost.

In essences, what we had proposed was not a bypass, but a blending of wet weather treatment system and the full secondary treatment. This in an important distinction in that the USEPA has recently informed Congress that the concept of blending

should receive favorable consideration when looking at wet weather alternatives. In

our particular case, the USEPA would only agree to blending provided we not only

remedied the issues at the wastewater plant but also embarked upon a massive construction program in the collection system.

The previous discussion is only a portion of our lawsuit issues, but it serves to

highlight some of the problems with completing wastewater infrastructure projects.

The first topic that needs to be addressed is regulatory oversight. The USEPA in

recent years has placed more emphasis on enforcement rather than water quality

results. Meeting the technical definitions contained within rules and regulations is
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more important than water quality standards. There seems to be an imbalance between the technical assistance and the enforcement divisions within the agency.

There needs to be more assistance, which will lead to greater cooperation in solving

technical issues rather than achieving goals through the enforcement provisions. In

our particular situation, we have experienced this with the bypass and blending

issues. We believe that our alternative would have been able to provide the same

water quality benefits at a much lower cost.

A second area that involves regulatory oversight is the issue of cost effectiveness

and scientifically based reasoning. Again, it has been our experience that these two

concepts are secondary to meeting the procedural criteria of the enforcement section.

In discussions, everyone champions the idea of applying good scientific evidence,

sound engineering principals and cost effective solutions to problems, however, in

practice, these issues are not given the weight or consideration which is appropriate.

Often municipalities are forced to comply with standard procedures that are based

solely on approved treatment techniques. This unyielding approach ultimately leads

to higher costs for wastewater infrastructure. The recently adopted CSO Policy has

a better approach. This policy talks of a comprehensive and coordinated planning

effort by the municipality, the regulatory agencies and the public. It allows for sitespecific solutions and the need for flexibility to tailor controls to arrive at the best

solutions. The USEPA needs to fully embrace this approach to enhance technical assistance standpoint and reduce the need for regulatory enforcement.

In Toledo case, our proposed consent decree will cost the ratepayers over $400

million. The city of Toledo is prepared to spend this amount. We have not finalized

the decree because we are concerned that the overall cost will balloon to $600 million or $700 millions. As I have previously indicated with our experiences, ballooning costs are a real possibility. To give you some idea of the impact of these

costs to the city of Toledo, consider the following. The current overall debt of the

entire city of Toledo over the last 100 years is around $423 million. With the wastewater projects proposed, the city of Toledo will double its debt. This places a huge

burden on the ratepayers. Over the next 15 years, we anticipate our rates will more

than double to provide enough funds to service the debt. We recently put out a Request for Proposals (RFP) for the engineering on these projects and that alone will

cost $35 million.

The amount of funds being request for infrastructure improvements may lead to

the conclusion that the city of Toledo has neglected it wastewater system. This simply is not true. Toledo has been a proactive leader in wastewater improvements. We

have installed storage tunnels for the combined overflow system (CSO) to catch the

first flush and we have continually invested in our system. Over the last 20 years

we have invested over $234 million in infrastructure improvements.

The need for the water and wastewater capitol infrastructure improvements industry wide over the next 5 years amounts to an estimated $46 billion per year.

That equals $230 billion over that 5-year period. Clearly, there is a tremendous

need. Since the early 1970’s, Federal funding of water and wastewater projects has

been steadily declining. It is time to reverse this trend. Congress needs to create

a long-term, sustainable, and reliable Federal funding structure. This should include

things such as grants, low interest loans, loan subsidies, congressional earmarks,

State revolving loan funds and refinancing opportunities. The Federal Government

should ensure that the programs are fully funded, provide flexibility in their use

and streamline the funding application process. At a minimum, the industry need

$57 billion from years 2003 to 2007 just to remain solvent. In summary, Congress

should encourage the following:

1. Regulations that are based on sound scientific and engineering principals.

2. Regulations that are based on water quality objective.

3. Regulatory actions that place an emphasis on cooperation rather than enforcement as outlined in the CSO Policy.

4. Federal funding that is long term and in sufficient quantities to help meet the

need of the industry.

5. Clarification of the language (blending, bypass issues) of the Clean Water Act

to provide flexibility in meeting the demands of wet weather treatment systems.

6. Provide research and support for the use of new, innovative technologies.

7. Provide Federal grants because the need is so large.

8. Continue to educate the public of an often overlook area of public health and

environmental protection.

9. Allow communities to become a partner in the process, not simply those who

execute the plan.

10. And finally, put more emphasis on non-point source discharges rather than

continuing to try to extract water quality gains from point source discharges that
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have been improved significantly in the last 10 years. It simply does not benefit the

environment to continue to follow this approach.
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ATTACHMENT TO COMMENTS BY DONALD M. MOLINE

PROJECT DESCRIPTIONS

1. EAST SIDE AND BAYVIEW PUMP STATION RENOVATIONS

These improvements involve the renovation of the East Side Pump Station (ESPS)

and the Bay View Pump Station (BVPS). The majority of the work is structural and

mechanical. The work will include the renovation of the vacuum priming systems

at both pump stations, new windows and doors, new discharge valves on the raw

sewage pumps 1, 3 and 4 at the ESPS and at all 5 pumps at the BVPS, new HVAC

at both stations, new fencing and repair of the roadway at the ESPS.

The floor drain system at each pump station will be reconfigured so that they are

separate from the wet well. Flow meters will be added for pumps 1 and 6 at each

station. The vacuum pumps, discharge valves and flow meters will be automated

and integrated with the plant’s control system. The existing gas detection systems

will be upgraded and alarms will be sent to the CO Building.

2. WINDERMERE PUMP STATION RENOVATION

This project involves the Windermere Pump Station (WPS). The work of this

project includes the replacement of the two bars screens and conveyor system as

well as the wet well dewatering pumps. The #2 and #3 raw sewage pump VFD’s

will also be replaced. The new VFD’s will be able to communicate with the plant’s

PLC system using remote I/O. The two existing VFD’s will be similarly configured.

FPS will investigate the condition of all 4 raw sewage pumps and motors and recommend corrective action.

The existing generator control panel will be replaced with a new panel equipped

with automatic start and loading features. Renovation of the HVAC system, doors,

windows and fencing will also be required. The hydraulic system will be renovated.

The PLC and the telemetry system, the lighting system and the security system will

be upgraded. Finally, the project will include the replacement of the existing flowmeter and installation of new gas detection system.

3. BACK UP POWER FOR SECONDARY AND BLOWER REPLACEMENT

The back up power system should be able to supply all of the power required to

operate the plant in a stand alone mode and peak shave. This project will also provide additional air blowers to increase the air supply capacity by 100,000 SCFM for

the biological treatment process.

This project will require the successful bidder to perform the engineering services

and provide an overall plan for the project to provide electrical power to include:

Electrical switching and distribution network, generation equipment with duel fuel

ability, electrical substations, power transmission requirements, new air blowers,

examination of air delivery system, removal of existing diesel engines and structural

analysis of ME building to house the new equipment.

4. EQUALIZATION BASIN

The Consultant will design an equalization basin with a minimum capacity of 60

million gallons. The basin will be located either at the Harrison Marina site, on the

golf course adjacent to the Bay View plant, or other feasible location. The basin will

be designed to capture and store, during storm events, additional wastewater above

and beyond the capacity of the existing plant for treatment at the wastewater plant

once flow to the plant is reduced. The basin is expected to be utilized between 10

and 30 times a year. The rest of the year the basin will remain empty.

The equalization basin, actually a set of basins or tanks, shall be constructed of

suitable material and shall have multiple dividers and gates with options to vary

the basin size or number of individual basins or tanks to be used. Isolation gates,

large valves, drainage pumps, feed pumps and weirs will be used to facilitate filling

and draining of the individual basins. The Consultant will provide a basin or tank

cleaning system to flush the solid content of the wastewater remaining after it is

drained. This system must be maintenance free, automated and integrated with the

plant’s control system.

When selecting materials for the basin, special design consideration shall be made

for corrosion control. The basin will be filled and emptied often, providing the concrete with much exposure to corrosion and freeze thaw cycles. Gates, weirs, and

other equipment shall be made of corrosion resistant materials or painted with corrosion resistant coatings.
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The Consultant will review the existing pumping capacity of Bay View, East Side

and Windermere pumping stations, preliminary treatment facilities, elevations of

the existing main interceptors and force mains coming into the plant, and make a

recommendation for improvements needed to fill and drain the equalization basin.

The consultant shall look at and develop the most feasible method for additional

preliminary treatment facilities which must be maintenance free, automated and integrated with the plant’s control system.

Odor control must be included. A life cycle cost study will be performed on all odor

control options proposed by the Consultant. These options will include, but not be

limited to, pre-aeration, chemical addition, odor retention basin, mixing systems, dry

and liquid scrubbers. The facility must be maintenance free, automated and integrated with the plant’s control system.

The Consultant will investigate and make recommendations on a back-up power

system for the equalization basin complex. The Consultant will perform a life cycle

analysis on all options. This system will be integrated with the plant’s existing and

planned back-up power systems. The system must be capable of an automatic start

and loading sequence and an uninterruptable return to utility power upon command

from the plant’s computer control system.

This project includes the preparation of a 401 and 404 permit for the Ohio EPA

and Army Corps of Engineers should the project be located at the Harrison Marina

site. The permits will include mitigation of lost water surface, sediment sampling,

sediment characterization and the design of a retaining wall at the river.

Title work and appraisal of the properties associated with the Harrison Marina

location have been ordered by the City. All other work to be performed by the Consultant.

5. SECONDARY CLARIFERS

The Consultant will design a new final tank designated as final tank #13. The

final tank will be located next to final tank #12 and will be the same size and configuration. This project will be designed to increase the firm capacity of the final

clarifiers from 170 MGD to 195 MGD.

This new final tank will be filled and emptied often, providing the concrete with

much exposure to corrosion and freeze thaw cycles. The final tank will normally be

put on-line during storm events or when other final tanks are out of service for

maintenance. During dry weather flows the final tank will be empty.

This project will include the addition of one new sludge withdrawal pump and

flow meter identical to the existing pumps and two new mixed liquor feed pumps.

The new sludge withdrawal pump will be located in the Sludge Withdrawal Pump

Station (SWPS). The pump will have its own variable frequency drive (VFD) and

will be automated and integrated with the plant’s control system. The VFD will be

located in the SWPS. Power for the VFD, pump and flow meter can be taken from

Power Panel 4 or the lightning panel located in the SWPS.

Flow is provided to final tank #12 using four low head high capacity pumps. The

Consultant must design two new wet wells, cross over piping and flow meters for

each of the two new mixed liquor pumps. Each pump will have its own variable frequency drive (VFD) and will be automated and integrated with the plant’s control

system. The VFD’s will be located in Gallery Building #3. Power for the VFD’s,

pumps and flow meters can be taken from Power Panel 3 or the lightning panel located there.

A splitter box to control flow to each final tank will be needed along with all process and drainage piping, valves and tank controls. The new tank will be automated

and integrated with the plant’s control system.

The Consultant will design a new secondary diversion chamber to replace the existing diversion chamber. This chamber allows flow to be diverted from the swirl

concentrators to the aeration tanks. This diversion chamber will be designed for a

firm capacity of 25 MGD with consideration being taken for future expansion. This

chamber will include a flow monitoring device.

The Consultant shall investigate and develop the most feasible method to provide

flow to the diversion chamber then to the aeration tanks. The chamber and all associated equipment must be maintenance free, automated and integrated with the

plant’s control system.

6. BALLASTED FLOCCULATION FACILITY

The Consultant will plan and conduct a 12-month pilot study of the ballasted

flocculation process. This will be done, if possible, with a truck mounted test facility.

From these results, the Consultant will size the facility and begin design. The design of the facility will last for an additional 9 months. The study will also include
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various disinfection alternatives including the use of ultraviolet light or sodium hypochlorite at the end of the wet weather system.

The Consultant will design a wet weather treatment facility (WWTF) composed

of a ballasted flocculation process sized to handle a firm capacity of 185 MGD of

raw combined sewage. This facility will come on line when the plant flow exceeds

the 195 MGD and the equalization basin is full or when the plant flow exceeds 195

MGD and the pumping capacity to the equalization basin is exceeded. This facility

will be housed in its own building and will be located at the mooring basin site.

This facility and all associated equipment must be maintenance free, automated (if

possible) and integrated with the plant’s control system.

The WWTF will include a final effluent pump station with a firm capacity of 195

MGD. This station will be used when the river level rises and interferes with the

plant’s ability to discharge effluent. The plant effluent flow and the wet weather

treatment facility flow must be sampled separately, recombined and sampled prior

to discharging to the river. Post aeration for the combined flows must maintain an

effluent DO of 5 mg/l. The Consultant will determine, using life cycle costs, the most

economical pumping configuration and post-aeration option. The pump station, aeration system and all associated equipment must be maintenance free, automated

and integrated with the plant’s control system.

A new disinfection process for the wet weather flows will be designed based on

the results of the pilot study. The Consultant will consider a new disinfection process sized to handle the plant’s effluent flow along with the wet weather flow. A life

cycle cost analysis will be performed on the disinfection alternatives. All necessary

piping, pumps, controls, chemical feed systems, contact tanks and buildings will be

included under this project. The disinfection system and all associated equipment

must be maintenance free, automated and integrated with the plant’s control system.

The Consultant will review the existing pumping capacity and preliminary treatment facilities and make a recommendation for improvements needed to provide

flow to the wet weather treatment facility. If necessary, the Consultant will perform

life-cycle cost studies on various preliminary treatment and pumping alternatives.

All pumping systems, preliminary treatment systems and all associated equipment

must be maintenance free, automated and integrated with the plant’s control system.

Once the project is complete, the Consultant will perform a 2-year full scale study

titled the ‘‘allasted Flocculation Study.’’

7. GRIT AND SKIMMING TANK SEPARATION

The main objectives of I–45 are to separate the plant’s two skimming tanks into

four independent skimming tanks/grit tank process trains. A cross channel complete

with motorized slide gates will be installed to allow any of the grit tanks to be routed through any skimming tanks when other tanks are off line for repairs. The inlet

gates to the existing grit tanks are being replaced.

New skimming equipment will be installed in each of the skimming tanks along

with an automated tipping tube. The primary clarifier scum collection system is

being converted back to a gravity drain system that will discharge into a scum pit

located outside of the pre-air building. Two scum chopper pumps will transfer the

scum to the grease concentrators. New air flow meters and valve actuators will be

installed on the air lines. A drainage pump station will be constructed in the existing scum ejector pit to pumps located in the basement of the pre-air building. This

pump station will be used to dewater the primary clarifier for maintenance.

The skimming tank collector mechanism, tipping tube and motorized gates will

be automated and controlled through the plant’s control system.

Reference OEPA permit to install 03–12308.

8. IMPROVEMENTS TO CSO’S

Columbus CSO

The sanitary area from Manhattan Blvd. south to Forest Cemetery and from

Chestnut Street east to Counter Street is served by a predominately separate sanitary sewer system, which drains into the combined sewers east of Michigan Avenue

on Columbus Street.

Drainage from the sanitary and combined sewer systems travels to a 102’’ sewer

located in Columbus Street and on to a regulator located east of the intersection of

Columbus and Summit Streets. A 36’’ sewer, which carries flow from a combined

sewer area bounded by Summit, Chicago, Ontario, and Troy Streets is believed to

connect to the 102’’ sewer just west of Summit Street. Storm overflows exit the regulator through a 102’’ pipe and discharge into the Maumee River. A 24’’ diameter re-
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turn line carries dry weather flows from the regulator to an 87’’ sanitary interceptor

located on the east side of Summit Street.

The sanitary drainage for the Columbus Street regulator is estimated to be 676

acres. The storm drainage is estimated to be 205 acres. Separation of the sanitary

sewer flow from the combined sewer is expected to result in overflow reduction.

The Columbus Street CSO Optimization Project includes verifying pipe configuration, smoke and dye testing, recommendations to separate public sources of inflow,

look at separation of sewers and design improvements.

Parkside CSO

The Parkside CSO project is primarily concerned with the area around Calvary

Cemetery which is served by separate sanitary sewer system. This area is located

near the Upton and Bancroft as well as the Upton and Door intersections. The system in this area does overflow to the combined sewer system at Ottawa River and

Monroe Street. The area serves approximately 600 acres of sanitary sewers.

The basic purpose of this project is to minimize inflow in this area, monitor the

flow rate to ensure the inflow is minimized and then construct the required sanitary

sewers to divert their flows directly to the interceptor.

This project has not been designed yet and it will be the responsibility of the Consultant to examine the area in detail and develop the project.

Maumee CSO

This CSO is located at Maumee Avenue and Orchard Street in South Toledo. This

project has not been designed yet. The basic objective of this project is to reduce

the overflow from this structure.

The return sewer line from this regulator is a 5,880 ft. long 18’’ diameter sewer

with a slope of 0.25 percent. Overflows from this regulator occur at lower rainfall

levels than other regulators which service similar acreage. The overflows could be

caused by flow restrictions such as sedimentation buildup, plugging by debris or excessive headloss. The exact cause needs to determined and corrected.

9. ELIMINATION OF SSO’S IN POINT PLACE

The Director Findings and Orders from the Ohio EPA set forth the time schedule

under which the city of Toledo must eliminate the SSO’s that are in Point Place.

This project is underway and to date, the city of Toledo has been able to meet all

of the specified deadlines.

The project is divided into phases with a phase 1 completion date of January

2001. In this phase, the city of Toledo was to do intensive sewer cleaning and correct the deficiencies in the 116th Street interceptor as well as construct a relief

pump station at Manhattan Boulevard. Phase 2 remediation will examine the results of the phase 1 investigations and suggest alternatives for corrective action

along with the costs. A detailed plan for corrective construction will be submitted

to OEPA for applicable permits by June 2003. Phase 2 improvements must be complete by November 1, 2006.

Another part of phase 2 is the River Road SSES work referenced below.

10. SSES IN RIVER ROAD AND MIDLAND AREA

This part of the SSO elimination project is centered on an area in South Toledo.

The first phase of the project involves smoke testing and televising the sanitary

sewers in this area. This portion of the project is currently underway. Phase 2 involves the collection of data, analyzing it and making recommendations to eliminate

SSO. Phase 3 of the River Road project will be submission of plans and the construction of the remediation efforts by June 1, 2004. Phase 4 is a placeholder if the Phase

3 efforts need additional improvement. The final construction must be complete by

November 1, 2006.

11. CSO SYSTEM WORK

This portion of the work involves implementing the results of a 2-year collection

system study to meet the objectives of the U.S. EPA Combined Sewer Overflow Policy. The team will be required to first establish a Long Term Control Plan (LTCP)

that addresses or considers the results of all of the studies listed herein and minimizes the overflows from the CSO’s. This LTCP will take into consideration the

characterization of the collection system through monitoring and modeling to

achieve a through understanding of the sewer system, the response of the system

to rain events, the characteristics of the overflows and the water quality impacts

that result from CSO’s. Many of the studies that we are asking the engineering
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teams to undertake speak directly to this goal. The LTCP must also address the

issues of the nine minimum control standards for CSO’s put forth by the U.S. EPA.

Currently, the city of Toledo has combined sewers that serve approximately

17,600 acres. Three interceptor sewers collect dry weather flow from combined sewers at the regulator chambers. Wet weather combined flows discharge to the

Maumee River, Ottawa River or Swan Creek at 31regulator overflow locations.

Extensive improvements to the collection system have included both major and

minor projects resulting in the overall reduction of combined sewer overflows. The

major projects with significant impact on overflow reduction include: the Ten Mile

Creek Relief Interceptor, Windemere Pump Station, Swirl Concentrators, combined

sewer outfall tide gates and regulator modifications.

The construction and activation of three independent CSO Abatement Pipeline

Storage Tunnels are the most significant actions taken by the City to improve water

quality of the Maumee River along with downtown waterfront area and of Swan

Creek along the CSO reach.

12. TWO-YEAR STUDY OF BALLASTED FLOCCULATION

The purpose of the 2-year study is to establish the daily operating parameters and

effectiveness of the new facility. In setting up the study, the Consultant will consider the manufacturers operating recommendations and use them as a reference

point. The Consultant shall develop appropriate scientific mechanisms such that the

data developed from this study will be valid in establishing the operating range of

the facility. The Consultant will also establish the range of flows that can be properly treated in the facility.

The Consultant shall, 12 months after the start of our contract, submit to the U.S.

EPA a work plan for the testing of this facility. The plan shall include, but not be

limited to (a.) the effectiveness of the facility to remove suspended solids, carbonaceous biochemical oxygen demand, total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN) and ammonia

(b.) any difficulties encountered in or limitations involved with using these facilities

over a range of flow conditions, chemical feed rates and other operational control

parameters and (c.) measures that Toledo has taken to optimize the use of the facility.

After the study is complete, the Consultant will complete a written report that

will be submitted to the U.S. EPA within 60 days after proper consultation with the

City.

13. FLOW CHARACTERIZATION STUDY

The flow characterization study is fully explained on pages 15 through 18 of the

attached draft consent decree. The Consultant is advised to take note of the time

requirements for (a.) the work plan within 30 days of our contract (b.) the one year

time period for data collection and (c.) the requirement for the report within 30 days

following the completion of the study.

The city of Toledo has installed flow-monitoring devices and has collected data regarding the amount of wastewater in the system during rain events. It is the responsibility of the Consultant, to review this information and determine the usefulness of this data and determine what additional data will need to be collected. The

current data will be available for inspection at the Division of Water Reclamation.

14. WATER QUALITY STUDY AND MODEL

The city of Toledo, in conjunction with Limno-Tech, Inc. has already performed

an extensive water quality study. This will form the basis of the work described in

the draft consent decree on pages 18 through 21. The major new area of investigation will be sediment oxygen demand and its relationship to dissolved oxygen in

Swan Creek and the Ottawa River.

The Consultant will be required to closely review the previous work and coordinate the new investigations such that a comprehensive water quality report is obtained. The Consultant will also develop the proper water quality model after extensive impute from City representatives and consistent with the directions listed on

pages 24–25 of the draft consent decree.

Here again, the Consultant is reminded to check the timeframes and report requirements.

An Executive Summary of the water quality report is attached. A complete copy

of the report is available at the Division of Water Reclamation.
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15. HYDRAULIC MODEL

The Consultant will develop a hydraulic model of the collection system to be used

in all phases of the evaluation of the system and the handling of wet weather flows.

The detailed information of the requirements of the study are listed on pages 22– 24 of the draft consent decree.

The Consultant will use the information developed in the flow characterization

study as a basis for this model. To that end, the city of Toledo has some background

information available for inspection at the Division of Water Reclamation.

16. LONG TERM CONTROL PLAN

The Long Term Control Plan seeks to integrate the various plans and models into

one single document that addresses the reduction of flows from our CSO outfalls in

order to comply with the CSO policy. The pertinent characterization of this document is found in the draft consent decree pages 25–31. It is the item which receives

the most description in this document and is important to the city of Toledo as well

as the U.S. EPA.

The studies that are being performed as part of this work can be characterized

as informational research. The flow characterization, water quality study and hydraulic models provide the informational basis upon which design and implementation can proceed. Once the information collection phase has been complete, the consultant will begin to evaluate the alternatives. This will require the engineering

teams to concentrate their expertise to suggest the most effective yet most economical solution.

Following the conceptual design phase, there will be a review procedure and then

detailed design. This design will require the integration of all of the talents of the

entire team as well as the city of Toledo’s efforts to produce an acceptable product.

Construction of the remedy of the sewer system will be completed in the second

half of the project. At present, it is unclear what type of work or engineering will

be necessary. It is, therefore, impossible for the Consultant to provide a price for

these services. The city of Toledo has included, in this proposal, a mechanism for

a price re-opener once the 2-year study is complete (see CSO System Work). It is,

however, possible for the Consultant to provide a price for the 2 year LTCP study.

17. PUBLIC PARTICIPATION PLAN

This is an aspect of the project that must not be overlooked. The development of

a clear, concise communication mechanism could be the difference between acceptance and rejection of the project. The Consultant will be required to formulate a

public relations plan that can effectively communicate the engineering ideas to the

city of Toledo, the regulator agencies and the general public. It is in this area that

the Consultant and the City must work especially close to provide a clear vision of

the project.

In the draft consent decree there is a requirement that this public involvement

be active during the planning and formulation of the LTCP. We believe that it is

important to have this aspect functioning throughout the entire project.

The public relations efforts of this project will have as its fundamental charge the

duty to explain to the public the benefits derived from the improvements being installed in the wastewater system. Large expenditures of public funds will be used

to build the improvements and it is critical that we are able to explain how the environment will be improved.

The Consultant is instructed to present, with their proposal, a summary of this

plan.

18. SEWER SYSTEM MONITORING AND REPORTING PLAN

This section will involve a timely reporting of any SSD to a body of water to the

Ohio EPA. A reporting mechanism will need to be developed such that all of the

pertinent information is recorded and conveyed to Ohio EPA.

This work will also involve a record keeping function during wet weather times

and the responses that the Division of Sewers and Ditch Drainage provide to residential customers.

The details of the content of the Sewer monitoring can be found in the draft consent decree on pages 35–36.

19. SANITARY SEWER DISCHARGE RESPONSE PLAN

This work requires the consultant to develop a plan that will identify and establish procedures to handle any sanitary sewer discharges with the appropriate public

notice. This plan will also include the provisions for limited access to the area, reme-
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diation if necessary, contingency plan for emergency response and dispatch of city

personnel.

A summary of this work can be found in the draft consent decree on pages 36–

38.

20. SANITARY SEWERO&M PLAN

This work entails the creation of a management, operation and maintenance

(‘‘MOM’’) plan for the collection system. The city of Toledo has clearly defined rules

and procedures although most of these have never been collected in a single document. The Consultant will be required to work with the Division of Sewers and

Ditch Drainage to compile and create the necessary document. It is expected that

the Consultant can draw upon past experience to create this document.

This plan will include, but not be limited to, all aspects of the collection system

operation including cleaning, televising, inspecting, corrective maintenance, information tracking, maintenance schedules and pump station inspections.

The summary of the elements of the plan are to be found on pages 38–42.

21. WWTP O & M PLAN

The Division of Water Reclamation does have an existing O & M plan that is current and does fulfill most of the provisions of this requirement. The Consultant will

need to review these plans and determine if additional work will be necessary to

comply with the outline provided in the draft consent decree on pages 42–43.

There are a number of anticipated changes such as a wet weather facility that

are not part of our current plant and will need to be added as they are constructed.

It will be the responsibility of the Consultant to continually update both the WWTP

O&M plan and the Sewer System O & M plan as new processes or change are made.

22. WORK PLANS

The draft consent decree has listed in a number of the tasks, a work plan due

within 30 days of the entering of the consent decree. A great deal of discussion was

undertaken to describe the nature of these plans and detail necessary to comply

with their submission. The U.S. EPA indicated that these plans were to be approximately two pages in length and are to outline the approximate timeframes and critical path issues to be followed. They are not a preliminary design nor are they expected to be done in a significant level of detail. They will, however, need to document a course of action that the U.S. EPA can follow.

23. INDUSTRIAL WASTEWATER RELEASE MINIMIZATION PLAN

This work entails the review of our pre-treatment plan to ensure that we are

minimizing the discharge of industrial pollutants through CSO’s and SSD’s. The

current pre-treatment program is active and should provide most of this information. The Consultant can review this program at the Division of Environmental

Services. A brief summary of the requirements is contained in the draft consent decree on page 38.

STATEMENT OF PATRICK T. KARNEY, P.E., DEE, DIRECTOR, METROPOLITAN SEWER

DISTRICT OF GREATER CINCINNATI, CINCINNATI, OH

Chairman Crapo, Senator Voinovich, on behalf of the 650 environmental professionals of the Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati and the 800,000

Hamilton County users of our utility I want to thank you for providing this opportunity to address your committee on this rising crisis.

NATIONAL HISTORY OF WATER POLLUTION ABATEMENT ACTIVITIES

When our country was young and still made up of vast wilderness, waste disposal

was a very simple matter—nature would take care of it with very little help. As our

population grew, and our ability to produce larger and larger quantities of wastes

increased nature’s solutions began to become overwhelmed. The resulting pollution

of our environment drove America, and the developing world to institute increasingly complex methods of wastewater collection and treatment. Wastewater infrastructure—underground sewer systems and wastewater treatment plants—was invented, implemented and continuously refined to answer the ever-growing need for

protection of public health and the environment.

National water pollution abatement law was not developed until a century after

founding of our country with 1878 passage of the Ports and Harbors Act. Followup

to this legislation did not appear for another century with Public Law 92–500, the
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Clean Water Act being passed in 1972. Prior to early 1900’s, wastewater disposal

was basically addressed by either forcing it into the ground (privies or outhouses),

or moving the waste to the nearest water body, be it a stream, river or lake. Treatment of the waste was left to nature. And nature did an acceptable job until civilization’s capacity to generate wastes exceeded nature’s ability to treat it.

Water pollution abatement is a relatively modern innovation, with many of our

large U.S. cities not constructing their first major treatment works until the 1950’s or 60’s. As treatment facilities moved from rudimental, primary treatment process

to the more refined secondary treatment processes during the 70’s and 80’s, regulatory emphasis began to turn to deficiencies in the collection systems (underground

piping). That movement was more strongly pursued as the 1990-decade progressed

with the publication of the USEPA’s CSO Policy in 1994. SSO issues continue to

evade our grasp, especially given the incredible financial impact that is becoming

apparent.

CINCINNATI/HAMILTON COUNTY HISTORY

Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio’s experience closely parallels that of the

Nation. Our collection system has origins in the early 1800’s, with the installation

of drainage systems to remove rainwater from developed neighborhoods and the

business district. Shortly thereafter, the cesspool crisis was addressed by collecting

individual building waste streams, connecting them to the existing stormwater system and conveying this combined flow to the nearest stream (this marked the beginning of Hamilton County’s combined sewer system). As the smaller stream’s assimilative capacity was surpassed and the degree of localized pollution could no longer

be tolerated, those waste flows were intercepted and conveyed to larger streams and

to the Ohio River.

By the 1940’s discharge of sanitary wastes into the Ohio River became intolerable,

and designs were prepared for the construction of regional wastewater treatment

plants. Underground pipes were redirected to the first of these plants in 1953. This

is clear testimony to the fact that the water pollution control industry is not that

old. The interceptor sewers which captured the old stream/river discharges were designed to convey the sanitary flow and a portion of the stormwater, with constructed

regulators to discharge excess combined flow to local streams and the Ohio River

(CSOs).

Soon design approaches changed through the Nation, with Hamilton County following suit—combined sewer systems were no longer the design of choice; separate

sanitary and storm networks were installed to prevent the co-mingling of sanitary

and storm waters in newly developing areas. As more and more development occurred in the separate sewer areas, and additional sources of sanitary sewage were

connected to the existing collection network, the older portions of the sanitary system became overwhelmed. Localized wastewater back-ups occurred on an increasingly frequent basis. Resolution of these health hazards was economically arrived

at by the installation of collection system relief lines (Sanitary Overflows)—these

were logically planned and installed using conventionally accepted engineering

methods. Little did the engineers and elected officials of the day realize they were

constructing an incredible liability for future generations.

Primary treatment plants were upgraded to secondary processes as the 70’s

turned into the 80’s. Then in the late 80’s, following massive investment in its water

reclamation plants and reflecting a change in national emphasis, Cincinnati turned

its attention to another aspect of the problem—that unseen and often forgotten underground maze of pipes known as the wastewater collection system. The much heralded site-specific solutions of less than a generation earlier, the overflow relief

structures, had descended the environmental scale to a status of environmental detriments.

Beginning in 1987, the Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati initiated

countywide studies aimed at finding solutions for CSOs. Over the past decade that

work has translated into not only system capacity increases and constructed solutions, but has further expanded into issues involving SSOs. Cincinnati’s efforts have

mirrored, and often led, national regulatory development aimed at curing the problems inherited from past generations.

ESTIMATED FINANCIAL IMPACT OF CURRENT/PROPOSED REGULATIONS (NOT INCLUDING

NATIONAL NUTRIENT REMOVAL OR TMDL-IMPOSED STANDARDS)

Early in 2000, the Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati performed

an in-house estimate of the costs involved in addressing its current collection system

needs. The resulting figures were so staggering that District management elected

to engage a consulting engineering firm to perform an independent analysis of the
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needs. Given some unknowns with respect to developing national regulations, a single number could not be reliably arrived at. The fact that the two studies (one internal and one external) came to very similar conclusions provides a very high degree

of confidence in their accuracy.

Exclusive of normal operations and maintenance costs and the routine/planned rehabilitation efforts of an aging system, which the community now supports, the new

design/construction necessary to alleviate the CSO and SSO problems amount to

somewhere between $1 billion and $3 billion.

USER CHARGE IMPLICATIONS

Current Charges

At the present time the user charges in affect for MSD are right in the middle

of those for the surrounding 67 utilities.

Projection of Increases

In order to meet the obligations currently imposed upon it by the Federal Government, MSD will be forced to increase its user charge rate by approximately 7 percent per year for each of the next 15 years—$1 billion of design and construction.

This would multiply the existing rate by nearly threefold (276 percent). Taking a

more conservative view of how the pending SSO regulations might final impact the

utility, the cost would rise to $3 billion for design and construction. That would result in rate increases of 21 percent per year for 15 years. This would multiply the

current rates 17 times (1,750 percent).

National nutrient standards and TMDL-related limitations would impose an even

greater financial burden upon the Cincinnati/Hamilton County ratepayers. Their impact is not definitively quantifiable, but could easily approach upwards to an additional $1 billion. That would place the utility in a position of having to raise $4 billion, with a forty-five-fold increase being imposed upon the residents (4,526 percent)

over 15 years.

ISN’T IT TIME FOR USERS TO PAY THE FULL COST OF SERVICE

The Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati’s ratepayers have been

paying the full cost of service since 1968. As with nearly all other major wastewater

utilities, MSD is a stand-alone enterprise that does not receive subsidies from other

governmental units via property tax contribution or payments whose source is a different taxing authority. Hamilton County ratepayers do know the true cost of wastewater collection and treatment—they see it every quarter in the bill mailed to their

homes and businesses.

The local burden is already rising. In 2000, the Metropolitan Sewer District of

Greater Cincinnati’s rates were increased by 9.5 percent. In 2001, Hamilton County

enacted another MSD rate increase of 7 percent. Further, the County Commissioners are prepared to consider another 7 percent rate hike in 2002. Our local elected officials and utility managers are stepping up to the plate and making tough decisions about paying the cost of protecting public health and the environment.

AVOIDING THESE COSTS

What if these horrendous costs are not incurred? What will happen?

• USEPA will begin imposing fines upon Hamilton County.

• Moneys that might have been spent improving environmental quality and protecting public health, will then go directly to the Federal Government.

• The Department of Justice will intervene and initiate civil and criminal proceedings against local jurisdictions and officials for violation of the Clean Water Act.

• Concerns about environmental degradation will go unaddressed.

Thus, these huge expenditures cannot be avoided.

LOCAL FUNDING WITHOUT FEDERAL ASSISTANCE

The rate increases noted above would begin. Within a few years the rates would

increase dramatically and the results would be:

• Economic distress on the entire County.

• Extreme hardship visited upon those most unable to pay (environmental equity).

• Loss of jobs and commerce due to competitive pressures from other localities.

• Loss of population.

• Spiraling utility revenue loses, in spite of increased rates, reducing usage and

billability of the customer base, driving rates higher than originally anticipated, further decrease use and pushing revenues even lower . . .
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CINCINNATI/HAMILTON COUNTY IS NOT ALONE

Cincinnati/Hamilton County are not alone in facing a financial need of crisis-proportions. Every older Northeast and Midwest city has aging infrastructure and the

challenge of eliminating CSOs and SSOs. Throughout the United States, all major

cities, even those without combined sewers, are trying to cope with increasing rehabilitation needs. As with Cincinnati these other communities are coming to the realization that their future costs are far in excess of their ability to pay. Adding the

expectation of ever tightening regulations only further frustrates their attempts at

coming to grips with the situation.

Clearly this is not simply a local or even regional problem. Every major, as well

as medium and small communities, are subject to water and wastewater infrastructure demands.

NEED FOR RELIEF ON A NATIONAL BASIS

Elected officials and residents of Hamilton County alike can easily agree upon one

point—local efforts are not enough to address this growing infrastructure need. The

impact of not only maintaining the underground system of collection pipes dating

back to the early 1800’s, but also contending with ever tightening regulatory mandates is staggering. For years this infrastructure has been, ‘‘out of sight, out of

mind.’’ But that is no longer the case.

Local utility managers have been feeling the growing pressure to plan for future

needs for some time, but it has not been until recently that an effort has been undertaken to raise the national consciousness. Why the delay? The size of the problem was not quantified earlier. We, and our predecessors, knew it was quite large,

and there were other day-to-day problems we had to contend with. Then as we

began to get a feel for the actual numbers, they were so massive that very few of

us were willing to even mention them, much less engage a national debate how to

proceed.

Today we have a much better feel for what is required, and are searching for a

solution. The American people can no longer avoid the growing crisis. Elected officials on the local level are beginning to feel the crunch. Individual homeowners and

businesses are being affected. Local governments are facing a growing shadow of financial doom.

The need is nationwide. The magnitude of the problem is of national proportion.

Citizens and local officials must have relief, and the only source for relief of this

magnitude is the Federal Government.

WIN PROPOSAL

The time has come to once again make water infrastructure funding a national

priority. On a national basis it has been estimated a $23 billion per year funding

gap exists between current local investment in water and wastewater infrastructure

and what is needed over the next 20 years to replace aging and failing pipes and

meet Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act mandates.

The environmental gains made by the water and wastewater community over the

past thirty years are impressive, but they are in jeopardy. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Nation will lose a generation of water quality

progress without significant new investment in water and wastewater infrastructure. Recently, more than a million consumers in California were plunged into darkness as the nation’s energy crisis deepened. Imagine what would happen if the nation’s water and wastewater systems began to fail. Could we ask our citizens to tolerate untreated or unsafe water? I think not. Failure of wastewater systems could

create a public health emergency, cause widespread environmental degradation, and

lead to an erosion of our local economies.

The $23 billion gap is documented in two reports released by the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN), most recently in February’s Water Infrastructure Now:

Recommendations for Clean and Safe Water in the 21st Century (WINow), which has

been endorsed by over 30 nationally recognized organizations. The WINow report

makes specific recommendations on bridging the infrastructure funding gap through

a renewed Federal commitment to the nation’s municipalities. By authorizing an average of $11.5 billion per year in capitalization funds over the next 5 years, the Federal Government will provide States with the necessary funds to offer grants and

loans to local water and wastewater agencies for repairs and replacement of aging

infrastructure.
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CALL TO ACTION

It is our hope that this attempt to articulate the problem will lead Congress and

the Administration to begin the lengthy process of coming to the assistance of local

communities throughout the country. If we can answer any questions or provide additional information in the future to assist you in taking action, please feel free to

ask. Utilities throughout America are prepared to answer your calls.

Senator Voinovich, on behalf of wastewater utilities nationwide I would like to

thank you for your recent initiative aimed at re-energizing the nation’s State revolving fund program. Such leadership is what is needed to bring us all to grips with

the funding crisis facing our water infrastructure, and threatening our citizens.

Thank you, again, for this opportunity to provide insight into this financial crisis

that is facing our entire country.

STATEMENT OF PATRICK D. GSELLMAN, P.E., MANAGER, ENVIRONMENTAL DIVISION,

AKRON ENGINEERING BUREAU, AKRON, OH

SUMMARY OF ISSUES—AKRON, OH

Akron, OH is located on the Cuyahoga River, in northeast Ohio, approximately

30 miles upstream from the city of Cleveland. The Akron wastewater planning area

covers approximately 167 square miles and includes most of the Akron metropolitan

area. There is a population of 352,000 in the service area and includes all or a portion of 5 cities, 4 villages and 7 townships.

The sewer system includes approximately 1,165 miles of sewers consisting of 188

miles of combined sewers. There are 38 combined sewer overflows (CSO) within the

city of Akron. Based on predictions from the hydraulic model typical annual CSO

volume is 2,440 million gallons. Previous efforts by the city of Akron have resulted

in the elimination of sanitary sewer overflows (SSO) in the city of Akron and the

award of the Association of Metropolitan Sewer Association’s (AMSA) gold award for

no effluent violations in 2000.

The city of Akron has proposed a Long Term Control Plan that will cost more

than $248,000,000 to implement. This cost is in addition to the millions Akron has

already spent to date to study, address and reduce CSO’s, and the $25 million spent

to eliminate SSOs. Akron has seen a significant decline in its industrial base since

the 1960’s, requiring the residential users to carry the burden. Akron already carries one of the highest residential sewer rates in the State for communities of similar population.

The Akron Public Utilities Bureau is undergoing significant changes as result of

the high water rates. The rates led to a Blue Ribbon Panel to study the Utility and

the current Competitive Action Program. This program includes the water treatment facility, sewer maintenance, Water Pollution Control Station and Utilities Engineering. Significant reductions in operation costs are being realized and will allow

the Utility to be competitive in the future. This will allow for the City to pay its

fair share of needed improvements as long as the Federal Government contributes

its fair share.

As part of developing Akron’s Long Term Control Plan, several options to fund

the projects were evaluated. Given the significant total cost of these projects, it is

likely that funds will have to be obtained from multiple sources, i.e. grants, low interest loans and revenues obtained by sewer rates. Grants are essential to the

fundability and feasibility of the program. Without outside funding, sewer rates will

more than double due just to the CSO program. The impact of additional operation

and maintenance costs, system repair and replacement and normal inflation will

likely see the rates triple. Current monthly sewer charges for a typical residential

customer are approximately $30.00 per month for sewer only. The rate increases to

$60.00 or $90.00 per month will adversely affect a significant portion of ratepayers,

including those who can barely afford their current utility bills.

The selected alternative for the city of Akron Integrated Plan incorporates storage

conveyance tunnels, detention basins, treatment basins and sewer separations. A set

of rating criteria was used to compare various alternatives. The criteria included

storm water impacts, water quality improvements, operation and maintenance costs,

public acceptance, community improvements and construction issues. The approach

taken with the Long Term Control Plan (LTCP) was the ‘‘presumptive’’ approach.

The annual percent capture after the LTCP is 94 percent.

In addition to the funding, the issues of wet weather standards, use designation

and urban stream habitat need to be addressed.
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Wet Weather Standards.—The current water quality standards do not (nor were

they intended to) address wet weather events. Re-evaluation of water quality standards for wet weather is needed on a State and Federal level.

Use Designations.—Reasonable and sincere re-evaluation of ‘‘use designations’’ has

not been conducted by the State agencies as allowed by the CSO Guidance. EPA

has reported that they do not have adequate funding to re-evaluate these requests,

yet they expect local POTWs to expend hundreds of millions of dollars on CSO controls. A fair re-evaluation of a stream’s ‘‘use designation’’ is needed prior to the expenditure of millions of dollars financed by ratepayers.

Stream Habitat.—Urban stream habitat is not adequately addressed in the Ohio

Water Quality Standards. Variances for CSO receiving streams should be allowed

until the proposed Urban Stream Habitat can be fully assessed.

The city of Akron Public Utility is also faced with rapidly rising costs associated

with storm water, total maximum daily loads (TMDL), and drinking water regulation.

Akron continues to develop access to the receiving stream with bike paths, downtown development, Mustill Store restoration and Cascade Lock Park. Also, the National Heritage River designation and National Park will continue to attract people

to the Cuyahoga River. We look forward to a solution that will cost-effectively address CSO issues while producing benefits to the Akron rate payers, enhance the

parks and trails, show improvements in water quality and further the goals of the

Clean Water Act.

The significance of the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, National Heritage River

status, State Resource waters, Metropolitan Parks, and the Ohio & Erie Canal National Heritage Corridor should all be factors in the allocation of grant funding.

Proposals similar to the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN) are needed to provide for adequate funding now and in the future. Through water and sewer bills,

local rate payers already pay about 90 percent of the total cost to build operate and

maintain their water and wastewater systems. We need a long-term, sustainable,

and reliable source of Federal funding for clean water.

Wet Weather Standards.—The advent of the CSO program and other wet weather

control regulations has focused recent attention on the need for wet weather water

quality standards. The focus of wet weather standards has been on attainment of

the criteria for waterborne bacteria, generally measured as either fecal coliform bacteria or more recently as E. coli. Typically many urban and suburban streams do

not meet the recreational use criteria for bacteria during wet weather. The bacteria

counts in streams rise during storms due to bacteria from a variety of non-point and

point sources.

Studies in any major population center have consistently shown non-attainment

of the existing ‘‘dry weather’’ criteria during and following even moderate wet

weather events. Bacteria enter the streams from surface runoff, from septic system

leach fields, and from both separate and combined sewer systems. Even areas with

no sewer overflow often have bacteria concentrations that exceed the existing standards. Non-point sources of bacteria include pet wastes and wildlife (particularly

geese) wastes.

The issue of wet weather standards has been raised at the national level by the

Water Environment Federation (WEF), AMSA and other organizations representing

municipal sewer authorities. The USEPA has thus far, been unwilling to derive a

tiered water quality standard for wet weather recreational use. Fortunately the

USEPA has typically not pursued enforcement cases where recreational use attainment is the primary.

There is no argument about the current standard being applicable and protective

of human health during dry weather. The shift to the E. coli measure is also generally supported as being more representative of organisms that pose a risk to public health. The argument for a wet weather standard or variance has been put forward to provide a mechanism for avoiding consistent non-attainment where the

source of that non-attainment is beyond the control of the municipal sewer authority. Also there is some question about the need for protection of contact recreational

uses in urban areas where such contact does not typically occur during wet weather.

Also a wet weather standard provides alternatives for control of CSO that will reduce costs and remain protective of water quality. Many remedies selected for control of CSO include chlorination in an attempt to meet recreational use standards

for bacteria. The addition of chlorine has been shown to have detrimental effects on

aquatic life use so dechlorination of CSO is also considered. If a wet weather standard were established it could effectively reduce the amount of chlorine used and reduce those risks and the cost of the chlor-dechlor process.

The proposed standards that have been discussed with (but not accepted by) the

USEPA include provisions for an increase in the allowable concentration during wet
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weather and mechanisms for determining what is a qualifying wet weather condition.

USE DESIGNATIONS

During the early years of implementation of the Clean Water Act, States were

tasked to develop use designations for all streams. The initial designations were

often made without any detailed information about the existing use attained or attainable in a particular stream. Many streams were designated to meet a standard

higher than what was ‘‘existing’’ at the time of the designation. These ‘‘default’’ designations have resulted in conditions where streams are prevented from meeting a

designated use by conditions that cannot be controlled by pollution control technologies alone. Habitat alteration, flow modification, and dams are some examples

of conditions that occur commonly in streams where those factors alone might prevent attainment of an aquatic life use designation even absent and significant point

or non-point sources of pollution.

Subsequent re-designation has been difficult for State agencies because of the

anti-backsliding provisions of the Clean Water Act. Citizens Groups often view a redesignation as a ‘‘degradation’’ of water quality, even if the existing water quality

does not meet the existing designation.

The implementation of TMDLs and the ongoing implementation of CSO controls,

highlights the difficulties with current designations. The difference between use attainment, in different States, depends more on the process used for designation than

it does on causes and sources of non-attainment. Many streams change from nonattainment to attainment as they cross State boundaries because of the variation

in use designation. Since TMDLs are now required in many States for all waters

that are in non-attainment as a result of point source pollution, many States have

additional incentive to review the designation process. These incentives do not remove the difficulties involved with a perceived ‘‘lowering’’ of a designated use.

Even within States the use designation process is often administered differently

in different jurisdictions. On the Scioto River an impounded areas less than a mile

long was re-designated as ‘‘modified warmwater habitat’’; in the Cuyahoga River the

sewer authority was told that a two mile long impounded area was ‘‘too short’’ and

would unnecessarily ‘‘segment’’ the stream. In the Hocking River more than 3 miles

of urban stream was re-designated as modified warmwater habitat ‘‘channelized’’

where the stream was straightened and had earthen banks of trapezoidal shape for

a few stretches of about a mile with intervening stretches of natural stream banks

and meandering channel shape. In the Little Cuyahoga River a variance (not a redesignation) was requested for a stream where a stretch of over 3 miles is straightened, predominantly in a rectangular concrete channel and contains no significant

stretches of natural channel. That variance was refused by Ohio EPA on the

grounds again that this would segment the stream and discourage the municipality

from attempting to improve the existing use which had never met the existing designated use since many years prior to the inception of the Clean Water Act.

The cost of comprehensive use designation for streams is in the tens to hundreds

of thousands of dollars depending on the size of the project. Clearly this expenditure

can help to prioritize expenditure of further pollution controls to streams where use

is appropriately designated and attainable.

STREAM HABITAT

Urban settings provide unique conditions for stream habitat. Streams in urban

areas have typically been extensively modified. The goal of storm water management in urban areas has always been to provide drainage and avoid any surface retention of water in cities. That goal creates habitat conditions dominated by runoff

hydraulics. In wet weather these streams have high peak flows and velocities that

create scour and destabilize existing conditions. In dry weather these streams may

have flows lower than would be expected in a stream not dominated by a storm

drainage system. These two stage systems (low base flow, high peak flow) are not

well suited for maintaining aquatic life.

Typically the property owners, the USACOE and City authorities have devoted a

significant amount of engineering resources to stabilize these streams and prevent

flooding during peak events. Most aquatic life use designations are developed based

on habitat standards determined by ‘‘natural’’ streams with moderate change from

pre-Columbian drainage and land use. Urban streams represent an extreme condition where most first order (the smallest) many second order and some third order

streams have been replaced by pipes. In areas where these streams have not been

entirely culverted they are often straightened and regularly dredged to promote

drainage and prevent flooding. The remaining streams of fourth order and higher
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are often disconnected from areas where populations of fish and macroinvertebrates

can find conditions suitable for propagation or other functions essential to supporting the broad range of species that would be supported in a more diverse ecosystem. Often the larger streams are also extensively modified to provide other functions such as riverfront recreation or commercial navigation. In New York City as

the most extreme example the ‘‘streams’’ in Central Park are entirely artificial and

are fed primarily by tap water and drain into the combined sewer system.

While Ohio has much less extreme modification to the natural environment than

New York City, the condition of the streams in urbanized and even in many suburban areas is highly modified. Those modifications prevent adequate colonization of

fish species that would be necessary to support a warmwater habitat aquatic life

use. Given the importance of the aquatic life use as an indicator of good water quality, as developed in Ohio Water Quality standards, it is important that the standards recognize habitat conditions that would prevent attainment even if all urban

pollution sources were completely controlled.

Discussions have been initiated by several entities to develop an appropriate

‘‘urban’’ stream designation to address these conditions that prevent attainment of

aquatic life uses. To date, the Ohio EPA has not been particularly open to developing an alternative to the existing designation system.
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NEWS RELEASE

CORPS CONTINUES PARTNERSHIP WITH OHIO AGENCIES

BUFFALO.—The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Buffalo District, the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Ohio Department of Health (DH) are working together to improve the investigations being performed by the Corps under the

Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP) in Ohio. By

partnering, th technical experience and expertise of all of theagencies is combined

to provide valuable input toward provide resolving complex cleanup issues.

‘‘All of our agencies are committed to having an open and honest dialog on

FUSRAP sites in Ohio and ensuring that we develop plans that are safe and fully

protective of human health and the environment,’’ said Lt. Col. Glen R. DeWillie,

Buffalo District Commander. ‘‘We are working together and coordinating the comprehensive evaluations being prepared for all of our sites.’’

The Corps is mandated by Congress to follow the Comprehensive Environmental

Response Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) in evaluating FUSRAP sites

‘‘Our ultimate goal in following CERCLA is to develop cleanup remedies that are

fully protective of human health and the environment,’’ said DeWillie. The district

involves all stakeholders in partnering meetings to coordinate with the agencies and

proactively seek their opinions and concerns so they can be properly addressed.

The Corps, the Ohio EPA and the Ohio DH schedule monthly telephone conferences and correspond regularly to ensure all issues and concerns that could impact public health and safety are properly evaluated while developing cleanup alternatives for the Ohio sites that are fully protective. The Ohio sites are: the Luckey

Site; the Painesville Site; the former Harshaw Chemical Company in Cleveland;

Dayton Unit 1, Dayton Warehouse, Dayton Unit III, and Dayton Unit IV; and the

Scioto Laborator Complex in Marion.

Citizens interested in being added to any of the Ohio Site mailing lists or seeking

additional information regarding the site can contact the USACE FUSRAP Public

Information Center toll-free at 1–800–833–6390. The Internet website for the Buffalo District is http://www.lrb.usace.army.mil/fusrap.E-mail can be addressed to

fusrap@usace.army.mil

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