Dischargers to negotiate cleanup plan

With lawyers whispering at their elbows, Spokane River dischargers agreed Friday to negotiate the specifics of a river cleanup plan over the next few months.

At a meeting Friday with state and federal regulators, Spokane officials stressed the high price tag to utility ratepayers of new sewage treatment technology to meet the state’s proposed phosphorus discharge limit.

Spokane has been a good steward of the river, but the city’s 200,000 residents make an average $26,000 to $28,000 a year and can’t afford huge utility rate increases, said Jack Lynch, Spokane’s deputy mayor.

“We can’t run the risk of escalating utility rates … it’s a real balancing act for us,” Lynch told regulators from the Washington Department of Ecology and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“We need an implementation schedule that allows us to pay for these things over 20 years. Ratepayers are left holding the bag,” said Spokane County Commissioner Todd Mielke.

Others said the state’s proposed 10 micrograms per liter phosphorus cleanup standard, called a total maximum daily load, or TMDL, must be met to protect the river. “We should strive for the standards set in the law. That’s the heart of this 90-day discussion,” said Mike Petersen of The Lands Council, a Spokane environmental group.

The state’s top water regulator said Ecology is obligated to uphold state law – but can be flexible on how best to achieve cleanup.

“Our job is to make sure the standards are met and whether they’re the right standards. But they won’t be met next year – it will take a lot longer. Meanwhile, we shouldn’t go in the opposite direction,” said David Peeler, Ecology’s water quality program manager.

EPA, which has final say on the TMDL, won’t approve a plan that violates the Clean Water Act, said Tom Eaton, the EPA’s Washington state operations manager. “The plan can be different than proposed. But if it doesn’t show you can achieve water quality standards, it won’t be legally defensible,” Eaton said.

Spokane lawyer and former Spokane City Councilman Steve Eugster criticized the draft “guiding principles” for the negotiations circulated by the dischargers. They say the river’s water quality must be improved but stress that any solutions must be attainable, affordable, flexible and serve regional growth.

“I don’t see what these so-called principles have to do with water quality standards. They are designed to say, we want relief from these standards. Let’s be honest here,” Eugster said.

“Attainable and affordable” has a bottom-line meaning to Inland Empire Paper Co., said Wayne Frost, general manager of the company’s real estate division. The company is a subsidiary of Cowles Publishing Co., which also owns The Spokesman-Review. It employs more than 140 people and is the third largest taxpayer in Spokane County.

Inland Empire Paper has done pilot tests on reducing phosphorus in its effluent and can’t achieve Ecology’s new limit, Frost said. “What’s attainable and affordable for us is whether we can stay in business,” he added.

Peeler said it’s common around the state for water bodies not to meet standards at certain times of the year for temperature and pollutants. The problem season for the Spokane River is summer, when some stretches have too little dissolved oxygen due to phosphorus pollution.

The dischargers agreed to find a neutral facilitator to lead future meetings. Ecology Director Jay Manning “has been emphatic that that’s needed,” said Jani Gilbert, Ecology spokeswoman in Spokane. The costs should be shared by Ecology and the dischargers, she said.

The talks will resume at meetings in Spokane on March 30 and April 13.