Plenty of Fixes, but How to Pay?

A road map for tackling issues of water quality in East Hampton Town, and the inadequate wastewater treatment and disposal that underpins them, was sketched out last week by Pio Lombardo of Lombardo Associates, a consultant who has drafted a comprehensive wastewater management plan for the town.

Begin, he said, with the “obvious improvements” that can be made in areas that clearly need work, such as three parts of Montauk where he has proposed swapping the use of individual, malfunctioning septic systems for state-of-the-art neighborhood sewering systems.

Conduct studies of the Fort Pond, Hook Pond, and Georgica Pond watersheds, to evaluate nitrogen and phosphorous levels, and determine what should be done there, he said, and install demonstration projects of a barrier system that prevents those elements from entering the ponds.

And, at the same time, he suggested, the town should improve pertinent regulations and enforcement of those that already exist, such as a requirement for inspection of septic systems every few years.

At a town board meeting in Montauk on Oct. 14, Mr. Lombardo outlined his recommendations for that hamlet. Neighborhood wastewater treatment systems should be set up in three areas where inadequate individual cesspool or septic systems have been found and the conditions make it impossible or unlikely to correct that problem: downtown Montauk, the Ditch Plain area, and around the docks.

Downtown lots, he said, lack the area needed to install on-site systems to sufficiently deal with waste. In Ditch, an underground layer of clay and a high water table mean that some septic systems or cesspools are sitting in groundwater. Pollution from them is the cause of the high bacteria levels in the south end of Lake Montauk, where swimming closures have become common after rain.

“Those properties can’t solve their problems with individual solutions,” Mr. Lombardo said.

A waste system is considered to be malfunctioning if it requires a pump-out three or more times a year, Mr. Lombardo said.

An owner of the downtown restaurant 668 the Gig Shack, who was at Tuesday’s meeting, provided an example of the problem. Lewis Gross said he must have his septic pumped about once a week, at a cost of $10,000 to $14,000 annually.

In the neighborhood systems, Mr. Lombardo said, pipes would collect and carry liquid waste from septic tanks at individual houses or businesses to a centralized underground treatment area. The Montauk Fire Department property and another site for sale across the street could be suitable locations, he said. Treated effluent could be used for irrigation of ball fields or the Montauk Downs golf course.

The recommended underground system, Mr. Lombardo said, is air and watertight, eliminating odors. Besides eliminating nitrogen, it can also be conigured to address “emerging contaminants” in the wastewater, such as the traces of pharmaceutical drugs increasingly being detected in groundwater.

The consultant provided cost estimates for the systems in each of the three targeted areas, based on the assumption that the waste would be sent to a centralized treatment area and that each property’s wastewater system would be replaced. 

In downtown Montauk, the cost would be $15.6 million; in Ditch Plain, $10.6 million, and in the docks area, $18.1 million.

Those hooking up to the three proposed community systems, Mr. Lombardo said, would individually need to pay only for the cost of a pipe from the house to the system, expected to be “well under $1,000,” he said.

But the capital costs of the infrastructure would have to be borne somehow.

There are “a lot of options” for funding, Mr. Lombardo said. The New York State Environmental Facilities Corporation, which provides grants and low-cost loans to municipalities, has interest in funding centralized wastewater systems such as those proposed, he said. Other funding sources could include a grant from Suffolk County’s wastewater fund or the creation of local water-quality improvement tax districts, through which the town would levy a tax to affected residents to pay for the projects. Savings that result from the closure of the town’s scavenger waste treatment and transfer facility next month — expected to be about $460,000 next year — could also be used.

In addition, Mr. Lombardo mentioned the possible use in the future of money from the Peconic Bay Region Community Preservation Fund for water quality protection projects such as the wastewater systems.

The idea of using some of the preservation fund revenue, which comes from a 2-percent tax on most real estate transfers in the five East End towns, has come up in recent discussions of the wastewater plan. A change to the state law authorizing the fund would be required. That idea is covered in a separate story in today’s Star.

The cost issue is a serious one, said Mr. Lombardo, who compiled data on the income of town residents in order to assess the affordability of options in the wastewater management plan. A third of the town’s households have a mean annual income of less than $50,000, he said, and half of the town’s households have an income of less than $75,000.

“If you’re looking at a community system, you’re looking at some kind of special district,” Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell said at the meeting. “It’s going to have to be paid for somehow. A district would be created, and taxes would be paid.”

Whether individual taxpayer participation would be optional or required would be a matter of town policy, Mr. Lombardo said. However, he said, in cases such as those at Ditch Plain, where “we know that certain of those properties are causing contamination, one could take the position that they don’t have the option.”

Town officials would have to carefully identify the properties that would fall within a certain potential wastewater tax district, examine the tax assessments there, and determine the tax impact to individuals, Mr. Cantwell said, while bearing in mind residents’ financial limitations.

“The check is going to be written, for the large part, by the property owner,” Mr. Cantwell said. “So the board is going to have to be very careful.”

Lombardo Associates evaluated conditions on every single one of the land parcels in the town. They determined that there are septic system problems that must be addressed on 3 percent of them. Another 18 percent could have “small or moderate” issues, said Mr. Lombardo. “We know, on a parcel-by-parcel basis, what are the needs, if any, associated with those properties.”

Spreadsheets showing the consultants’ evaluation of conditions at each parcel in Montauk have been prepared; others addressing land in the rest of the town are under way.

Work needed to address improperly functioning septic systems at private residences would generally cost $15,000 or less, Mr. Lombardo said — sometimes far less.

The town could, perhaps, require a septic system upgrade, if deemed necessary, before a property can be sold, or at the time a certificate of occupancy is updated, Mr. Cantwell suggested. “The property owners are going to have to be vested in this for this to work,” he said.

The presentation of the data regarding water quality and the state of the wastewater systems is just the first step, Mr. Lombardo said. Mr. Cantwell’s suggestion that citizens’ committees be appointed to study and respond to aspects of the draft wastewater plan is a good one, Mr. Lombardo said.

The plan and supporting documents are posted online at ehwaterrestore.com.