Akron’s New Sewer Plan Would Drop Price Tag About $300 Million

By Stephanie Warsmith, Akron Beacon Journal

Akron’s proposed new sewer plan would shave about $300 million from the mammoth project’s cost, dropping the estimated price tag to about $800 million.

The plan would change the order of projects, adopt more environmentally friendly measures and extend the time frame to complete the work by 13 years, giving the city until 2040.

These are a few of the details about Akron’s new “Integrated Plan” shared with Akron City Council members during a Public Utilities Committee meeting Monday.

“We need an extension in the schedule and the ability to optimize our program,” said Deputy Service Director Phil Montgomery. “That would be consistent with what other communities are getting.”

Akron will submit the plan to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) July 31. The agency has the authority to sign off on some of the changes Akron is proposing, while others also must be approved by U.S. District Judge John Adams, who is overseeing the city’s federal environmental lawsuit.

Montgomery said negotiations between Akron and the EPA will take between six months and a year. During that time, the city will proceed with sewer projects required under its original sewer plan.

City leaders have been providing council with regular updates on the Integrated Plan while it has been developed, a process that started last year. Akron decided to go this route in hopes of trading gray projects for greener approaches and saving money.

The most recent estimates on the project’s cost pegged it at about $1.14 billion. The purpose of the project is to curtail sewer overflows that pollute the Cuyahoga and Little Cuyahoga Rivers and the Ohio & Erie Canal.

The changes Akron is proposing include:

• Decreasing the number of huge, concrete storage basins to hold rainwater from 10 to five. The size of some basins also would be reduced.

• Increasing the number of sanitary and storm sewer separations and green infrastructure projects from five to 13.

• Eliminating plans for a second storage tunnel, in addition to the one that will be bored through downtown, and instead increasing the size of sewer pipes and doing sewer separations in this area. The second tunnel was supposed to be built in North Akron. Doing away with it will save about $100 million.

• Moving up plans for improvements to the Water Reclamation Facility, including the use of new technology.

In some cases, Akron determined that a storage basin was needed and that sewer separations and green options couldn’t be used in its place. For example, Montgomery said the city discovered that a storage basin on Hazel Street needed to be larger than in the original plan. The basin would increase from 2.5 million gallons to 4.5 million gallons.

“We would not be able to meet performance requirements,” Montgomery said of the smaller basin. “With the EPA, to be considered for a modification, there has to be some benefit.”

Montgomery said Akron is looking at not only addressing the combined sewer problem, but also at public health issues caused by stormwater problems that result in water in residents’ basements during heavy rains.

“We are hoping to expand our program to address these needs,” he said. “We know that is important to our residents.”

As part of the Integrated Plan, Akron will provide the EPA with more detailed affordability information. Michael Musgrave, a vice president of Colorado-based MWH Global Inc., a consultant hired by the city, said the information included unemployment data and median-house incomes for Akron and the larger service area its sewer system serves.

Asked how much sewer rates, which already have been raised to help pay for the project, would go up under the revised plan, Montgomery said it’s impossible to determine that right now because the city doesn’t know which modifications the EPA and Adams will approve.

“We are hard pressed to speculate on what they will be,” he said. “We don’t know what they will allow us to do.”

Councilman Mike Williams, who asked numerous questions during the committee meeting, praised the administration and the city’s consultants for the new plan at the end of the meeting.

“I’m in prayer that the EPA and the judge will take a look at this and we can start movement in the right direction,” he said.