The City of Granite Falls has received and respond t0 a Letter of Warning from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) for violations documented during a Compliance Evaluation Inspection performed by the agency in January.
The violation concerns the city’s practice of bypassing excess inflow and infiltration (I/I)water form the wastewater treatment process.
The infraction usually occurs during the wettest times of the year, typically around April, when storm water passes through the city’s sewer system at a rate greater than what can be treated by the plant.
The wastewater treatment has the capacity to process 800,000 gallons per day (gpd) from the city’s sewer system, and, on average, the I/I is well below those numbers at 426,549 gpd, according to the MPCA report. This past April, however, heavy rains increased the flow to just over 1 million gpd, necessitating that wastewater treatment operators to bypass some of the flow downriver to avoid overrunning the system.
The problem is an issue for many cities throughout the United States, according mayor Dave Smiglewski.
In response to the warning, Granite Falls will comply with MPCA requirement for a written plan to address the violations. The proposal, which will be developed by the wastewater treatment plant’s original engineers, Bonestroo and Associates from the Twin Cities, was approved during Tuesday’s City Council meeting at an expense not to exceed $10,000.
Other news:
•Council members voted to renew the contract of city building inspector Darin Haslip who has been with the City since 2007. The terms of the agreement remain unchanged from those accepted in his original contract. For his services Haslip receives a portion of building fees, $45 for each additional hour of work unrelated to inspections and a minimum quarterly fee of $2,000 from the City.
•The council agreed to retain the services of Huls Brothers Trucking, Inc. for lime sludge disposal generated from the city’s water treatment process held in the water treatment plant lagoons. The trucking company receives $19 per ton, and hauls and disposes of 1,000 to 3,000 tons of lime sludge per year. During the last five years the City has paid, on average, just over $27,000 for the service.
The city council had considered constructing a local disposal site for the sludge in 2004, but found it was not cost effective.
•A low bid of $39,990 was awarded to Jacobsen Tree Experts for an Electric Line Cleaning Project approved in early February. The 2010 Electrical Department Capital Improvements Budget had set-aside $55,900 for this work, which involves clearing tree limbs from the path of electrical lines.
•Council members passed a resolution of support from the Southwest Corridor Transportation Coalition that calls for federal funding for the expansion of Highway 212 to a four-lane expressway between Chaska and Cologne and also between Cologne and Norwood Young America
Granite Falls, Minn. —
