Ronan Council rejects county’s polluted water disposal proposal
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RONAN – During the regularly-scheduled Ronan City Council meeting on July 11, council rejected accepting contaminated water from the old county road shop to be disposed of into the city’s sewer system. According to Lake County Commissioner Ann Brower, the water has been sitting in the wells since the 1970s, when the shop contaminated the water with the chemical Penta via wood treatment activities on rail posts.
Since then, the water has been periodically tested, with the last reading showing Penta levels at 1.5. According to Brower, the county must first formulate a disposal plan and have it approved before they can go in and test the water, which hasn’t been tested in many years.
According to the Department of Environmental Quality, if the water tests less than one percent for Penta, it’s safe enough to pour into the ground. The problem for the county is that with the city’s decision, they don’t have the required pre-approved disposal plan so they can test the water to see what its contents currently are.
The initial two proposals to the city of Ronan were to either purge the water into the city’s sewer system, or have the contaminated material transported to Pablo, where the water would be accepted.
The issue with transporting the material is the $3,000 it would cost to hire a licensed driver to take 12 gallons of the waste to Pablo twice a year. The problem with dumping the waste into the sewer is that the sewer isn’t capable of breaking the Penta down, rather diluting the substance.
“It’s costing a fortune to test it,” Brower said. “We don’t want to spend a fortune transporting it as well.”
Council members argued that the city would be held responsible if the Penta caused ill-effects on the surrounding ecosystem. Throughout the debate, the council discussed possible problems that could occur if the waste was dumped in the sewer, including the possibility of killing fish in the Flathead River, which would be the city’s fault and could bring major expenses down the road.
After discussing the issue for more than half an hour, the council voted 3-2 in favor of rejecting the water, choosing to avoid any liability with the waste. With this action, Brower says the new plan is to fill the water into containers and let the water evaporate.
In other business, council denied a three percent salary raise for the employees of the Ronan City Library.
“With the way the economy is right now it’s not the right time to discuss this,” Mayor Kim Aipperspach said. “Our budget hasn’t been finalized just yet. In four to six weeks we should have a good idea.”
Later in the meeting, council members discussed advertising to hire a financial advisor to come in every quarter to check the city’s records for errors. According to Aipperspach, they have been looking into hiring a financial officer for a year and a half. The discussion didn’t sit well with City Clerk Kaylene Melton, who said she put in countless hours over the past five years to get the city caught up when the files were disorganized, moldy, or nonexistent.
“It’s been a lot of work to catch us up,” Melton said.
“The more finance officers you get, the less money there is to go around,” Aipperspach said.
“You’ve created a hostile work environment here,” Melton said.
After discussion, the council decided to not advertise for the position.
“It’s small town Montana,” Aipperspach said. “There’s just not a lot of money to go around.”
