The Chesterton Utility has finalized the issuance of the first batch of sewer revenue bonds--which could total up to $5.1 million--and now it’s time for staff to hit the drawing boards.

Town Attorney Chuck Lukmann told the Utility Service Board at its meeting Monday night that the projects to be funded with the bonds should be designed and the specs put out for bid as soon as possible.

Included in the first wave of projects will be the long-discussed, long-postponed Downtown sanitary sewer separation and replacement, estimated to cost $672,000, the single most expensive item on the Utility’s to-do list. Town Engineer Mark O’Dell said that this project is currently slated for next April

Other projects or purchases to be funded by the bonds: the repair of the Morningside subdivision sewer supports and bridge and the re-lining of that sewer under the railroad right-of-way; the purchase and installation of new blowers at the wastewater treatment plant to reduce energy use; and the purchase and installation of variable frequency drivers for the influent pumps at the plant.

The first batch of bonds were sold in sub-batches at interest rates of 4.25 percent, 4.35 percent, and 4.5 percent, significantly less than the maximum rate of 7.5 percent authorized by the issuing ordinance approved by the Town Council in June. The bonds will be repaid with revenues from customers’ sanitary sewer rate payments.

In December 2008 the Town Council increased that rate by 14 percent, effective Jan. 1, 2009, on the split recommendation of the Service Board, which requested a single-phase hike in order to put the Utility in the position to issue bonds. Members John Schnadenberg and Jim Raffin preferred to see a two-phase hike, with a 7-percent increase this year and another 7-percent increase in 2010.

That hike raised the average residential customer’s bimonthly sanitary sewer bill from $66 to $77.25.

Currently around $3,080,000 remains outstanding on a sewer revenue bond issued in 2001 for the purpose of financing the expansion of the wastewater treatment plant.

In other business, O’Dell told the Service Board that the upgrade of the Dickinson Road lift station--whose entire cost is being borne by the Lake Erie Land Company--is well under way, with the boring under Ind. 49 now completed. Today the contractor, Woodruff & Sons of Michigan City, was scheduled to begin the installation of an additional force main beneath the eastbound lane of East Porter Ave. from Ind. 49 to South Calumet Road.

The Dickinson Road lift station pumps virtually all wastewater generated east of Ind. 49 on its way to the treatment plant, first west via the East Porter Ave. force main and then north via the huge Eighth Street gravity main.

In conjunction with that project, members voted 4-0 to authorize O’Dell to prepare a scope of project for the replacement of that ductile iron force main between South Calumet Road and Fifth Street. Schnadenberg was not in attendance. Last summer it was discovered that the force main serving the Dickinson Road lift station between South Calumet and Eighth Street had prematurely corroded and the piece of main between Fifth Street and Eighth Street was accordingly replaced with PVC. The rest of the main, though it has been temporarily bypassed, is still in the ground and needs likewise to be replaced with PVC.

Meanwhile, O’Dell said, consultant SEH Inc. continues to work with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on the design of a re-line of the 19-inch gravity main beneath West Porter Ave. U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-1st, has secured an earmark of $300,000 for that project, which the Utility will match with $100,000 of its own. On top of that, the Utility is paying SEH up to $54,600 to shepherd the project through the federal bureaucracy. The re-line should be done in October.

Members voted 4-0 to authorize Lukmann to draft a tie-in agreement with the homeowner at the southwest corner of 100E and 1100N, after it was discovered that his septic tank encroaches by four feet into the right-of-way purchased from the homeowner as part of the South Calumet District project.

The homeowner has been extremely cooperative throughout the process, Lukmann noted, and would have been happy to tie in to the sanitary sewer system had he known at the time that his septic tank was in the purchased right-of-way.

Members also voted 4-0 to authorize a payment of $10,000 to long-term control plan consultant DLZ, which is conducting flow-monitoring under an order by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management as part of the Utility’s development of a long-term control plan to reduce the number of combined sewer overflows caused by rain events.

The flow monitoring, O’Dell reminded the Service Board, is an open-ended commitment. “IDEM says we have to do this monitoring while Porter is doing its own monitoring,” he said.

In July Chesterton used 54.32 percent of its 3,752,000 gallon per day (gpd) allotment at the wastewater treatment plant; Porter, 50.83 percent of its 767,000 gpd allotment; the Indian Boundary Conservancy District, 58.25 percent of its 81,000 gpd allotment; and the plant as a whole, 53.50 percent of its capacity.

There were no bypasses in July, with rain totaling 2.9 inches.

In July the Utility ran a surplus of $177,340 and in the year-to-date is running a deficit of $50,909.

The Service Board spent a few moments at the end of the meeting welcoming newly hired Superintendent James Chris Shank on his first day on the job. “It’s good to have you here,” Member Andy Michel said. “I hope you feel the same way. You’re stepping into a lot but you’ll be getting a lot of help.”

Member Scot McCord urged Shank to feel free to call on the Service Board at any time. “I think we made a pretty good choice,” he said.

With the $5.1-million bond issue in mind, President Larry Brandt wished Shank good luck. “You’re going to need some,” he said. “But you’ve got a good team to work with.”

Shank is a Class III certified operator with eight years of experience in charge of the Whiteland wastewater treatment plant in Johnson County, Ind.

Posted 8/18/2009