Cape Cod taxpayers are objecting to the staggering costs of centralized sewers to solve the nitrogen problem in coastal waters. Stearns & Wheler’s new number for Falmouth is $600 million, up from $500 million. The Stearns & Wheler number for Mashpee has been $550 million; maybe that will go up now, too. For just two Cape towns, the costs are over $1 billion before interest and the inevitable cost escalation. With 14 of the 15 Cape towns having to address a nitrogen loading problem, how many billions will centralized sewers cost?

Former State Representative Eric Turkington, who lives in Falmouth, is working with present State Representative Matt Patrick on getting the state Department of Environmental Protection more focused on less expensive alternatives to centralized sewers that are common in other U.S. states and in Canada that will do the nitrogen removal job just as well.

Mass. DEP has cold-shouldered these alternatives. We understand that DEP is now under orders from Secretary Ian Bowles to put these cost effective alternatives on an equal evaluation basis. The Office of the Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs and the Department of Environmental Protection are attempting to fast-track an information session for Cape Cod on nitrogen removing cost effective alternatives for later this month.

The article by Mr. Turkington that appears below makes some financial comparisons to show the magnitude of the cost to Falmouth property owners of a Big Sewer solution. Using the same approach, the comparison for Chatham is far worse: Where Falmouth would be “quadrupling” its outstanding debt with funding for the centralized sewer ($150 million, adding $600 million), Chatham officials are proposing to add to our present debt of $30 million some $210 million or $300 million, depending on what year you stop counting. Those are seven-fold and 10-fold increases.

To the Chatham numbers can be added the $30 million cost to taxpayers for running the centralized system for the 20 years before it’s fully operational at the end of Phase 1.

And one cannot forget the individual property owner’s cost of connecting to the system: For the two-thirds of property owners that will be connected in Phase 1, that’s at least another $28 million.

What Turkington says about the centralized sewer cost crowding out other capital needs and constraining budget growth applies to Chatham as well. Bond payments will run out for 50 years.

It’s no wonder that Cape towns want less expensive alternatives and state officials are finally paying attention.

Falmouth Enterprise, October 28, 2009:

SIX HUNDRED MILLION REASONS TO ASK QUESTIONS

By Eric Turkington

There used to be five hundred million reasons to look carefully, deliberately, and critically at the “Comprehensive Wastewater Management Plan” recently forwarded by the Selectmen to the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).

That was the previous estimate of the number of dollars it would cost to design and construct the townwide sewering project being proposed.

Now that number is six hundred million, according to Wastewater Superintendent Gerald Potamus at Monday night’s Selectmen’s meeting.

And as we all know from experience, these estimates will rise again.

For a town with an annual budget of around $100 million, and a total long term bonded indebtedness of less than $150 million, undertaking a capital expenditure quadrupling that amount of debt is a staggering proposal. It would require an enormous increase in the property tax rate, severely impact Falmouth’s bond rating, and crowd out every other capital need the town has for the next 25 years.

The reasons to do it have been persuasively and persistently laid out by its advocates, and few would quarrel with the goals of restoring our town’s waterways to health. This is a goal we all share.

But the rationale presented for adopting all the elements in this particular plan can and should receive a lot more critical scrutiny than it has up to now. Here are some of the proponents’ representations we should look at, carefully and skeptically.

ADOPT THIS PLAN OR BE SUED: We should ask this question – who would be doing the suing, and on what grounds? In the forty years since the Clean Water Act became law, has any town anywhere been successfully sued because some of its residents’ private septic systems nitrogen adversely affected coastal waterways?

THE DEP MANDATES IT: We should ask this question – Is this the same DEP that approved the location and construction of the town’s Treatment Plant in West Falmouth, the plant whose plume was directly responsible for the worst degradation of any of our town’s harbors? The same DEP that ordered everyone at great expense to install title V septic systems, which they concede do nothing to stop the nitrogen loading that afflicts our estuaries? Their judgments are certainly not beyond challenge.

DO IT NOW, OR LOSE FEDERAL/STATE AID: We should ask this question – what aid? Aside from Stimulus money, which will be long gone before Falmouth is ready, the Federal government has nothing to offer to defray the cost of the conventional sewer construction being proposed. The state offers low interest (2%) loans, and a small amount of no-interest loans, both of which involve competing for limited loan dollars with every other water and sewer project in Massachusetts.

Let’s not kid ourselves – in the end, most of this project will be paid for by us, through property tax increases and through betterments.

THERE ARE NO ALTERNATIVES: Here’s the real Catch-22. There are many alternatives, including many which have been accepted and are in use in many other states and countries, but almost none are accepted by DEP for use in Massachusetts. So any plan that needs DEP approval, including the one prepared for Falmouth by its consultant Stearns and Wheler, has to disregard any of the promising and proven systems used elsewhere, or it won’t be approved by DEP.

The sewer debate isn’t over; in fact, it’s just beginning, as DPW Director Ray Jack and former DPW commissioner Virginia Valiela emphasized at the Selectmen’s meeting. Many people -- experts, advocates, conservationists, scientists --are convinced that Falmouth can clean up its estuaries sooner, and for less money, than the current plan calls for.

We have six hundred million reasons to see if they are right.

(Eric Turkington is the former state Representative for the Barnstable, Dukes and Nantucket district. He is currently a lawyer practicing in Falmouth.)