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Utah Department of
Environmental Quality
The 11-member Water Quality Board is waist deep in waste issues.
This decade, rural communities will be faced with having to build expensive sewer plants to meet growing populations. Some financially strapped suburbs could seek on-site septic systems rather than community-wide sewer plants. Millions may be needed to remove pollutants from treated waste waters. Then there are the nagging issues of trying to figure out how much selenium can be discharged into the Great Salt Lake or how mercury is getting into our lakes and streams.
These and other challenging issues now confront the Water Quality Board, a diverse cross-section of citizens who oversee a $24 million per year Wastewater Project Assistance Program while making sure Utah’s waterways remain pristine.
More to the point, the board does three things, said Leland Myers, manager of Central Davis County Sewer District who was appointed to the Board last month. “The Board acts as a mechanism for approving rules relative to water quality, including discharge permits. It acts as an approval process for loans issued under the Utah State Revolving Loan Program, which includes both federal money and state sales tax money (See related story). And, it acts as an appeals board for decisions made by the staff relative to enforcement of regulations.”
To Myers, the biggest challenge will be tackling the so-called Total Maximum Daily Load, or TMDL analysis, for all impaired waters and streams identified throughout the state. That analysis will help determine the amount and effects of any pollutant including “nutrients” that has been identified as causing harmful effects to the flora or fauna of the waterway.
“This could have a huge impact from Santaquin to Tremonton. Residents may be faced with huge sewer bills as most of the wastewater facilities in this area do not have the capability of removing all nutrients being discharged into the rivers, streams or lakes. If, for instance, it is determined that phosphorous is the problem to all the rivers, lakes, or streams along the Wasatch Front, it could cost $500 million to fix the problem,” said Myers. “As a member of the Water Quality Board, I hope we find ways to get sufficient funding to do these TMDL analyses completely and correctly, including the analytical studies necessary to support them.”
Board Chairman Joe Piccolo, the mayor of Price now serving a second four-year term, adds a host of other issues to a long list of challenges. “Rural Utah is faced with growth and it will lean on the Water Quality Board to help pay for the infrastructure. I think that’s equally important.”
Piccolo and Myers won’t have to tackle the problems on their own. They will have the help of an experienced staff and other members of the Board who come from a diverse background: Agriculture, Government, Environment, Wildlife and Recreation and Manufacturing.
Board members are committed to solving the problems as a matter of public service. They don’t get paid for their participation. “It’s in the true spirit of volunteerism,” said Walt Baker, who as director of the Division of Water Quality serves as the Executive Secretary of the Board. “This is public service at its best.”