Her first argument against the sewer is economic. “The sewer system had a $15 million budget for construction. If you divided it by the 200 properties that would be serviced, that’s an investment of $75,000 per property. Annual maintenance was estimated at $500,000, so that’s, another $2,500 per property year. These are enormous sums of money to handle the septic needs of a small community.”
Most of those funds would have been paid by New York City, but Nolan observes, “If you took those same monies and put them into a septic maintenance fund, you could provide centuries of septic management for the same village and still save money. Most conventional septic systems cost $10,000 to $15,000 to construct and last at least 10 years.”
For a larger community, says Nolan, a centralized sewer makes economic sense, but the small number of users does not, in her opinion, justify the expense in this case. In neighboring Boiceville, where a sewer system has been installed for only 126 households, the participation of Onteora Middle/High School and Bennett Elementary School, plus large businesses such as the Boiceville Supermarket and the Maverick Health Center, means the system actually has a large number of users.
Nolan also cited health issues that traditional sewer systems do not address. “They only remove bacteria and a small amount of viruses,” she observed. “They do not remove pharmaceuticals, hormones, and heavy metals. The system the engineers proposed as a revision for Phoenicia would have been a membrane system, which would do better on some of those considerations but probably not as well as the best modern septic systems.”
Septic technologies developed over the past decade break down pharmaceuticals and other toxic compounds instead of discharging them into waterways for consumption in drinking water.
“Even the old-style septic systems probably remove most of those substances because they release effluent into the ground, and microbes on the roots of plants metabolize those components before they reach water sources,” stated Nolan. “There are types of sewer plants that will aid in that kind of processing, like reed bed systems and sand filtration, but the engineer hired for the Phoenicia district said those don’t provide the tertiary treatment that DEP requires — a high-level treatment to virtually guarantee removal of bacteria and some viruses.”
Concerns about drugs being found in breast milk and human tissues have led to the establishment around the country of pharmaceutical collection programs to try to keep people from flushing outdated medications down the toilet, once recommended as a disposal method. But even people taking medications are contributing to the dispersal of drug components, said Nolan. “Most drugs are processed by the kidney or liver and end up in urine or stool. If you have a centralized sewer system, all that is getting sent into the waterway the sewer empties into.”
Nolan is vice president of the Ashokan-Pepacton Watershed Chapter of Trout Unlimited, which arranged a presentation by a representative of Decentralized Solutions, an advocacy group that provides information on septic alternatives. According to the speaker, she said, “Septic systems with peat or algae mechanisms are no more expensive than conventional systems but are better able to remove additional compounds. And they take up a small amount of space, so a residence or business can have a system that’s even better than a conventional one.”
As a result of her research, Nolan has concluded, “How we handle our waste is more important than almost anybody thinks.”
Sweet Sue’s septic problem was remedied before the town board was to vote to hold a public hearing to form a sewer district.Stanley was a no show at that crucial meeting. He was also the one who brought in the CWC to explore every possible sewer configuration on the promise to hold a referendum. He did not honor his agreement with the City or the CWC and now cries that they won’t be putting in individual septic systems and now is asking the CWT to back him so he can sue the City. All questions of cost would have been answered in the bidding process at which time the district would have been able to refuse if the costs were higher than the grant offered by the City. Phoenicia is full of houses and Main Street businesses that have failing systems. The State can condemn these properties and close the Elementary school which also has been cited. Phoenicia has no prospect of growing or becoming a bustling little town. This article by Ms. Snow is skewed, much like her reporting of the Hanover/Higley farm stand debacle. Could we get the whole story? Why not bring in Mr. Smart again, to report the truth from both sides instead of writing about Ms. Nolan’s fantasy solution and Stanley’s pathetic excuses?