Litigation surrounding a weak force main in the District of Sechelt that has caused sewage to spill out onto the roadway on several occasions has ended in the district's favour.
The District of Sechelt will receive $400,000 from Dayton and Knight, one of the companies involved in the design and installation of the faulty force main.
"There were a number of companies involved in the design and installation of the system and now a settlement has been reached with all parties," said Bill Brown, administrator for the district.
The force main that runs from the Ebbtide sewage treatment plant to the Dusty Road sewage treatment plant incurred a major break and subsequent spill onto Ebbtide Road in 2000. The district has been in negotiations with the companies since the first spill. Since that time, there have been smaller spills reported to the district involving the force main.
Now the District of Sechelt is responsible for the pipe's maintenance and repair, and it is looking into a sewage treatment option that would ease the burden on the pipe, giving it a longer lifespan.
"We're talking about moving the two existing plants together into one location, where the land has been cleared on the way up to the dump," Brown said.
That site is farther down the mountainside than the current Dusty Road plant that sits closer to the dump.
"If we can move the site down, there will be a major reduction in pressure going through that force main," Brown said.
He said there have been problems with the current Dusty Road plant since it was constructed.
"It failed to meet environmental standards for the first four to five years of operation," said Brown.
The plant passed the environmental standard test in 1999 and has met that standard ever since.
Combining the two plants into one site will reduce the operating costs slightly, said Brown, who noted the new plant would be able to handle the district's population expansion, which the current sites are not capable of servicing.
"This is something the district has been working on for over two years now, and this settlement just moved us one step closer to tying up any loose ends," said Brown.
Currently the district is in negotiations with Construction Aggregates Ltd. (that owns the land the district wants to use for the new sewage treatment plant) and the province, discussing ways to share the cost.
"We hope to have things all tied up by the end of this year," Brown added.
