Scarborough Sanitary District reviews force main repair, approves retail project

[2:01] Nick (Chair): All right, we'll call this regular monthly meeting to order for the Scarborough Sanitary District. We'll call the roll. We'll start with Leroy. Here. Jason. Here. Ben. Here. Tony. Here. Mike. Here. I'm Nick. I'm here, too. Ruth has an excused absence. All right, the next one on the agenda is approval of the minutes from the August meeting. Motion to approve. Second. Second. Thank you, Jason. Thank you, Leroy. Any corrections? All in favor? None opposed? All right, next one up is you, Dave, superintendent's [2:46] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): report. All right, a copy of the monthly report of operations for the month of August is included in the packet. Our average effluent flow for the month was 1.32 million gallons per day. Our effluent quality was well within our permitted limits. We averaged 95% BOD removal and 97% TSS removal for concentrations of 15 and 8 milligrams per liter, respectfully. Copy of the pump station flows report is also included in your packet. No issues were noted. Attached is our 2026 second quarter summary report for the Green Mile solar farm that we are a partner to. During the second quarter, we saved $12,735, that's some hours there, and since inception of October of 23, we have saved a total of $240,769. dollars. May, Riley, Rudy, John, and I attended the Maine Wastewater Control Association Conference up in Sunday River this past week. Nick was also in attendance. It's actually one of the best conferences I've been to ever since starting to go to them. We received our first proposal for purchasing the secondary clarifier equipment. The first proposal came in at approximately $800,000. We are waiting on two more proposals. We have budgeted $600,000 for this equipment so we'll see how it all works out. The pilot study continues to provide some good data helping us troubleshoot for the operations of the plant and try different process changes. I think one thing that we've noticed the loads coming into the plant are graded and anticipated in character that requires a high dissolved oxygen concentration. We'll probably start once we shut down the pilot we'll actually start doing some tracing up through the collection system see if we can identify the source. We are currently running the pilot to simulate utilizing three aeration trains versus the two that we currently have online. And then the next test is we're going to change it to an MLE process. We have closed on the purchase of 24th Champion Street. I'll be going out to bid for demolition of the existing building shortly. Staff have cleaned that the sludge blend holding tank and replaced all the diffusers. We And that is all we have. [5:41] Nick (Chair): Any questions for the superintendent? [5:45] Tony: Go ahead, Tony. David, the drilling that was on the property at A&B, basically there's no salvage at all? [5:53] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): We can't. We've looked at reusing it, and we can't. There's no use for it for our purposes. [6:00] Nick (Chair): Yep. Any other questions for Dave? All right. On to correspondence. [6:08] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): Okay. On August 27th, a resident reported spotting an SSO in Eastern Trail. As you recall, that was the day of our last meeting. By the footbridge near Pine Point Road, I immediately responded and called Risbella Construction and Galen Nickinson from DEP, who both met me on site dig safe was called equipment mobilized and haul trucks were all ordered and arranged and the eastern trail was closed in the area of the break once exposed the cause of the break was turned to be caused by some trap rock a sharp piece of rock that was directly underneath the force main and punched a hole in the force main we were able to make the repair with a stainless steel wrap, and we had completed that at approximately 7 p.m. that night. Getting it all done in the daylight was fantastic, and the fact that it was low tide during all the work was much to our advantage. I did include a copy of the incident report in the packet along with a couple photos of the actual construction and the final product. there's interesting there were some Facebook posts about the site about the break as it was happening and the next day I in some cases I kind of bit my tongue and didn't respond because you know they made some comments on the post that it was negligence on our part which I think we should focus on the fact that we immediately responded and got, you know, no hesitation on getting it fixed as quickly as we did. My staff and Rizvera and all the haul trucks that coordinated, worked with us to get this work done, did a great job and got it repaid quickly. So that's that report. [8:12] Nick (Chair): Any questions on the incident report? I have a question. Sure. Is this the second time or third time that Horseman is broken? [8:26] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): I think it is the third time. The first time being when they had the washout of the trail and the whole trail just gave way. This is predated and made by a number of years. [8:43] Nick (Chair): 1995, yep. Yeah. And then in 2022? [8:49] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): There was a breakdown by the golf course. [Nick (Chair): Just curious.] I mean, the pipe that was exposed actually was in, other than the hole that was punched into it, appeared to be in fantastic shape. It's a thin-walled fiberglass pipe there. It's called perma-strand. It's not commonly used, but it showed no degradation due to, you know, any corrosion or anything like that. It looked like the day it went in, so. Okay. Yep. Scarborough Public Schools requested the ability to serve letters for proposed additions to the Eight Corners School, Blue Point School, Wentworth Primary School, and the Middle School. Those letters were provided. All but the Middle School are within their wastewater allocation. The school department is looking into why the Middle School is using twice as much water as the other schools. Depending on the findings will dictate the amount of capacity reserve fee due do. I have since spoken to Todd Jepson at the school department and I'm going to be meeting them out at the Middle School. I believe it's October 7th. I think their thought right now is that the water cooling tower is leaking and causing the increased use in water. So they wanted to put a sub-meter on that and see if that may be the cause of the issues. But that facility certainly is using a significant amount of water. [10:37] Nick (Chair): So it would be good to figure that out. [10:39] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): And my thought on this, although the letters said otherwise, if the facilities come in below they're required, and below their already allocated wastewater allocations, I don't see a need for them to come back to the board unless the board feels otherwise. In the final correspondence on September 9th, we did experience an exceedance of our bacterial limit. We assume the cause was due to some nitrite interference with the disinfection process, which is not an unusual event during the summer times. A lot of a lot of facilities that start nitrifying have similar issues. So once we identified we responded to it many [11:38] Nick (Chair): other questions for the superintendent [11:40] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): Correspondence. All right, old business. The odor complaint an Old County Way. The odor control system has been returned to service and they've been adjusting it as needed. So they've been working on tuning it up so to speak to make sure it meets the needs down there. [12:06] Nick (Chair): New business? [12:08] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): 72 Market Street, the Downs Town Center Lot 2 Retail D on behalf of M&R Development and MRW Town Center Development LLC, LJB Engineering requested the approval of the proposed 4,000-square-foot retail space, the consisting of a 2,000-square-foot retail space and 2,000-square-foot of the bank. The requested wastewater flow is 250 gallons per day. I recommend approval of all conditions. The wastewater flow allocation is 250 gallons per day of typical sanitary waste. The project is fully subject to the capacity reserve fee. The current capacity reserve fee is $20.86 per gallon and is adjusted monthly based on the NR. Based on the current rate and total capacity reserve fee due The due for this project is $5,215. Any flows more than this approval are subject to additional approvals in the capacity reserve fees. And a complete zero connection and oil water separated permits and their associated fees shall be submitted to the district. No site work shall be completed prior to receiving executed permits. [13:27] Greg Musil: Chair Greg Musil: "Motion to approve based on the caveat set forth by the Superintendent." [13:30] Nick (Chair): Thank you, Jason. Thank you, Leroy. Any questions about the project? Barring none, all in favor? Budget summary. [13:47] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): The eight-month budget summary is included in your packet, and I recommend approval. Motion to approve. Thank you, Jason. [13:56] Nick (Chair): Second. Thank you, Leroy. Any questions about the budget summary? All in favor? None opposed. We have some public available. Any public comments? All right. Make sure the mic is on. I'll keep it to three minutes. No worries. Just explain who you are and what you're talking about. [14:26] Matt Garrett: I'm Matt Garrett for Marsh Rock Circle. I'm a candidate for one of the seats coming up, and I just wanted to thank the board and the staff for the excellent job that they're doing, especially Dave Hughes for taking the time today showing me around the plant. It was very, informative, a lot going on down there, and I think you guys do a great job. Anyone else? Richard? [14:53] Nick (Chair): All right. Cool. Trustee comments? We'll start with Ben. [15:00] Greg Musil: I appreciate the Green Mile solar report. That's a great savings for the district, and also just appreciate all the great work going on at the district and cleaning that equipment must have been fun I appreciate the staff that did that and yeah that's about it [15:23] Tony: Cool Tony, yes, great job on the force main Dave, getting it back online, that tank cleaning and the fuses, adding the fuses, and it had to be a trip because it can be kind of a challenge getting down there for air quality and stuff like that, right? Yep. And the other thing was, there's one other thing I was gonna ask you about. I forget. Everything's good. You know my number. I know you, I know you, I got your number. Mike. [16:00] Greg Musil: Yes, to echo what Tony was talking about, commendable job to the district today, [16:05] Jason: the staff on the forced main repair, including all the participants, [16:13] Greg Musil: Risvera, the folks doing the hauling. And thank you for all your hard work. [16:22] Jason: Cool. Jason. Ditto the comments on the forced main repair. [16:27] Matt Garrett: It's great to see our partners come together quickly, execute a plan, and make it happen so fast. And along with the district staff as well, so thanks for everybody involved with that. [16:39] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): That's it. Can I say something? I actually want to compliment DEP because our inspector actually met me out there and in my 15 years of working with the district in this type of situation is the first time ever that I've had a DEP inspector show up and it was very informative for him to see the logistics involved and in responding to an event like this and how long it takes to mobilize equipment and get the dig safe cleared up such that we actually can start the excavation so I think it was actually a very good process for him to observe and see. Cool. Sorry about that. [17:29] Nick (Chair): No worries. No worries. I think it's your turn, Lee-Laurie. [17:34] Jason: Yeah, great job getting that taken care of so quickly. I mean, your staff responded very quickly, and you were on your way to the meeting here, I believe, at the time you probably got the call. So you guys did a great job. You borrowed my flashlight. I did. You guys did a great job with that, and thank you for working with the schools and helping them as well. Well, as everybody probably knows, I was an integral part in getting that passed through, so I'm glad that we're able to help them out on their quest to get all that taken care of. It's going to be a massive undertaking with everything that's going on with all the schools, and I can't imagine cleaning that up. It must have been quite the chore for the staff cleaning that area up, so thank you. You do a great job, as always. [18:15] Nick (Chair): Cool. I'm going to echo my fellow trustee comments. Thank you to Rosmaro Brothers, the crew, Dave,, the septic haulers, Galen, all that responded to the emergency. And I also want to say I had a blast in Miuya, the Sunday River Conference that we just attended last week. Riley was there. Rudy was there. John was there. I enjoyed visiting with them. Dave, eh, not so much. I will say this. DAVE DID WIN THE ROGER GAGNEY AWARD SO HE IS NOW AN AWARD-WINNING SUPERINTENDENT SO YOU DID I DON'T THINK HE MADE IT TO THE AWARD CEREMONY THAT 'S A STORY FOR ANOTHER DAY WITH THAT I THINK I WILL INVITE THE LAST MOTION OF THE EVENING MOTION TO ADJOURN SO WAIT A MINUTE HAVE ONE ANOTHER I [19:17] Tony: I remember what I was going to say, Dave. One of the, odor control, that could be a very significant impact to a lot of people. And how you deal with that can really have a huge impact around the town or wherever the location is. So, kudos to you for getting it right back online. And that, to me, is a lot of work. [19:39] Dave Hughes (Superintendent): And, you know, it's tough on the neighborhood. It is. I get it. So, you know, I can appreciate their pain, so. Yeah. [19:50] Nick (Chair): No worries. You moved. Second. And then Tony seconded. All right. All in favor? None opposed. We're done.