By Patrick Tepoorten

Rush Cityís sewer capacity, or lack of it, took center stage at the city council meeting on Monday Nov. 21, as the council directed city engineering firm SEH to create a comprehensive sanitary sewer plan to address the cityís rapidly diminishing sewer capacity.
ìWeíre pretty close to capacity,î said City Administrator Daniel Hoffman, who added that, when all of the already approved developments within the city are complete, the city will have reached that capacity.

That fact is driving what is, in essence, an involuntary moratorium on development within the city, as it is unable to consider any future development until they are able to address the situation.

The cityís inability to accommodate more growth at the present time hit home for Janet Sundermeyer, who spoke to the council on behalf of the Truls Larson family, which is currently a party to a purchase agreement with a developer for their acreage within the city.

Sundermeyer noted that her family had spent significant amounts of money in assessments towards sewer, water, and blacktopping projects and has been trying to sell the property in order to pay those assessments. With the cityís sewer capacity at its end, and no time-frame for improvements, her family is in a bind. ìWe donít want to lose the deal,î she said, adding, ìWe need an answer as soon as possible.î

Hoffman informed Sundermeyer that the board had earlier approved the creation of a sewer plan through SEH, but that it could be years before any plan came to fruition. ìIt has to go through the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency,î he explained. ìUltimately we discharge into the St. Croix River and that gets a lot of attention. The Minnesota Citizens for Environmental Advocacy has several attorneyís working full time,î he added and explained that the group can keep any plan to increase discharge into the St. Croix river in court for years.

Hoffman also explained that the city was trying to avoid going to a mechanical treatment plant, as they are very expensive to run, and added, ìWeíre hoping we can come up with some kind of hybrid.î

Sundermeyer responded that, in the meantime, her family has $35,000 in assessments, including roughly $1,400 in annual interest on those assessments, and they have no vehicle for paying them, because they canít sell the property.

ìThe city wonít stop you from selling to a developer,î responded City Attorney Joe Anderson, can they get permits (to build) is the question.î

Mayor Mike Skalsky assured Sundermeyer that the creation of a comprehensive sewer plan should ìget done pretty soon,î and hoped to be able to address the situation again in a couple of months. He also suggested that, at that time, the city may have a more concrete understanding of the hurdles it faces and a possible time-line for sewer treatment capacity improvements.

In other council news, Rush City School District Activities Director Bob Schlagel reported to the board that the Aquatic Center had received 17,000 visitors the previous year. He also drew the councilís attention to the substantially smaller financial loss the center suffered this year, which, at $2,172.43. In large part, that is due to a $16,000 donation from the Diers family in Rush City, but admissions also increased by over $10,000, and concessions also increased by almost $4,000. As well, the center gleaned $13,776.30 in interest from its trust fund, an increase of almost $4,000.

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