Regional sewer plans in Ascension appear headed for another set back – The Advocate

GONZALES More than a year after the outgoing Ascension Parish Council decided to explore a public-private partnership to build a $500 million regional sewer system, the plan appears all but dead.

The parish agreed in November 2015 to try to work out a deal with Ascension Environmental, SCS Management, GSA and others to move the sewer project forward after years of false starts.

Last week, though, a key council committee recommended killing the effort to create a municipal-style sewer system through a public-private partnership, as has Parish President Kenny Matassa. Once a final council vote happens on the partnership Feb. 23, the parish faces starting all over again on sewer plans, officials say.

The parish has grappled for years with how to finance the sewer program without new taxes or high user fees, even as regulatory pressure has intensified to improve water quality in area bayous. Some parish officials have argued a public-private partnership was the solution.

Under such a partnership, the parish would get expertise and access to hundreds of millions in capital to build out a system that will discharge in the Mississippi River. The trade-off is paying a premium to the partners and granting them a long-term concession to recoup their investment.

Some estimates of the current partnership plan suggested the overall cost of the 30-year deal approached $2 billion.

In calling for an end to the deal, Matassa cited the same concerns Tuesday that the Council Utilities Committee noted late last month before members, at Councilman Daniel "Doc" Satterlee's urging, agreed to a last-ditch meeting the save the proposal.

The parish president noted the structure of the proposal from the public-private partnership, known as a "P3," had changed.

Meanwhile, a critical $60 million low-interest loan the parish got from the state Department of Environmental Quality a few years ago is in jeopardy after delays in the sewer work.

Finally, Matassa said, the parish may have other options it could pursue and preserve the loan, but those can't be considered with the current proposal in play.

"Therefore, the administration recommends abandoning the current P3 proposal and moving to consider other options," Matassa said.

Matassa got little argument, even though the planned last-chance meeting with the partnership Satterlee suggested never even occurred.

Satterlee asked David Einsel, senior project manager with GSA, a P3 partner, what happened.

Einsel responded that GSA was comfortable with the recommendation to end the deal based on the "changes in the structure of our overall team."

Satterlee said he thought both parties could have done more to try to make the private-partnership deal work.

"I firmly believe there were problems on both sides," he said.

One big change in the plan was the loss of Ascension Wastewater Treatment, a private sewer provider with thousands of customers. However, that company may turn out to be an option for the future if, as expected, the P3 deal is killed later this month.

According to letters last fall between Tim Hardy, the parish's legal adviser, and SCS Management, Ascension Wastewater wants to make the parish an offer directly.

Council Chairman Bill Dawson said some officials may be interested, but said the parish needs to take a broader view, given tougher water quality standards on Bayou Manchac.

"I would say we just want to look at all the other options," Dawson said.

One idea is revisiting some version of an older, more localized plan in the Prairieville area along La. 42, La. 73 and Airline Highway, where the parish is already installing sewer infrastructure as part of state highway expansions.

Dawson said the parish needs to bring a plan soon to DEQ to secure the loan, and the Prairieville-based proposal could include less detailed options for sewer for the rest of east Ascension.

An analysis two years ago of the Prairieville plan showed it would generate only 2,041 customers and leave the system in annual, multimillion dollar shortfalls and with a $60 million loan to repay. That study helped build the case for the current public-private partnership.

Ascension's long-elusive goal of regional sewage treatment has foundered before on failed partnerships most recently in the spring of 2011, when Ascension Wastewater also pulled out of that deal. But the pressure to act in some way on sewer may be starting to ratchet up.

In addition to an approaching expiration date on the DEQ loan, tighter water quality rules on Bayou Manchac are constraining, though not eliminating, subdivision developers' options on sewer service, regulators say.

Manchac, which, for years, has ended up as the receiving bayou for treated effluent from much of fast-growing Prairieville, has been deemed to be maxed out for certain kinds of new pollution from treated sewage.

Since 2010, this finding has resulted in tighter requirements on what sewer systems can discharge. The limits have gradually been rolling into effect as five-year DEQ sewer permits are renewed, DEQ officials said.

Kimberly Corts, permit and biomonitoring supervisor at DEQ, said brand new plants must avoid discharging into Manchac through detention ponds or land application of effluent.

If they do discharge into the bayou, they must meet a much tougher, more expensive treatment standard and, at the same time, take in older plants that now treat to a lesser standard so no additional pollution ends up in the waterway, she explained.

Some parish officials see these rules as growing leverage in any potential negotiations with Ascension Wastewater.

Thomas Pertuit, owner of the company, declined on Friday to discuss what he wants to offer the parish but insisted the water quality rules won't prevent his company from continuing to provide sewer for new homes and businesses in Ascension.

"There are ways for us to deal with that," Pertuit said.

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Regional sewer plans in Ascension appear headed for another set back - The Advocate