Editorial: Ross Valley Sanitary deserves our thanks for addressing infrastructure issues

Ross Valley Sanitary District’s $100 million overhaul might not be apparent to many people.

Of course, local ratepayers saw an increase in their bills and construction crews at work. But that work, overhauling sewage pump stations and underground pipes, doesn’t attract a lot of attention, unless they aren’t working the way they should.

That was the serious quandary facing the district in recent decades, a challenge that led to bitter political upheaval, frequent sewage spills and eventually a state order to clean up its act.

The work has paid off, cutting the number of reported sewage overflows by almost two-thirds and the gallons spilled to a fraction of those experienced in past years.

Besides upgrading its pump stations and replacing old and cracked mains, the district has also worked with homeowners to fix their leaking laterals.

Of course, paying for that work has meant increased rates.

The public investment is paying off. Our environment is the beneficiary.

Hopefully, the state’s San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board will come to that conclusion. It is reviewing a progress report from the district and plans an inspection of the district’s facilities.

In 2012, a district survey estimated that 165 to 170 miles of the district’s 200 miles of sewer pipes were 50 years or older and in need of repair.

The district’s documentation of miles of cracked mains and history of spills led to a state order to overhaul the aging system. The state has monitored the district’s work and progress.

Other Marin agencies are wrestling with the same challenges – old and broken underground mains and leaking laterals.

In the 1980s, centralized sewer plants were built to bring systems up to federal anti-pollution Clean Water Act standards.

But work on local mains and laterals has lagged. In many cases, local agencies have spent millions of dollars to expand the capacity of plants in large part to handle the freshwater that pours into cracked and broken sewer pipes.

Officials determined that it was cheaper and faster to expand capacity than to replace miles of underground pipes.

As Ross Valley has learned, however, those pipes and pumps cannot be ignored. Benign neglect of needed maintenance all too often winds up costing more in the long run.

The lesson learned is this out-of-sight network of pipes and pumps has to be maintained and repaired. There are environmental and pocketbook costs for ignoring broken pipes and overworked pumps.

The district’s road to this point was politically and fiscally arduous, but after several turnovers of its leadership, a board of directors was elected that focused on making steady progress.

Politically, it may not be as celebrated as creating a new park or a new public building. There is an “out of sight, out of mind” attitude toward sewers, but local leaders committed to keeping them in good repair deserve credit.

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