Hi Phil,
Regarding the Bear Creek outflow pipe
I spoke with Erik last Wednesday and was hoping to speak with Jon last Friday, but I missed him. However, Erik seemed confident the old Bear Creek discharge pipe was plugged at the plant because there still is a storm water system that connects and drains through the outflow. There is a natural drainage way the crosses under OR 211, enters our property from the south and drains north along the eastside of the lagoons before flowing through drain tiles into to a buried storm drain, which connects to the Bear Creek outflow they have requested the City to plug.
I will confirm my understanding of Erik’s knowledge is true with Jon Patrick this Friday. It is my recommendation not to address their concerns here. The old discharge station is decommissioned and cannot drain to the Bear Creek outflow even if it was not plugged.
JC
Jennifer Cline, P.E.
City of Molalla
Public Works Director
O: 503.759.0218
F: 503.829.3676
"From: Dan Huff [mailto:dhuff@cityofmolalla.com]
Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2015 11:29 AM
To: Phillip Bender; J.W. Ring; Mark Strandberg; Jennifer Cline; Chad Jacobs
Cc: Sarah Goodling
Subject: RE: Molalla: revised redline of Consent Decree for your review
Phil - I don’t have any specific comments but have a few general comments as follows:
1. In reading through our release and discharge of the Plaintiff will there be any level of restriction with regard to their trespassing, blocking the public way, etc. in the future?
2. The checklist is not a regulatory item that can be compared with anything. Based on our knowledge of the Plaintiffs they will make it an issue. I am more than fine with your language.
3. 29. I would like it to read “determined by the City to be the most cost effective”. I would like the option that we have now to determine our own fate. We will most likely use a consulting engineer but do not want to be locked into that if we are in a situation where we do not need that assistance.
The City does not have any additional archiving/retention requirements beyond State Law.
I think we will find a lot of information regarding City Council perspective tomorrow night. Having Chad there will be helpful in making sure that they move beyond their (in most cases hatred) angst with Susan Hansen, Jeff Lewis and Co., and make a rational decision. So, I think a discussion on Thursday may be in order. They may want more information on the $ risk - that may sway their thoughts.
Dan Huff
City Manager
City of Molalla, Oregon
(503) 829-6855
"_______________________________________________________________________________
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From: Phillip Bender [mailto:PBender@ringbenderlaw.com]
Sent: Wednesday, January 21, 2015 1:02 PM
To: J.W. Ring; Mark Strandberg; Dan Huff; Jennifer Cline; Chad Jacobs (Chad@gov-law.com)
Cc: Phillip Bender; Sarah Goodling
Subject: Molalla: revised redline of Consent Decree for your review
Dan, Jennifer, Chad, Jeff and Mark,
I have attached the revised version of the Consent Decree as we discussed yesterday. Please review closely to confirm that my revised version tracks our discussion yesterday.
I have also attached two pages of engineering drawings of the WWTP. These show connections to the line running to Bear Creek to which the discharge from the chlorine contact basin originally ran. There are two other connections in addition to the now-plugged chlorine contact basin outfall connection showing on these drawings. Those are (1) a 6" PVC Drain (D3034)(see the first drawing) and (2) what appears to be an aeration basin overflow line (see the second drawing). Plaintiffs propose the placement of a plug at the downstream end of the outfall line to which these two lines connect (see para. 14 of the proposed Consent Decree). As we have talked about before, the question is whether these two lines can be effectively plugged or whether they have to remain connected down to Bear Creek via the junction box shown on the drawings. I assume that as part of the initial permitting of the WWTP, these engineering drawings would have been submitted with the permit application and that the permit and subsequent renewals were for this particular layout of the WWTP, including the connections of these two pipes to the Bear Creek outfall. I thus am concerned that the City may not be able to effectively plug these two connections without modifying the NPDES permit and also that plugging the outfall may have unintended negative consequences on the operation and functioning of these two lines. I revised the Consent Decree to address this concern by simply requiring the City to determine if it is even feasible to effectively plug these two lines. My intuition is that it is not.
On the 350 cfs issue, I have attached the permit for ease of reference. The number in the permit is 350 cfs.
With respect to the website posting period, does the City have a document retention policy? State law has retention requirements for certain kinds of municipal records, DMRs and so on, but does the City have its own separate document retention policy? If so, the City should follow it with respect to the website, but I would be surprised if it contained a retention period shorter than Jeff's 120 days. In any event, I reinserted the 120 day retention period as a minimum; of course, if the City wants to leave stuff up longer because it cannot get to managing the postings, that is fine.
On the attorneys' fees negotiation, Dan, please let us know what authority we have to negotiate the amount of the attorneys' fees settlement. As we discussed, Chad can brief the council on our discussion of that issue and our recommendation. We can also provide more detail of our analysis of the City's risks with respect to plaintiffs' fees in writing, if you would like. Or we can wait until Jeff and I can have a discussion with council.
Finally, the Court has approved the parties' request that we extend the deadlines for discovery and other matters. I have attached the Court's order with the new deadlines in case you are interested.
Thanks.
Phil
Phillip M. Bender - Partner
925 Liberty Ave., 8th Floor
Pittsburgh, PA 15222
(412) 770-7721
Ring Bender McKown & Castillo LLLP
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