Here’s Pagosa Springs Mayor Shari Pierce, speaking on the second day of the Town Council’s annual retreat, on July 14:
“About staffing. Making sure we retain the staff we have, and fill out the positions that are open… It’s hard…
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“And I don’t know what that looks like… to keep [our sanitation staff] these days. They are doing a heck of a job… but…”
Council member Mat deGraaf, who’s day job is with the Pagosa Springs Area Water and Sanitation District (PAWSD):
“Yes, sadly, what we’ve discovered is that it’s the housing thing. That’s the deal breaker. We get candidates inquiring, but when they start looking at relocating themselves or their family, they respectfully decline.”
Mayor Pierce:
“But yesterday, [Town Manager Andrea Phillips] was talking about Town employees leaving to work for the Springs Resort. So they are not necessarily leaving the community. They’re just leaving the Town [government]…”
Mr. deGraaf:
“Well, wastewater is just one of those things where… you know…”
I have to agree, Wastewater is just one of those things where… you know… A dirty job, but somebody has to do it.
Except that very few people want to do it.
That’s one of the challenges facing the Town government. Another challenge is a sewer pumping system, completed back in 2016, that decommissioned the existing sewer lagoons and started pushing downtown sewage seven miles uphill through a pipeline that — due to failing pumps — nearly stopped functioning last spring, threatening to spill all our downtown wastewater into the San Juan River.
One might be tempted to suggest that the system is functioning, right now, on band aids and staff overtime. But that’s not entirely true. Nearly a million dollars in repairs and replacements have the system working — apparently — the way it was originally designed by the engineers from Kansas-City-based Bartlett & West. The pumping system itself is merely one of the challenges, however. We also have downtown service lines to worry about.
Here’s Town Manager Andrea Phillips (who resigned effective August 4) speaking at the retreat, responding to a question about the maintenance of the downtown’s network of old sewer pipes:
“We have a phased replacement plan that we wrote back in 2020, and that refers to $6.5 million dollars worth of lining, repairs, and full replacements.
“So, that’s the plan. Now, whether we have the money money to follow it…?”
Leonard Martinez is, in my opinion, a refreshingly thoughtful new voice on the Council:
“Last night, the thing that was really dominant for me, given our discussions, is ‘What is the greatest threat to us?’ And what would be the greatest threat to us, in thinking strategically? And this [wastewater challenge] was it.
“So this didn’t strike me as the ‘number one priority’ in a strategic plan. It felt, instead, like the number one reason that we couldn’t do strategy.
“I think the idea of combining of water and wastewater — whatever that takes — we have to find a way to find a way for this business model to work, for some organization. Somebody who’s going to work with us, whoever that is. And that seems to me to be the model that’s the one that will work. If they can find a way to make some money — water — then we find ways to make wastewater part of that formula…
“Maybe those are the people who — if we prioritize all the staff that we have, and maybe help the ones who need the help the most, with housing or additional pay…”
Maybe this ‘organization’ could — once it’s consolidated — find a way to keep or replace staff?
Might that ‘organization’ be the Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District… the organization that has been making overtures to the Town Council for the past couple of years… suggesting a similar cooperative effort to address some huge community issues?
I’m thinking, this morning, about the absolutely essential things people need, to survive in a rural town in the middle of a scenic ‘nowhere’.
1. We need water.
2. We need a place for our water to go when we flush it.
3. We need food.
4. We need shelter.
5. We need energy for heat, and to run our machines.
6. We need enough money to pay for these things.
(Some Daily Post readers might argue that we also need ‘love’, but that’s beyond the scope of this editorial series.)
Back in the 1990s, homes were reasonably priced in Pagosa Springs. Energy was reasonably priced. Food was more expensive than in some other towns, but not terribly so.
Money was in short supply, compared to certain other places in Colorado. But not terribly so.
Water and sanitation services were reasonably priced.
Downtown Pagosa’s “drinking water” business got separated from its “wastewater” business in 1992, when PAWSD acquired the downtown (and Highway 84) drinking water system from the Archuleta Water Company.
But the Town government retained control of its sewer system.
That created a challenge for the town. In a business like wastewater treatment, scale matters. It’s generally a lot cheaper to run a large system and treatment plant (like the PAWSD plant, uptown near the Vista mobile home park) serving 10,000 homes and businesses… than to run a small system (like the Town’s now-decommissioned sewer lagoons) serving only about 1,000 homes and businesses.
But in 1992, the Town wanted to maintain control of its own (then-relatively-inexpensive) wastewater system.
The reason? Apparently, the Town felt it would have more control over where new development took place, if they were in control of treating the wastewater for any of the surrounding ranch properties that might be subdivided in the future.
The Town had given up the ‘control’ that comes with permitting drinking water, to PAWSD. Without control of wastewater, the Town bureaucracy would have less ‘bargaining power’ over developers.
At least, that was the theory. And it’s still the theory, as was mentioned by Town Manager Andrea Phillips at the July retreat.
But the near-failure of the Town’s uphill pumping system has apparently caused some of the Town Council and Town staff to reconsider… whether that control is really worth the price town residents and businesses will have to pay to maintain it…